In August 2015 we resurrected our May 2014 Deadlands Classic offer featuring the original 1996 Weird West tabletop roleplaying game designed by Shane Lacy Hensley of Pinnacle Entertainment.
Deadlands Classic is the original Weird West RPG. Here gunslinging cowboys in frontier towns meet magic, mad science, and the undead. In this alternate 1876, a Native American ritual to drive out European settlers goes horribly wrong, summoning evil entities known as Reckoners. These beings feed on fear, so they bring monsters, madness, and magic to the West. An arcane resource called ghost rock allows for steampunk-style mad science, while spirits gamble with mortals to provide power — at a price. You can play Texas Rangers, Native American shamans, magical hucksters, Confederate deserters, snake oil salesmen — even saloon girls.
For almost two decades Deadlands has stood tall as one of the most original settings in gaming. Its flavorful and fun alternate-history horror-fantasy-Western mix has spawned card, miniatures, and computer games, as well as multiple tabletop RPG lines. There are Deadlands versions for the D20 System, GURPS, and Savage Worlds. This offer presented the original Pinnacle Entertainment edition, which has remained on sale and popular since its 1999 debut. (Well, technically we presented the 2004 update, the most recent version of the original rules.)
The system that powers Deadlands Classic is an early version of the Savage World step-die mechanics, but it reflects its Western theme. For example, characters who use magic play with a real poker deck; to cast a spell, draw five cards and make the best poker hand you can. The game also uses poker chips, raises, bounty points, and more — a true dovetailing of setting and rules.
Our Starter Collection included six titles (retail value $30) as DRM-free .PDF ebooks:
- Weird West Player’s Guide (retail price $7.50): The core book for players, with the original rules and setting that started it all. [Note: Deadlands has been adapted to several rules system. This revived offer re-presents the 2004 revision of Pinnacle Entertainment’s flagship 1996 game and its supplements.]
- Marshal’s Handbook (retail price $7.50): The Game Master’s guide to the Weird West of 1876.
- Fire & Brimstone (retail price $3.75): The Blessed folks of the Weird West — Baptist Bible-thumpers, frontier rabbis, soapbox evangelists, and wandering Buddhist monks.
- Hucksters & Hexes (retail $3.75): The soucebook for magic (and poker) in the Weird West.
- Rascals, Varmints, & Critters (retail price $3.75): Scores of Deadlands desperadoes, abominations, and freaks.
- Smith & Robards Catalog (retail price $3.75): A full range of weapons and equipment, plus New Science gizmos and rules for fantastic devices and the madm– um, geniuses who create them.
Customers who paid more than the threshold price also got our complete Bonus Collection with seven more sourcebooks and adventures (retail value $25.50):
- The Agency: Men in Black Dusters (retail price $3.75): One of the highest-rated Deadlands supplements, this training manual documents secrets the Agency (a secret service of the Weird West) doesn’t want you to know.
- Book o’ the Dead (retail price $3.75): The secrets of those who have passed beyond the veil — and back. New rules for generating undead heroes, as well as over 50 new mystical Harrowed powers.
- Canyon o’ Doom (retail price $3.75): The native peoples call it the House of Stone and Light. In its shadowed depths, unnatural things wait. An epic 128-page adventure.
- The Collegium (retail price $3.75): The intrigue-filled association of mad scientists in the Great Maze boomtown, Gomorra, and their newest, least stable steamtech inventions.
- Ghost Dancers (retail $3): The sourcebook for Native American Shaman characters, their powers, and the Happy Hunting Grounds where mad spirits dwell.
- Law Dogs (retail $3.75): About law enforcement, and the enforcers who have to be as ruthless as the outlaws they pursue.
- Lone Stars (retail $3.75): The Texas Rangers sourcebook!
If some huckster in a Tombstone alley got you to pay full price for all these .PDFs, you’d spend $55.50.