Boot Hill is a Tabletop RPG set in The Wild West. Written by Brian Blume and Gary Gygax, it was published by TSR and initially released in 1975. A second edition followed in 1979 and a third, by Steve Winter, in 1990.
The default setting is "somewhere in the Southwest", circa 1870-1890, and the default game is purely historical, with some artistic license but no fantastical elements. The player characters are skilled gunfighters who get caught up in disputes or quests for riches.
The second edition uses two 10-sided dice (d10) and resolves all actions with percentile rolls. Third edition significantly changes this system and only uses d10 for the initial character creation, with everything else using d20 or d6.
For the second edition, characters have five main statistics: Strength, Speed, Gun Accuracy, Throwing Accuracy and Bravery. They also have an Experience stat, establishing how many gunfights they've survived before the game starts, which may boost their accuracy stats. All of these statistics are randomly rolled. The game is very focused on combat and (apart from an optional rule for gambling skills) there are no non-combat character abilities.
For third edition the character statistics become Strength, Coordination, Observation, Stature and Luck. Third edition characters also get a mix of combat and non-combat skills; non-combat skills work independently of stats whereas combat skills boost a relevant stat (e.g. a roll for a rifle shot would use Coordination + Rifle).
List of Modules:
- Mad Mesa (1981), written by Jerry Epperson and Tom Moldvay.
- Lost Conquistador Mine (1982), written by David Cook and Tom Moldvay. Set in 1868, in the New Mexico town of Dead Mule, it gives the characters a chance to claim the gold of the titular long-lost mine.
- Ballots and Bullets (1982), written by David James Ritchie. It's 1882 and the newly built Arizona town of Promise City is about to hold its first elections. They are not going to go smoothly.
- Burned Bush Wells (1984), written by Jeff Grubb. It's the middle of a hard winter and the titular town is suffering. The player characters get caught up in a conflict that may make things even worse.
- Range War! (1984), written by Philip Taterczynski. It's 1875 and a feud between the ranchers and sheepherders of Grant County, Oregon, is starting to get violent.
Tropes associated with this tabletop game:
- Ax-Crazy: Mad Mesa features Irving "The Mad", who's described as a homicidal maniac. Irving's recently escaped from a local asylum, stealing some guns along the way, and has arrived in Mad Mesa looking for someone to shoot. The asylum's actively searching for him, but unfortunately the player characters run into him first.
- Bigot with a Badge: In Lost Conquistador Mine, Dead Mule's sheriff, Ernest Johnson, doesn't generally do much to enforce the law. Unfortunately, Native Americans are an exception as he "hates Indians of all tribes" and many have been imprisoned and then shot while trying to "escape" (the module uses Scare Quotes for "escape", leaving little doubt about the truth).
- Coffin Contraband: One Mad Mesa encounter sees the characters encounter Ben Stockwell's gang, who are digging up a grave in the town's cemetery. The gang aren't Grave Robbing, they're recovering loot that was buried in a coffin after a bank robbery.
- Collateral Damage:
- The second edition's optional rules add a small chance that anyone directly behind the intended target will be hit by a missed shot.
- Shotguns and scatter guns potentially hit every target within the width of their field of fire, whether friend or foe.
- Experienced Protagonist: The second edition rules include an Experience stat, which is randomly rolled as part of character creation. Some player characters may never have been in a gunfight before, but others may start as veterans of 10 or more battles, with a corresponding boost to their Accuracy stats. More experienced characters improve more slowly once play starts, or might even have reached their maximum Accuracy already (although their Speed and Bravery can continue to improve). All of this was removed for third edition.
- Famed in Story: Third edition adds a Stature statistic to track the character's fame. Very high scores may mean that a character's instantly recognised ("rooms fall silent when he enters"), stars in their own dime novels or is simply "a living legend". Stature is randomly generated during character creation, but capped so that player characters won't be more than "average" before the game starts.
- Gamebooks: Most of the Mad Mesa module is a solo adventure, "Night in Mad Mesa", which combines the usual Boot Hill rules with a gamebook approach using numbered sections and a predefined set of choices.
- Game Master: Here, the Game Master is called the Referee.
- Genre Shift: Not only is this a change from TSR's previous fantasy titles, but it serves as a setting for genre crossovers with Dungeons & Dragons.
- Greater-Scope Villain: The main antagonist of Burned Bush Wells is local businessman Lyle Underhay, who's well on his way to establishing himself as a Tyrannical Town Tycoon. Underhay is backed by Mr. G, a wealthy and mysterious rancher in the Promise City Area, who takes a cut of everything Underhay earns. It's implied that G's aware and supportive of Underhay's violent and crooked actions, as he runs his other operations in a fairly ruthless manner. If the pre-generated characters are used, the Cross Y Ranch that employed them burnt down in an "unexplained" fatal fire, which allowed G's operation to buy its herds and equipment, then lay off all surviving staff.
- Grenade Hot Potato: In 3rd edition, thrown dynamite may be picked up and thrown back, provided the target can make a luck attribute check. Alternatively, they may yank the fuse to disarm it.
- "Just Leave" Ending: In the Mad Mesa module's solo adventure, "Night in Mad Mesa", the player character can leave town on foot or simply return to Larsen's Livery Stable, reclaim their horse and ride out of town, "thus ending the adventure". Nobody will try to stop them if they take one of these options.
- Luck Stat: The third edition adds a Luck statistic for player characters. Luck checks are used in a range of risky situations (e.g. when making a dangerous jump or fooling around with explosives) and determine whether or not a character survives if they take a mortal wound.
- One-Hit Kill:
- Most hits are Light or Serious wounds that are deducted from Strength, but any hit to the head or torso may be randomly classed as a Mortal wound (effectively a Critical Hit) that immediately kills the target. The third edition rules soften this by letting player characters roll against their Luck Stat to survive a Mortal wound.
- Dynamite is introduced by the second edition's optional rules. Dynamite explosions have a percentage change of instant death for anyone who's too close (which goes up to 100% fatality at close range if there are more than a few sticks). Wounds and stunning are only resolved if the character survives.
- Official Game Variant: The second edition includes a set of optional rules to expand the game. These include an alternative system for deciding who shoots first as well as rules for sharpshooting, stunning, misfires and stray bullets. Other optional rules cover dynamite, gatling guns and cannon, intoxicated characters and professional gamblers.
- Police Are Useless: In Lost Conquistador Mine, Dead Mule's lawman, Ernest Johnson, is "sheriff in name only". He won't actively go after outlaws or intervene if there are gunmen in town, and he's an ex-Confederate soldier who sympathises with those who turned outlaw and took to the hills. He won't actually aid criminals and he's not cowardly, he just "prefers a quiet life" so tries not to endanger himself over a cause he doesn't believe in. The one exception is his violent bigotry towards Native Americans, who are often shot while trying to "escape".
- Population: X, and Counting: Solo adventure "Night in Mad Mesa" starts with the protagonist riding past Main Street's sign. It originally read "Mad Mesa - population 157", but the number's been repeatedly crossed out and replaced. The latest number is now 132, but it's stated that this may be because there's no more space remaining on the sign.
- The Western: Naturally, since the game is explicitly set in the Wild West.
- You Killed My Father: In Mad Mesa the Malone brothers are determined to avenge their father by killing Sam Collins, the man who murdered him. Unfortunately, they also mistake one of the player characters for Sam and immediately start shooting.