Re: [DL] Our first foray into DL Original Recipe

["Ben Rasmussen" <thegremlin@cox.net>]

----- Original Message -----
From: "Jefferson Dunlap" <mAdHaTtEr@paizopublishing.com>
To: <deadlands@gamerz.net>
Sent: Tuesday, September 24, 2002 11:25 AM
Subject: Re: [DL] Our first foray into DL Original Recipe


> Very cool to hear that your group is giving DL classic a go. My advise:
>
> 1) Use miniatures & a battlemat if you can.
>
> 2) Keep it fast & don't let the players take too long deciding what to do
> when their card comes up.
>
> 3) Use the "mook" system detailed in the Marshal's guide. In fact, all the
> suggestions give there to help speed up combat works really well.
>
> Good luck & have fun!
>

I'd agree with #1. Only get nitpicky on distances or ranges if you have a
battlemat, however. I use a white board and after 2 fights, I've moved on to
simply eyeballing. Helped immensly.

#2 can't be stated enough, don't dwell. Or count in sets of three and figure
it out in order. I go Start at Ace and wait 5 seconds, this lets Aces and
People with jokers hop in if they want to. Then I'm on to King, Queen, Jack
and a 5 second pause. Repeat like so.

Also designate a player to be the dealer for the players. And get two decks
for player use that have different backs. That way if the black joker pops
up you have another ready to go and don't have to worry about all those held
actions out there.

For #3 I use the 5 wounds per mook rule. There have been 2 and I can't keep
straight which is the current official 'good' rule. I find the 30 hits per
mook is too much book keeping. Much easier to either put chips on the table
or just simply tick mark a piece of scratch paper.

I also ignore the stun rules 50% of the time. Partly due to speed and partly
due to leathality to PC's. When I do use stun rules, we've been rolling
Vigor vrs Wind lost. Failure is loss of 1 round.

Divide up the hit location chart for limbs into odd & even and dump the D6
for which limb is hit. Thus a 1,3 hit the right leg and a 2,4 hit the left.
It's one less die roll.

Called shots are quicker to figure then random hits. You can stop rolling
for the to-hit once you hit the TN as raises don't matter and you don't need
to roll for location. A simple called shot to the guts can be very effective
and speedy.

Color code your dice. I only have black and white dice, but even this is a
time saver. Get all dice of the same type in the same color and make each
type a different color. Thus all d8's are red, d10's green. It's quicker to
go for a group of colors then it is to hunt for that missing d8.



--
Ben Rasmussen

"Going to war over religion is like arguing over who has the better
imaginary friend." Richard Jeni