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Hi All, so I have been asked to run a new game at my FLGS, and I think that the consensus on what people are most interested in is the Deadlands setting. I have run two different Deadlands games before, but I personally hate the Savage Worlds system, and I was looking to try and transition to using D20 Modern instead. I just wanted to see if any of you had done something similar to this before, and had any tips. It seems to be fairly straight forward to me, the hardest item that I will need to change is how the card system works, especially the Huckster as he casts magic this way. Will have to revise the fate chip system as well. Anyway, any thoughts or comments would be appreciated!

Can't help since I've never actually played Deadlands, although the setting has always intrigued me. I also very much enjoyed me some d20 Modern/historical/future...

Will be watching this thread.

Disclaimer: There is at least 2 version of this game, I only played one, and a long time ago.

"How card system works"
The card system if used for character generation, for initiative and for huckster

Character generation: Draw x card, assign each card to a Stats (dex, str, cunning, whatever...) The higher the card, the better the stat.

Initiative: at the beginning of a round, each player make a initiative roll. On a poor rool you get only one card, a decent result receive 2 cards, excellent one, 3 or 4 cards , critical miss, none. For each card, you may make one action. The order of play is determine by the cards. The GM call them. "Kings?", "Queen?", "Jacks" , "tens?" You may act when the GM call a card you have, or keep the card "Up your sleeves", allowing you to act before another player or NPC, but after he declared his intension.

Example
GM: "Aces?", "Kings?", "Queen?", "Jacks? One of the desperado take his shot gun" (at the same time, the GM throw the card of the desperado face up, in the stack of used cards.)
Charles Bronson: (throwing in the stack an ace of spade) As soon as he touch his weapon, I shot him.

[iHuckster (magic user)[/i]

casting a spell:
Make your magic roll. If the roll is a success, the player draw 5 cards. If the roll is very good, 6 cards. Very,very good, 7...
Basic spells require a pair to be effective. tricky one 3 of a kinds...
Having a better hand than required increase the spell effect. The Jokers are wild cards (having a joker guarantee you at least a pair, the Black joker add a small magical catastrophe to the spell effect)

"Will have to revise the fate chip system as well."
Experience is given in the form of poker chip (fate chip). Fate chip can be use to increase stat, learn skill, increase the result of a roll or ignore a wound.

Try to find a cheap copy of Deadlands D20 thats done all the work for you ( there the ones with the red covers )

 Savagecoyote wrote:
Try to find a cheap copy of Deadlands D20 thats done all the work for you ( there the ones with the red covers )

So after feedback from other forums I visit, it seems that most people with experience in this particular combination find it to be just terrible. It seems the flair of the original system was very enjoyable, but the rules are very clunky and awkward. I have run the Savage Worlds version, and find it to be way to simplistic. Suggestions maybe then on similar Weird West games with a better system?

I ran Deadlands Classic for a while, and was initially very resistant to the Savage Worlds edition (and pretty much skipped the d20 stuff other than a few dual-statted books).

At first glance moving from DLc to Savage Worlds you lost the fine-grained wound mechanics and moved to something more akin to 40k's system. OTOH, you gained a pretty good (and standard') set of 'mook' mechanics. It's also massively faster. From memory, an attack in DLc involved rolling to hit, rolling a location, and rolling damage based off that. Then figuring out Wind damage. If it's a PC, they'll usually buy the damage off with a fate chip anyway, if they can. SW knocks this down to a lot less rolls.

Location based damage was a big deal, especially as zombies were the classic cinematic 'shoot to the head' type. No rolling for locations in SW... But there were traits to make zombies resistant to damage with a chance of still being hurt (the occasional random headshot) and the statement that called shots to the head would bypass this protection (with a minus to hit).

Skills became a bit more coarse. No specializing in different kinds of guns by taking different skills. On the other hand, I realized this meant the 'Shooter' characters were still guaranteed to be at least competent with other firearms beyond their specialization, and much of the edge-cases could be handed as smoothly, if not smoother, with perks/flaws (The Schoolmarm who is known as a nasty shot with a shotgun has a mediocre Shooting skill, but one or more edges to make her nastier with shotguns; The Duelist has tons of edge options to aid quick-draw speed, accuracy, etc.).

Magic was the biggest change, and the only one I'ms till a bit hesitant about. However, again, the DLc system was flavorful but not fast. Also, DLc had very different systems. Across the 3 eras of the game, you had: Hucksters, Blood Mages, Blessed, Shamans, Psykers, Enlightened Martial Artists, Mad Scientists, Junkers, Nanotech Guys, Librarians, and a bunch more I'm forgetting. SW uses a relatively generic system that combines many of these down to one generic set of powers.

It took a while to get the Huckster rules, probably the most iconic, right. i think they finally did. In DLc, the Huckster (a wizard of sorts who had learned to drop into another dimension, challenge demons to games of cards, and beat them with magical effects as the ante.) had to roll to cast the spell, then draw a number of cards (indicated by the roll), with each card drawn requiring a brief check to see if a poker hand was formed. Then the effect went off which might require rolling to hit, damage rolls, etc.

Savage Worlds uses a much simpler process. i don't have the current rules at hand, but I believe Hucksters can always cast a 'weak' power, but can use card mechanics to push ti for greater effect. They use a generic 'spell point' mechanic as a a base in common with almost all Arcane backgrounds.

Most other ABs use a variation on this. Same powers, but different trappings. Trappings in SW have two meanings. In some campaigns, they might be simple flavor: one wizards 'Blast' power might be a fireball, while another might be a massive thunderclap concussion-wave. Both do damage X to characters in circle Y, and secondary effects are up to the GM and players.

TL: DR; I liked DLc, but I don't think i'd run it today. SW has a lot of great stuff in it, though, and may be worth a second shot, especially with the Deadlands tweaks.

 Balance wrote:
TL: DR; I liked DLc, but I don't think i'd run it today. SW has a lot of great stuff in it, though, and may be worth a second shot, especially with the Deadlands tweaks.

Thank you for the detailed response, I found it to be very insightful. Honestly you touched on two of my biggest complaints with the SW version of Deadlands. Those of course being the simplistic magic system, and the overall skill set. I had a Huckster, Nun, and Mad Scientist in my party (sounds like an intro to a dirty joke ), and I consistently felt that in terms of magic ability and power the Huckster and Nun far outclassed the mad scientist, and made the game less enjoyable for some party members. Some also felt that the Huckster really was the only class that had a genuinely Weird West feel to it, but this could be more a matter of some group members not immersing themselves in their characters as much as they could. Anyway, I very well could give the SW edition a second look, despite my misgivings about the system.

Regardless, I would be happy to hear from anyone else on their thoughts regarding the current SW Deadlands system, and if they have found any other Weird West type RPGs that worked well for them.

Deadlands Classic Mad Scientists were "frustrating" for me. Neat idea, but they were extremely 'slow buildup' on a geological time scale compared to even the Shamans with the system of building up favor points.

To elaborate: The posse needs to blow something up.

The Huckster either has an appropriate hex, in which case makes the attempt to cast it and blows the target up. Otherwise, Huckster is at the mercy of acquiring a hex, which wasn't something to di in mid-adventure.

The Mad Scientist can build a Blows-Things-Up Device. This will,after consultation with the GM, require a pound of Ghost Rock, some other materials, and 3-6 months of development time.

So, basically, the Huckster wins because even if they need to acquire a new power, they do so by earning XP, or doing fun stuff. The Mad Scientist is more background, unless the group focuses on them. (I remember reading about an all-Mad-Scientist game years ago on the DL mailing list which made this interesting, but unless the Mad is in charge of the group, I can see them being a background character.

The big advantage of Mads is they could hand the devices over to others. Mad scientist devices were unreliable, but they were fundamentally 'stable' compared to hexes.

I think they way I'd consider handling it now is that a Mad should have an over-riding 'obsession' like "Build giant flying machine" or "More accurate rifles" that they're considered to always be researching. They should be able to have some easy-access immediate combat-effective powers with the requirement that they be somehow connected to the core obsession. They can have one power at the ready (maybe using MP to represent charges.) with an option to change it out with minimal concern. Key is they have to justify it... So the Mad's player needs to be thinking in crazy-mad-scientist to have access.

So an example: A Mad Scientist want to Build Giant Flying Machines. It's background that he's working on blueprints, maybe building prototypes. Maybe have a system for doing the 'great work' which should be really cool and a campaign-changing event. For the example, it'd require months of time actually building or managing construction, and it's kind of a future goal.

In the present, the Mad might decide he needs a flamethrower. Sorry, I mean a "Steering Thruster Prototype" and it's assumed he cobbles one together from spare parts. He gets the appropriate power, can give it away (but it might not be refuelable/fixable for anyone else), etc.

Later the Mad might need to carry something heavy. Over a night while the group rests, he can dismantle the flamethrower and build the Amazing Horseless Powered Lifter which uses some Gravitonic Repulsion Technology he's been working on for the airship, but is basically a forklift that replicates a Levitation power.

Make sure you've got the newest version of the SW rules. I was big into Deadlands when it came out, and got the leather-covered one. i think they've updated the core since then to make Hucksters work better and fix a few other things.