Deadlands General: Freshly Harrowed Edition

Deadlands was one of my favorite systems. Only one campaign each in weird and wasted west. First character in wasted west was a Doubting Thomas who didn't find out until he died the first time that he was a harrowed android. He slowly evolved from annoying redneck to terminator.
My character from weird west was the only religious character I ever enjoyed playing. He was basically friar tuck in a potato sack and rope belt. He was obese and carried around a sack of food to share and eat constantly. Being obese, with big spirit(or whatever it is called) let him use martyrdom to tank for his fellow sinners

Surely you've got some kind of proof you worked for a professional game company or something, right?

Yeah, I enjoy the settings a lot myself.

Had this idea for a campaign tell me what you think. All heroes are Harrowed but don't know it yet, literally wake up in their graves and dig their way out. They don't know they're harrowed and slowly start to piece together their backstories. Probably around level 5 they gain the harrowed specific abilities. I just can't think of what could've raised them and what would make them care.

Just gunna dump a few Weird west pics

I once rode my trusty steed, Bank-Note, to a cave. Inside was a giant spider, like freakishly huge. We killed it's babies, then it appeared, it bit poor Bank-Note's head and upper body clean off.

I'll never forget you Bank-Note, nor will Receipt ever be able to replace you.

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>related?

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Thanks man. I'll assume thats standard between the SW and the classic versions, since the SW seem to just be classic under a new, faster rules set. I don't think prices changed much.

Also, anyone have any pics that might work for a spanish prostitute/madame/huckster? Could use a better pic for an NPC of mine.

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That looks way too modern. Thanks for the pic though.

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Thinking of having my players in Hell on Earth play through the Worm's Turn. I'm thinking of having them be outriders for a (or possibly The) Convoy. Would I be too generous if I gave them a vehicle like pic related?

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Question for the Deadlands vets out there:
What is a good antagonist for a southwest campaign?

I've been thinking of fluffing up a mad scientist type to be the bad guy but after two of my players went in that direction I've been having doubts.

Is there an appropriate antagonistic force in the southwest that might work instead?

The southwest is probably well suited for the classic "western" themes, it doesn't have a lot of unique elements like the Maze or Disputed territories. Maybe a megalomaniac cattle baron looking to muscle out his competition, bandits starving a poor farming village of its water, ruffians in black hats riding around shooting up the place.

Horses don't harrow... right?

Right??

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Hey, new thread, how exciting!

So remember how I was bitching last thread that I never get to run Deadlands? Well gather around user and let uncle Willie spin you a tale.

Been running an OSR off and on the past few months with some friends that think I'm God's gift to gamers (Dunno how I fooled 'em into this, but I'm never one to look gift players in the mouth) but this week the half ogre had to bail for family stuff. He's sort of a lynchpin for the party so I was reluctant to proceed with that game and so proposed alternatives.

Chance had my hapless choose Deadlands and once I explained parts of the setting, they bought in hard. (One player "you had me at GambleWizards")

The party composition ended up as follows

Moira - Lutheran priestess. Peaceable, but not afraid to call upon the Almighty for protection.

Doc - A chemist of the New Science, looking to make money selling his "blasting juice" to mining companies and "anxiety tincture" to people as defensive supplies.

Zhong "Bad Luck John" Wu - A monk of the Drunken Fist who was sworn to poverty and fighting the evils of the West.

Since I didn't have anything really prepped, I decided to take them through the Flood campaign. Good a start as any for a bunch of saddletramps on their first ride out.

Bound together by mutual bonds of not wanting to be stuck in the desert on stalled train, the posse delved into the tunnel of the Hellbore, wary of things lurking in the dark. Their bickering along the way lead to some Wasatch rail warriors on guard to get the drop on 'em, and lead them to the heart of a secret underground mining camp.

There, they were introduced to the head of the enterprise, the gracious and charming Dr. Darius Hellstromme. After telling the story of the tunnel collapse, Dr. Hellstromme had to inform the posse due to the secret nature of his project, they would not be able to leave this camp. (1/?)

You could've just run a game online on roll20 or something man. Shit, if it was Reloaded I'd try a Huckster, and you'd get to watch my shit luck probably fry my fucking brain in the first 10 minutes.

No rule on the books saying I can't run 2. Online campaigns can be hit or miss with me though.

However, in exchange, because he was a gracious host, they would be witness to his grand project's completion. Plus, if they were willing to pull their weight in the camp, he would pay them the princely sum of $2 a day. Doc had dollar signs in his eyes, Moira was happy with a chance to minister to those in need, and Zhong was doubly happy. First that Dr. Hellstromme conversed with him in Cantonese, but also he would be able to tell his family in Shan Fan he'd found success as a rail worker. They all went to work, Moira to the medical tent, Doc producing more blasting juice than he'd ever made before, and Zhong shifting the refuse left behind by the wailing Hellbore.

Work proceeded along for a couple days, when the tunneling opened a side fissure. Strange creature poured from the side fissure and attacked the rail crew (Doc, ever the skeptic, was fascinated by the large insectoids) liberal applications of fire and Kung fu dispatched most of the beasts, leaving behind injured to tend to.

The Hellbore's operator had been taken, so Doc volunteered to run the device. Why, it was so simple a child could it! He was able to decipher the controls, and piloted the tunneler for the remainder of the day.

Mid-way through the next day, the bore broke through to light, the Great Maze of California beckoned! Hellstromme had his skilled guests board the Good Intentions, which was revealed to be some manner of floating locomotive, and they sped for the Wasatch railhead just outside Lost Angels.

The good Doctor's enemies got word of his impanding arrival though, and set out to stop him. Over a dozen rail warriors of the Iron Dragon, including ronin samurai and Chinese ogres ("They're just freakishly big men!" Protested Doc) beset the train.

The posse tried to fight off the boarders, but were out gunned and were forced to abandon ship after Zhong was beaten and run through, making leaps off the train as Wasatch steam wagons roared in to defend Hellstromme (2/3)

Well if you start one up I might give it a go.

>$2 a day

That might be too much or too little depending on the character. I been running some Deadlands recently, and as a result, sort of forced to look up weekly salaries and the like for some jobs.

>mfw a cowboy made around $6.25 a week and a deputy around $15 a week
>mfw the female deputy is literally making nearly triple the pay of the cowpoke and she gloats to him about it

While his companions bounced along the ground, Zhong Wu waited for his named be called as he waited in line at the Celestial Bureaucracy. Then, he felt a blazing hot hand on his shoulder. A demon grinned at him and advised he was not quite done and lead him to a black flaming door that had not been there before. Zhong found himself wandering the dark forest alone, catching glimpses of the dead deer beast stalking him.....

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So yah, harrowed martial artist. Probably gonna have them get to the Battle of Lost Angels just in time to see the bombs drop but miss all the supernatural stuff (because it'll be funnier for Doubting Thomas Doc to miss it)

Eh, I also gave the mad scientist like half a pound of ghost rock to play with and they could have gotten anything else they really wanted. Between the priestess and poverty monk, the only one who really cares about cash is the scientist, and even then he seemed happy with the pay and was more interested in the gadgets anyways.

A railroad Baron with TB who wishes to see the Pacific ocean before he dies. His hired gun has gone rogue and murdered an Irish family that owned property right in the way of his railroad. Why? "People scare better when they're dead." The Baron is stuck to his private train, which has rails that come down from the ceiling which he uses to climb around the coach.

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I'd like this guy as a harrowed. Goes town to town killing and assimilating other Harrowed weapons/arms on his body.

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Fuckin' Blueberry!

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I like this a lot, there's no reference to a year and it doesn't even mention Colt 1911 anywhere on the page.

OC pic

Hilux is OP, pls nerf.

That reminds me of a story.

My GM loves to quote history nerd facts, for example, Union soldiers made $13 a month. As part of the plot we needed $10,000 I forget what for. I go into a saloon and find the bartender "Hey Hoss, what time of the month do all the soldiers come in and get drunk?". GM looks at me weird but answers. I look at the rest of the party, "The 1,000 soldiers in the fort are owed $13 on the 3, I say we stake out the only rail line into town on the second. We'll even have $3,000 extra for gear"

And thus we robbed the Union payroll train.

Does anyone have a price list, like this guy has started?
I'd love to know how much various bounties were, how much a person could be expected to be payed for various jobs, that sort of thing.

Actually that setup would be about $5000 in HoE
> Small Pickup - $3000
> .50cal - $1000
> Weapon mount - $750
> 50 rounds .50cal - $250

Pic related would also be fun

The guy who stated the prices above, uh...I just Googled stuff. If people want to assemble a list, go for it.

Seems like my costs weren't horribly far off considering the posse was also being partially paid to hold themselves captive until the Wasatch Transcontinental was completed.

Ugh, I'm excited because I've got ideas for the next session, including a full Church of Lost Angels dinner for the players. Get 'em all tuned up and hungry, then let 'em have it close to the end of the session after smelling it cooking the whole time.

Also, I'll be working up a roll20 campaign setup here in the next little bit. Any anons have a story/regional preference, or do you just wanna saddle up?

>Any anons have a story/regional preference

Anything thats not the Great Maze really. Not a fan of sea adventure in the slightest. Also timezones are probably gonna matter a lot.

Since my first crew's already running the Maze, I figured I'd be doing something different for this one anyways.

I'm the PST and generally about to run from about an hour ago to 10pm weeknights, otherwise mostly whenever during the weekends.

I'm always a fan of the lonely town in the middle of the desert. That and any place in Louisiana, New Orleans, or the swamps and marshes. On roll20 do they have the deck of cards system? For initiative and spell casting etc? Never played on roll20 but I need to find someone to DM because I am so damn interested in the system.

Not the guy setting up the game, but far as I can tell, the Savage World stuff has sheets, macros for everything, and card decks.

Only thing it doesn't seem to have is a Fate pot. Which I have to simulate by making people roll 1d35 a few times.

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That's a solid method. Good idea.

Yeah, it works. 1-20 is a white, 21-30 is red, and 31-35 is blue. When Legends get added, just make the die 1d36/37/whatever. One thing computers have over traditional dice is the ability to just roll whatever the fuck you need when you need it, at least.

Attached PDF has some interesting stuff including the price of a pair of pearl handled peacemakers

Montgomery Ward catalogue 1875
> archive.org/details/catalogueno13spr00mont

I just want to run around and roll play a wandering cowboy, carrying a pair of these four pound bastards putting unholy monsters into the dirt they emerged from.

All right, here we are, one roll20 setup. We can coordinate more here.

app.roll20.net/join/2489025/90MmWA

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Cultists are always the most fun. A traveling revival comes to the area and everyone gets REAL excited about it. You can be subtle at first with just passing references to it during other goings on, but eventually you get to bring out the crazy eyed, human sacrificers. Plenty of different motivations for cult activity be it demon summoning, ancient magics, achieving godhood, and so on. Best of all, cults have a lot of manpower so you can reuse the same cult again and again no matter how dead killy your posse gets.

Bumping with my Huckster's art. Figure I'll go for some healing, gambling, and occult as my skill focuses. Even if we get a Blessed or something that could possibly do magical healing, figure it won't hurt to have a mundane guy to patch people up.

I've read about Deadlands a year or two ago, and really got my interest. But there wasn't anyone around to play or discuss it with.
I am glad to see it again.

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So just started reading Deadlands Classic stuff and I dig it. Was curious if any of you have a list or even just a couple one-off movies, tv series, books, comics, whatever else that you reach for to get people in the "supernatural west" mood? And if so, would ya mind sharing?

I'd say maybe Jonah Hex comics, possibly?

I think you'll find there are a couple of deadlands comics being recently released and if you wanna do the looking I'm sure you could find some of their dime novels hovering around from the classic days.

Sleepy Hollow (movie or show, either works)
The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly
Ravenous
Penny Dreadful
Tombstone
The Lone Ranger
99 days of night

Less serious but still in the right vein

Wild Wild West
Cowboys vs. Aliens
Tremors 4 (rest of the series as well, but this one especially)
League of Extraordinary Gentleman

There are other things that I feel like evoke the right feel, but aren't quite close enough to the genre to merit mentioning

>Wild Wild West
>Tremors 4 (rest of the series as well, but this one especially)
>League of Extraordinary Gentleman

Wild Wild West is honestly Deadlands focused on dealing with a mad scientist. Tremors 4, well, I have a sneaking suspicious mojave rattlers and desert things were based off the Tremors movies. That they made an old west one, even better.

And League, yeah. That could be a Deadlands group, especially once they go through some of the weirder shit.

Don't forget The Good, The Bad, and The Weird

Never heard of that one, I'll hunt it down.

Yah, the last three I was mostly separating out cause their tone is less grim serious, but humor of course has a place in the genre.

Oh shit, forgot about Van Helsing. That totally fits

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In Reoaded/Noir, the Harrowed Edge seems like it's something of a waste, since there's a small chance of coming back as a Harrowed anyway.

Tiny ass chance of coming back upon character death of a long played character, or 100% chance.

I know which I'd choose every time, and it isn't "tiny ass chance". It exists pretty much as insurance for a character you've invested a lot of time into.

Actually, in that case I'd rather a rule where instead of drawing, the player can take the next advance and use it on the Harrowed edge, given that being forced to spend an edge before the game even starts (and before you've invested a lot of time and energy in that character) seems rather shitty.

Honestly, that's probably one of my biggest problems with Savage Worlds in general. All the fun stuff is gated behind Advances and Edges, and you really only have 2 free Advances a Rank (Since you spend 1 on your Attribute increase, and 1 to increase your Combat/Something Else), 1 if you take spellcasting.

Instead make a deck of fate chips and upload pics of chips as the card fronts. When a player uses a chip they can plop it on the table even.

Some folks want to play deaders off the bat. I'm actually glad they changed it so people could take it off the bat rather than hoping to jackpot it on death.

As to Edges, they're well and good, but I wouldn't say they're the end all be all. You want your players to have extra edges to specialize, do it to it. As me for me, I like my players getting to improve their style every session or so, gives them progression without feeling too much like Santa Claus.

Oh, thats a good idea.

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If a player lights dynamite and throws it at someone, when does it go off? At the end of the current round? Do you let people pick it up and try to throw it back, or put it out by stamping the fuse? I was thinking of secretly drawing a card and having it go off when the card comes up. Classic if it matters.

I'm not a Classics player, but isn't there already fumble/failure rules for it?
Seems a solid way to do a "You failed your throwing roll, but not by a lot."

Unless it says otherwise, I'd imagine it goes off after being thrown unless they totally botch the roll or something.

There's a rule built into "throwin' thangs" that tells me about off target throws, but nothing mentions when the dynamite actually goes off.

There was an example in the book about it being really bad to roll and go bust when trying to put out a dynamite fuse, so I assumed it must be a thing that it doesn't auto go off.