[DL] Injun's, Injun's everywhere ......

["Roy Spence" <roy.ster@virgin.net>]

A big howdy from Scotland,

This is my first posting to Deadlands and am new to the Listserve business,
so bear with me if I make mistakes.  I have been running Deadlands for 8-9
months now and have only managed to kill off 3 PC's so far, almost got
another a couple of nights ago, but near misses don't count ....
unfortunately.  I've
got a few thoughts and questions and I'll post them as I get the time.  By
the way this ends up being longish.

I have been running a campaign in which after completing the first part,
leads to a reoccurring theme.

The PC's start off in Tumbleweed a town plagued by the usual Rancher/Miner
tensions and which has recently started having Injun troubles.  After 5
months of gaming time and many distractions, side plots, background plots
the characters eventually saved the town from a massive Indian raid (it took
us two three or four hour sessions to complete it!).  In saving the town two
of the PC's discover information that leads them to realise that the tribe
of Indians who attacked the town, were stirred up by a mysterious Indian
with a burnt/scarred face.  They have realised this Indian is up to no good
and so have set off west after him.  Unfortunately the 2 PC's have kept this
information from the other 3 posse members.  So now half the posse knows
that there is something big on the go and the others are clueless.  When
they are trying to decide where to go next, the 2 which are clued up try to
get them to go west and the others refuse because they know the two are
keeping something from them and won't co-operate (Anyone else had a plan
that they thought was pretty cunning torn to shreds by the PC's - all the
time I hear you cry.)

Anyway here's a greatly abbreviated version of the great plot behind what's
going on.

<SPOILER: For anyone out there who is part of the Airdrie Posse don't read
this ..... and Davie that means you!>


The scarred Indian is of course one of the Last Sons -  Ravens band.  He is
currently travelling west seeking some power/artefact (I've still to run the
Devils tower boxed set so I'm considering using the Heart O'Darkness as his
lure [yep, I'm waaaaay behind the official game setting]).  Anyway as he is
drawn west his black heart cannot resist causing trouble and so he stirs up
trouble as he goes.  Whenever he comes across a group of Indians living
close to the white man or who have some reason to hate the white man, he
incites them to attack (but only once he has left the region).  Anyway the
PC's stop the Indians near Tumbleweed and head west.  I am currently running
the second adventure that involves the posse trying to track down a preacher
in the maze, however as they travel they hear more reports of brutal Indian
attacks.  Once they have found the preacher and tied up some loose PC
subplots, I will draw them in to the three part Devils Tower set.  My main
problem is I have hit a bit of a block on interesting ways of incorporating
the Lost One into these adventure's without him just becoming another party
wanting the Heart for themselves.  The PC's know nothing about Raven or
really the Reckoning and so I though it could be a great shock for them to
discover the power of the Heart, who Raven is and what he could accomplish
with the Heart.  Does anyone have any thoughts, tweaks I could use?

Also in the Indian sourcebook (forgotten what it's called at the minute) it
gives you statistics for the Last Son and states that it should take about a
dozen men to take him down.  My problem is that, my posse contains a
hexslinger and a gunslinger who are both very good at what they do and have
no problems shooting for the head with every shot using a pistol in both
hands (One of them tends to get five actions every round, that's 10, 5D6,
bullets to the head - ouch [we still use the old rules or the damage would
be worse - four shots an action with a double action pistol!) .  Add to this
fact that another character has a pistol which is pretty hot (a relic) plus
the another can fire a rifle, hitting a NPC's head almost all of the time
the damage could become horrendous (also last but not least is the Huckster,
who is actually pretty balanced in what he can do).  Simply saying that
someone is immune to bullets is a bit of a cop out (and I've used it a few
times before now), I've also used armour (or armor, depending on what side
of the water you are on), but I was wondering if anyone else has encountered
this problem and how they dealt with it.  I thought that it might also be a
problem when the characters encounter Stone.

Cheers

Roy