Forged on the Frontier

Forged on the Frontier is a minimalistic, old-school Western RPG primarily inspired by Boot Hill. The primary setting of play is intended to be "The Old West", and so roughly post-American Civil War until the introduction of the automobile. With some research, play may extend back a little further back in time, but this is the core of it.

What is the overall goal and direction?

Boot Hill, while being a dead game line, is still available in PDF and PoD from DriveThruRPG. A popular blog post, "Boot Hill and the Fear of Dice", sings the praises of the role-playing that results from the minimal ruleset, and it's an article that often comes to mind when I think of RPG design. The overall goal is to take the core Boot Hill idea, what those rules do to play as explained in the above-mentioned article, and make a smoother, cleaner implementation of the whole idea. Also, the game should be a bit of an essay or commentary on the Western genre itself. While the rules should be relatively brief, there is room for a bit of history, "gear porn", genre talk and play talk to set the table for play. I will begin with a cloning approach, laying down the Boot Hill (2e) methods and rules, followed up by provisional re-implementations. Beyond that, there may be things added or removed from rules consideration as I take the idea my own way potentially. The text here is in no way aiming for "final", but rather is more like a notebook of everything under consideration.

Cool Inspirational Articles & Posts

• Boot Hill and the Fear of Dice
• Quicker Combat for Boot Hill
• Reputation in Boot Hill

Rules Ruminations

I'm just gonna start with documenting Boot Hill 2e as a start, beginning with the Attributes. The game has you roll percentile, then get a value based on that, but the values are different for each attribute. It's a little sloppy

• Speed: Ranges from -5 to +22. 0 is an averge person, +4 is a roll of 50, but +6 is average due to "Initial Modification", which gives PCs a bump over normal folk.
• Gun Accuracy: Ranges from -9 to +20, 0 is an average person, +2 is a roll of 50, but +5 is average due to "Initial Modification"
• Throwing Accuracy: Ranges from -9 to +20, 0 is an average person, +2 is a roll of 50, but +5 is average due to "Initial Modification"
• Strength: Ranges from 8 to 20, an average person is 13, roll of 50 is 14, average PC is 15. Damage is mostly in the form of light, serious or mortal wounds, but aside from that Strength serves as Hit Points.
• Bravery: Percentile roll gives you a title, which modifies your Speed (from -4 to +5, 0 average, +1 at 50 and for PC average) and Accuracy (from -6 to +15, 0 average, +3 at 50 and for PC average)
• Experience: Ranges from 0 to 11+, average 1, PC average 2. Based on number of gunfights a person has been in, provides accuracy modifiers from -10 to +10 (average, -5)
• Survival: As a character survives gunfights, their Experience rises (possibly increasing their Accuracy), and additionally, their Speed and Bravery increase based on the die score of those Attributes, adding 3, 2, 1 or 0.5 points to the score depending on the score's value.
• First Shot Determination is based on Modified Speed + Weapon Speed Modifier. This determines the order characters shoot in.
• Hit Determination is based on Modified Accuracy + 50%.
• Movement occurs before shooting and is based on a raw % roll, lower move first.
• Movement occurs first (low % roll to high), then firing (from high to low), the 2 rounds of Brawling (from high to low)

The range of Speed really only seems to matter in the Advanced game, where there is an optional rule for allowing multiple shots before someone can reply, but the numbers themselves don't matter, in that the Attribute ranging from -5 to +22 might as well be 0 to +28, or anything else. The Strength for HP thing seems OK currently, though maybe check scale and rejigger if it makes sense. Accuracy is used on a percentile roll. It is a little sloppy how some attributes are only used as modifiers to other attributes, though there are things I like about it as well. For example:

• "First Shot Determination" is based on Speed (Modified by Weapon). Speed is modified by Bravery. Both Speed and Bravery (which also increases Speed) can be increased by Survival.
• "To Hit" is based on Gun or Throwing Accuracy (modified by environmental factors). To Hit is modified by Bravery and Experience. As a character survives gunfights, accuracy goes up both due to Experience and Survival increasing Bravery, which can increase Accuracy.
• Overall, the "advancement", such as it is in Boot Hill, is based on survival of gunfights, yet there are 2 charts regarding it: Experience (Increase Accuracy) and Survival (Increases Speed and Bravery [which itself increases Speed and Accuracy]).

In melee, there is no accuracy involved, there is just character speed and rolling on a punching or grappling table. Strength matters in so much as it serves as Hit Points.

I'm just rambling. What I need to do is determine what should be kept, added or discarded. What matters to reinforcing the idea of what the game is in my head? At core, the original Boot Hill is just a gun fighting miniatures game with just enough bits added on that you could use it as an RPG. I have an inclination towards minimalism with this, but also an inclination to tidy up the mess of the original as well, as small of a game as it is. Like, the core should be able to operate more quickly and cleanly while maintaining its merits. Also, not discussed so far, is how Bravery works as morale for NPCs, and how it combines with the reputation and reaction mechanics (pretty light), from the adventures.