What a Mountie!

What a Cowboy is a brand new set of rules from Too Fat Lardies for playing Hollywood-style, wild west shootouts.  I jumped on the pre-order, and when the game arrived, I summoned some of my What a Tanker gaming mates around for a test drive. Apologies in advance for the poor quality of the photos.  I was more focussed on playing the game!

Since I live in Canada, just for fun I decided that we'd play a scenario with Mounties in the Yukon, rather than the Hollywood staples of the dusty Southwest or flat prairie.  We tried scenario 3,  'The Rescue'.  The Mounties had arrested a trapper for DnD and were holding him in their outpost cabin, when his mates decided they needed to bust him out of the hoosegow.  Each side had two shootists and two greenhorns, two armed with six shooter pistols and two armed with rifles.  

Here is the basic layout.  Two Mounties were at the cabin, and two came on at the far end of the board.  The four trappers came in on from the bottom of the picture.

Obligatory moose shot (just be glad I didn't pull out the beavers!)

The trappers advance onto the table

Constable Fraser dives for cover behind the laundry as Sgt King moves up to support with his rifle.

Trapper Bob and Sven Olafson move up alongside the creek.  Constable Macleod is forced to seek cover in the woods.  The little clouds of smoke are pin markers, used when a character dives for cover or hits the dirt.

Sgt Fraser has suppressed trapper Beardy MacBeardface with rifle fire, while the crazy Scotsman has pinned Const Fraser (again).

Standoff between Const Fraser and Angus the crazy Scotsman.

Angus has been taken down, while Trapper Bob tries to make his way into the NWMP cabin.  Not visible, but Const Frobisher is inside the cabin with the prisoner.

Next, Trapper Bob was killed.  At the end of this turn, the two remaining trappers failed their 'Ride or Die Test' and fled the table.

We all enjoyed the game.  As always in a first playthrough, we had a few questions, but since we are already familiar with the What a Tanker engine, the game came to us quite quickly and we were confidently taking our turns.  The game is fast and cinematic.  With a bit more experience, we will be better at using the Bitcoins Bonanza tokens and remembering to check our Desperado cards.  We are also looking forward to getting a chance to use some more advanced characters (gunslingers and legends), adding in horses, getting some Brawlin' (hand to hand combat) and more.