Rival gangs are vying for control of Deadwood and the new railway coming into town, the gang with the most money will win. The components of this game are excellent, although my only complaint is that the numbers are hard to read on the Cowboys face up side.
Each turn players can either place one cowboy from their Ranch onto a building in the town and "Annex" it, meaning they get to use its action/control function or they can remove any number of their cowboys from buildings in town or the abandoned mine back to their Ranch. All of the buildings provide different abilities to earn the gangs money or aid themselves and some provide means to scupper other gangs.
If you decide to place one of your gang into an occupied building there is a shoot-out determined by rolling dice and if one or both of the cowboys are killed they end up in boot hill and out of the game. There are 3 ways in which the game ends:
The railroad is completed by placing the Train Station
The last Wanted Poster is taken
One Gang has all of its Cowboys eliminated
The game is really easy to learn to play but strategies, as always, are a little harder to master. The game flows really quickly, and will speed up once players get to know which buildings do what.
I really enjoy playing this and it will almost certainly get loads more plays. It seems to work well with 5 players and not too bad with less, though I feel you need players more familiar with the game to ensure less than 5 players work at its best.
The mechanics of the game, the buildings, the artwork and every aspect of this game really suits the theme and the length of the game is just right.
The rules are pretty clear, easy to follow the only gripe I have is the layout of the building descriptions a uniform layout would have been easier to follow (ie picture then text to the right) also having then listed alphabetically making it an easier reference to quickly scan when a new building comes out.
Overall a really enjoyable game that will see a lot of table time.
