THE ECSTASY OF SILVERA western themed not-quite-a-mafia by JubalOld Jubal, they called him. A prospector who'd made it big in some mining rush or other, back in the day. Then lost it all. He'd tramp the desert with his old donkey, Marjorie, and stagger into a saloon with just enough money to get a beer and just enough wit to complain that it wasn't as good as it used to be. He'd sit in the corner, smoking a pipe with a bowl the size of his fist, carved out of a gun-stock some way back when. If the prospector still remembered whose gun it was, he never said.
But that was yesterday. Today, Old Jubal is gone. Some kid from the town of El Exilca found Marjorie the donkey running loose in Fire Bush Gulch, and some scraps of clothing are all that seems to have been left. The sheriff got told, then shrugged and went back to his whiskey. There's not a lot of law in these parts. And in any case, nobody was talking about the body. They were talking about the note.
See, Old Jubal didn't go without leaving some information about the one last thing he had, besides the donkey and the pick and the shirt on his back. One secret he'd carried with him for a good few long years. Seems he hadn't quite lost all that silver, after all... and in that last week before he vanished, he'd talked to a fair few people about it. And left a fair few notes. Where they'd lead, who knew...
Two hundred and fifty thousand dollars in silver bullion was somewhere out there in the hills. And three vagabonds were determined to find it... and claim it for themselves.
DRAMATIS PERSONAE (And win conditions)Jack Atkin: Wins by surviving to endgame with the Scar dead and 4+ clues held by remaining players.
Born to native parents, brought up by a wagon-riding settler who'd found the baby crying in the aftermath of a US Army raid, Jack Atkin is one of the misfits of the frontier. Dark hair, high cheekbones, and the charm of a swindler combine to make him a rising name among the saloons of these hills. His dappled grey stallion, Calto, is often seen riding tall and proud through El Exilca and he's recently had some success in hunting and cheating bandits where the sheriff has failed to do so. They say he has a heart of gold - but it won't let him get in the way of having pockets full of silver.La Musaraña: Survive to endgame with 4+ clues held by remaining players. You must hold more clues than any other remaining player to win.
Mexican bandits are two a penny in these parts, but La Musaraña is something different. Flitting in and out of saloons, what she doesn't know about the gunslingers of this part of the west isn't worth knowing, and so her life of one-woman banditry is often wildly successful, swooping in and clearing up the mess after other gunslingers have had their fun, or just making herself too valuable to some potential partner for them to risk shooting her.The Scar: Survive to endgame with Atkin dead and 3+ clues held by remaining players.
Nobody knows a lot about the scar. Not many people are even sure he has a scar - people who get close enough to check under his wide, shadowy-brimmed hat usually don't live so long. He'd be an outlaw if the sheriff even cared, and as it is he's a gunslinger, a bandit, a fiend and a thief. He lives on his reputation, and his reputation is rightly a fearsome one. He's barely in it for the money; it's a nice benefit, but it's the thrill of the kill that really keeps him heading back out with another clip of bullets and the same two guns in his holsters.CLUES: these are items or bits of knowledge that will ultimately lead you to the prize - however, the more of them you hold, the slower your reactions - more things in your pockets, or ideas buzzing round in your head, which can be fatal in a shootout. The order of gunshots in R3 is thus determined such that the person with
fewest clues goes first.
All player actions are taken in secret, but the players can publicly discuss things in each round. The round ends as soon as all three players have submitted an action.
ORDER OF PLAYRound 1: Fire Bush GulchAll: Give up to 2 clues to other players. You MUST give at least one clue, but do not have to give the second. You can give both to the same player, or split them between players.
All players will then be informed how many clues they have.
Round 2: The SaloonAtkin: You may unload 1 other player's primary gun, making it useless in the shootout, AND give 1 clue to another player.
LM: Steal up to 2 clues from one other player AND give 1 clue to another player
Scar: Load a second gun (which may be fired at a person of Scar's choice AFTER all 3 players have fired their first shot), AND give 1 clue to another player
OR discard/take a clue of your own AND give one clue to another player
All players will be again informed how many clues they have.
Round 3: Mexican StandoffShootout. Each player decides who to shoot.
Nb that simultaneous shots CAN happen.
Results of the game will then be announced.
Once everyone's checked in to confirm they've received their roles, Round 1 will start