GunslingerGang

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Gunslinger Gang

An area control BoardGame under development by AlexChurchill, for 2-4 players.
Playing time: 40 minutes (2p) / 60 minutes (3p) / 80 minutes (4p).

Summary

You are all gang bosses, moving your gunslingers around several Old West mining towns to be the one who gets to siphon off the cream of the output of the local mines. Collect the most valuable treasure by being in control of the towns you think are most important. But beware: as you plan your operations in different towns, opponents can see where you're planning to act and send their own underlings ahead of you.

Components

Meeples = Gunslingers, 20 in each of four player colours.
Each meeple represents one gunslinger. If a gunslinger is a sheriff or deputy, they're a "lawman"; otherwise they're an "outlaw".

Underling cards, numbered 1-5, in each of four player colours. From the back you can tell an underling card's player colour but not its value. (For playtesting purposes, it's useful to have opaque card sleeves in the four player colours.)

[Town tiles], 6 or 9 of which will comprise the board. Each town tile has: An indication of how many VP it scores to the player who controls it. A space for a stack of underling cards. A space for a special item tile. A space for the sheriff. Possibly a space for a deputy. A space for several (10+) gunslinger meeples.

Special items, about 25, of which only 6-9 will be used in any one game. Each item has a "complexity indicator", a dot in green/orange/red.

News Stories: A deck of about 30 cards.

Building tokens: 2x 1VP, 6x 2VP, 2x 3VP.

Score track showing who's Most Wanted.

Towns and Control

The board is made up of a number of towns in a grid. The game has 4 rounds, and after every round, you score points for controlling a town - having the most gunslingers in a town. Example: In a Gold mine (2VP), Red has 3 outlaws, green has 2, yellow has 2. Red controls the town and scores 2VP.

Each town may have a sheriff, and controlling the sheriff breaks ties: If there's a tie for most gunslingers, the player who controls the sheriff wins the tie and controls the town. Controlling the sheriff also scores bonus VP as indicated on the sheriff's badge. Example: In a Ruby mine (1VP, +2VP for sheriff), red has 2 outlaws, green has 1 outlaw and the sheriff. Both players have 2 gunslingers, so the sheriff breaks ties: Green controls the town and scores 1VP+2VP = 3VP.

If the sheriff is controlled by a player who doesn't have the most gunslingers, the sheriff has no effect. Example: In a Gold mine (2VP, +1VP for sheriff), red has 5 outlaws, green has 3 outlaws, blue has 3 outlaws and the sheriff. Red has the most gunslingers (5): Red controls the town and scores 2VP. Blue scores nothing, even though they have the sheriff, because they don't control the town.

Some towns may have a deputy, and controlling the deputy breaks ties that aren't broken by the sheriff (if none of the tied players controls the sheriff, but one of them controls the deputy, that player controls the town). Example: In a Diamond mine (1VP, +1VP for sheriff, +1VP for deputy), red has the sheriff, green has 2 outlaws, blue has 1 outlaw and the deputy. Green and blue both have 2 gunslingers, but neither of them has the sheriff, so the deputy breaks ties: Blue controls the town and scores 1VP+1VP = 2VP.

If there's a tie for most gunslingers and none of the tied players control the sheriff or deputy, nobody controls the town and nobody scores the VP for this town. Example: In a Diamond mine, red has 3 outlaws; blue has the sheriff and deputy; and yellow has 3 outlaws. Red and yellow are tied for most gunslingers (3): nobody controls the town.

Towns are one of the following:

Copper mine: 1VP to controller, +1VP if that player controls the sheriff too.
Gold mine: 2VP, +1VP for sheriff.
Ruby mine: 1VP, +2VP for sheriff.
Diamond mine: 1VP, +1VP if that player controls the sheriff, +1VP if that player controls the deputy.
Saloon: +1 gunslinger is recruited here for the player who controls the town, +1VP if that player controls the sheriff, +1 gunslinger if that player controls the deputy too.
Market: 1VP to controller. +1VP if that player controls the sheriff too. If that player controls the deputy, they get to choose any town they control and collect the item from that town (worth 1VP).

Setup

Each player chooses a colour and takes the gunslingers and underling cards of that colour.
Mines: Separate out the copper mine, saloon, and (for 3p-4p) market. Position them as shown in the diagram below. Shuffle the rest of the towns and fill in the rest of the board with towns, mostly face up, two of them face down as indicated. (Variant: Instead shuffle all the towns together and just deal out random face-up and face-down towns in the layout as shown below.)
Items: Shuffle the item cards and place one item on each town, face up. Even the items on the facedown towns should be face up, even though those items can't be obtained in rounds 1-2, so players can see what will become available in round 3. The rest of the items go back in the box and won't be used this game.
Outlaws: Each player places one outlaw (3p-4p) or two outlaws (2p) on each face-up town. Each player takes 9 more gunslingers to be their supply, and puts any remaining gunslingers in their colour back in the box.
News Stories: Deal each player a News Story card.
Determine a start player.

Board layout for 2 players:

     Face-up    Copper  [Facedown]
      town       mine   [  town  ]
   ========== ========= ==========
   [Facedown]   Saloon   Face-up
   [  town  ]              town
   ========== ========= ==========

Each player places two outlaws on each of the four face-up towns.

Board layout for 3-4 players:

     Face-up    Market  [Facedown]
      town              [  town  ]
   ========== ========= ==========
     Face-up    Copper   Face-up
      town       mine      town  
   ========== ========= ==========
   [Facedown]   Saloon   Face-up
   [  town  ]              town
   ========== ========= ==========

Each player places one outlaw on each of the seven face-up towns.

Turn Structure

The game has 4 rounds. Each round has four phases:

Planning phase
In turn order, you play one underling card from your hand face down into a town, on top of any other underling cards there (yours or opponents'). Then once each player has played one underling card, each player places a second card, and so on until each player has sent out 5 of their 6 underlings. Each time you play an underling card, you *may* also play a News Story card underneath that underling card.

Resolution phase
In turn order, choose a town where the underling card on top of the stack (most recently played) is yours. Turn it face up. Then either take that underling's A action (moving some number of gunslingers into this town from neighbouring towns and/or promoting to vacant lawman slots), their B action (hiring new outlaws in this town), or their C action (which varies). See below for more details. After resolving the underling card, return the card to the table in front of you, face up. If your only remaining deployed cards are all underneath opponents' cards, skip your turn.

If you had played a News Story under the underling, turn that News Story face up as well at the same time you reveal the underling card. Then choose to resolve the News Story before or after resolving the underling, or just take the News Story back into your hand if you'd prefer.

Keep going round taking turns resolving a card until all cards are resolved.

Scoring phase
For each town, the player with overall control (the most gunslingers in that town) scores VP for the mine's output. If that player has the sheriff or deputy, score those bonuses too. If the town has any buildings, the controlling player also scores the VP printed on each building.

Growth Phase
Pick the two towns which were closest to tied. (Nobody scored; failing that, places where a sheriff or deputy broke the tie; failing that, places where a player had only 1 more gunslinger than an opponent; next 2, 3, and so on. If multiple towns were as tied as each other, pick the one in the row closest to the top, and then the one furthest to the left.) If this is the end of round 1 or 2, place a 2VP building on each of those two towns. If this is round 3, place a 3VP building on each of those towns.
After that, start player passes left, and start a new round.

At the end of round 2 (i.e. halfway through the game), two new towns are founded: the two town tiles that were laid out facedown during setup are turned face up, taking the number of towns on the board up to 6 (2-player game) or 9 (3- or 4-player game). Place a 1VP building on each of those towns.

Underling cards

Your cards in hand are the bosses' trusty assistants, gang underlings. When an underling is turned face up during the Resolution phase, a underling can either use for their A ability to hustle in some number of your gunslingers from any combination of the orthogonally adjacent towns (1-5 as per the card), use their B ability to hire a new gunslinger from your supply, or use their C ability which is their own unique talent.

All underling abilities refer to the town where the card is resolving.

Your Corrupt Justice (1) can shoot an opposing sheriff or deputy if you've got a gunslinger in the town lined up ready to take their place. **If that opponent was more Wanted than you (has more VP), you score 1VP.**
Your Instigator (red 2) can persuade your gunslinger to shoot one outlaw here of each opponent. **For each opponent more Wanted than you (i.e. with more VP) who you shoot an outlaw of, you score 1VP.**
Your Recruiter (green 2) has no C ability, but their B ability can hire 2 new gunslingers rather than one. **If you are Least Wanted, hire 3 instead!**
Your Journalist (3) can draw you a News Story from the deck. You may then choose to immediately play it and resolve it here; or just take it into your hand for future use. Unused News Stories are worth 1VP at the end.
Each town starts the game with one special item that your Broker can collect if you control the town (4B: gain this town's item if it's not yet been claimed). These usually grant extra abilities to one of your underlings, and are also worth 1VP at the end.
Your Rancher's horses can shift a whole band of gunslingers either in (5A) or out of town. (5C: Move up to 5 of your gunslingers out of this town to one adjacent town.)

Promoting sheriffs or deputies

When using a underling's A ability to move gunslingers into a town, if the town has a vacant sheriff or deputy role, you may instead use one of the moves to promote an outlaw who's already in that town into one of these roles.
Example: Alice is resolving her Rancher (5) in a Diamond mine where both sheriff and deputy spaces are empty. She chooses to use the Rancher for his 5A ability (Move up to 5 gunslingers into this town). She moves one gunslinger in, which becomes an outlaw; promotes that outlaw to sheriff; moves another outlaw in; promotes that outlaw to deputy; and declines to make a fifth move.

End of the Game

After round 4, each player scores 1VP for each of their items and for each of their unused News Stories. The player with the most points wins!
In case of a tie, the player with most sheriffs wins; then most deputies. If there's still a tie, the players must duel at high noon to determine the ultimate winner.

Special Items

Items are randomly dealt, one to each town during setup. Each item is worth 1VP just for having it, and also provides some special bonus. Examples include:

Intimidating Mask: Your Instigator (2A) can banish an opposing sheriff to an adjacent town before moving gunslingers.
Hustler's Map: Your Broker (4A) can move gunslingers in from anywhere on the board, not just adjacent towns.
Prolific Writer: Your Journalist (3C) draws two News Stories rather than one. She can then play either one of them to this town (or neither).
Maverick Reins: Your Rancher (5B) can send one gunslinger to a different adjacent town than the others.
Precision Strike: Towns you control with a majority of exactly 1 score you +1VP. You need to have precisely 1 more gunslinger in the town than your closest competitor. Not 0 (breaking ties with a lawman), and not 2 or more.

The full list is at /Items.

Miscellaneous Notes

You're allowed to peek at any face-down underling card of yours that's on top of its stack. If it's got a News Story underneath, you may peek at that too.
Whenever a gunslinger is moved into a new town, they arrive as an outlaw, no matter whether they were an outlaw or lawman in their previous town.
Outlaws can only be promoted to sheriff / deputy when using an underling's A ability or whenever a card says so (such as 1C). In particular, movement using 5C can not promote outlaws to sheriff / deputy.

CategoryGames BoardGame