Silver Spring Showdown

Question for Silver Spring Showdown-ers:

If this milieu was viable from the role-play side, and the combat system was unwieldy because of the ref's decision about influence points, should I take a few weeks to settle what happened at the ruins with the players involved and continue for next year, in more or less the same fashion (only on a smaller scale for combat)?

It would be easy to arrange plot that sets up a couple of short combats and more role-play opportunities.  It would also be easy to add some seats at the table for tactical roles only, for those who want to skip role play and just spill blood.

Let me know.

John

Back to Zarcon 6 Games

Silver Spring is just your average little mining town in the thin tails of the big Nevada silver veins of Carson and Hall’s Creek. A little west of the Utah territory, it’s a place where the law comes by only every so often and most of the rest of the time, people make do best as they can.

"There’s a triple share of new trouble in town. Sheriff Hought has penned up that half-breed boy named Blackmartin. The Indians are just outside of town, like they’ve been for the last three months, but now they want him back. He caused some trouble down at Neville Kinkaid’s Lazy Whore claim, along with Sparks Brown. It was something about poor conditions in the mines. The magistrate is a few weeks away, and along with the trouble at the Mine, the Ute have been in town more often than before, which sets everyone’s hair across their eyes, on account of the massacre in '77. Then there’s Pablito. Him and his gang have been riding out this way since April, and the word is they’re close by. At least the Infantry is in camp. They’ll help keep the peace, even if the Mayor and Sheriff Hought can’t."

back to schedule


Silver Spring showdown is a tournament game that requires role-play, strategy and tactics. There is a prescribed order for the implementation of strategy, and no player needs to be bound by any promises or compromises made during role-play. Players make their binding agreements, promises, compromises, allegiances, partnerships, pacts, vendetta, and etceteras during the strategy phases of the game. Strategy phase agreements are binding in the tactical phase. You must lie in the bed you make (or that others make for you).

I’ll be using Skirmish Wargames’ classic (1977) Old West Gunfighter rules for the tactics – a simple d% system, with lots of gunsmoke followed by lots of bleeding and feverish reloading. It may sound complicated, but we’re all smart people who can think in two second increments.

back to schedule



Cast (people who want to play Silver Spring Showdown should think about these choices):

Sheriff Hought
Neville Kinkaid
Sparks Brown
Tall-as-the-Firs
Captain Wills

Back to top


Sheriff Hought has his hands full trying to keep the miners, cowboys, Ute and gamblers happy. He doesn’t work for Mayor Kelly, but Kelly likes to boss him around, the way Hought sees it, and it don’t sit right.

cast

It’s not enough to own the most lucrative mine in Silver Spring. Kinkaid nearly has the run of the town, because he has so many important people in his wallet – Mayor Kelly, Captain Mead from the garrison, Sheriff Hought. Lately, though, there’s been trouble at the mine, care of that rabble-rouser Sparks Brown.

cast

Brown’s worked at Neville Kinkaid’s Lazy Whore mine for fifteen years. Lately, though, Kinkaid’s stopped worrying about the men who work the Lazy Whore. If he did care, he’d make the mine safer for the blasters who work there.

cast

A Ute elder and a warrior from years past, Tall-as-the-Firs is no longer prone to warlike ways. He is here to negotiate the release of Earl Blackmartin, a half-breed born to a Ute woman in the camp. Tall-as-the-Firs elected to go, as an elder and a statesman.

cast

Captain Wills has shared the command of the Silver Spring garrison for a year, since being transferred here from Fort Lupton. His counterpart, Captain Mead, is a drunkard and a thief, but will not relinquish command. Wills is bound and determined to get his unit into line, and before the General comes in the spring.

cast


Email John about Silver Spring Showdown
Go back to schedule

Go back to top