The Knuckleduster Cowtown Creator; Create an Authentic Cowtown Setting for Any Western Role-Playing Game

This is a good resource for a historical Old West setting.The material is largely game system-neutral. Out of 265 pages between the table of contents and the index, there are 222 pages (84%) that are system-neutral, 22 pages on Deadlands, 4 pages on converting the Deadlands material to Fudge (which is easily turned into a conversion to the Fate system), and 17 pages on Deadlands d20. Even the system-specific content, with lists of NPC types, wouldn't be too hard to adapt to other systems.The chapter on Town Design (17 pages) gives a good description of different town types, instead of assuming a single generic Old West town. The various town types (17 of them!) discuss the sorts of buildings, people, attitudes, and goals you might find there. Most of the types are about the town's main purpose (territorial capital, railhead, fort, etc.), but some are more about the mood or state of the town (boom town, bust town, cultures in conflict, etc.), which means you can combine different town types, like having a railhead that's also a bust town, because its best days are already behind it. The chapter includes and describes a typical town layout.The chapter on The Cattle Business (16 pages) breaks down the whole process of a cattle drive, including the roles and hazards involved.The bulk of the book (132 pages) drills down into various building types: saloons, dance halls, gambling dens, "fancy houses," theaters, hotels, restaurants, banks, stores, blacksmiths, barber shops, stagecoach offices, and others. The more detailed chapters describe various subtypes, the character types you might find there, and the "stories" you could find there. The stories are usable as adventure hooks or random events. Most of these chapters include one or more annotated sample floor plans. The chapter on Gambling Dens gives an overview of the different types of gambling that were likely to be found, but without providing a system for playing them out in an RPG.A few chapters cover prominent character types: marshals, sheriffs, lawyers, and doctors, including what the role is about and different types you might encounter. The doctor chapter includes some discussion on the state of medical care in 1870.The Character Name Creator tables are good as far as they go: 371 male first names, 982 surnames, 155 nicknames (mostly male-oriented), and 52 female first names, all derived from historical sources. The tables are heavily focused on those with English names. There are no name tables for Native Americans, Mexicans, Chinese, Irish, Germans, etc.The random encounter tables aren't bad, just limited. They cover people, not animals, weather, or natural hazards. The tables distinguish between wilderness and town encounters, but without breaking down by terrain type or town type. Extra tables cover What They're Doing (again distinguishing between town and wilderness) and Quirks (a distinguishing feature, trait, or status), which are nice touches. You might wind up rerolling if you wind up with weird combinations (like a nun who's armed to the teeth and scouting robbery targets).The book is well-produced. The artwork consists largely of period woodcuts, drawings, and photos. The diagrams are clearly drawn and well annotated. The book is easy to look at. It's written clearly. It's bound well.I recommend the book for use in an Old West RPG setting. I imagine it could also be helpful if you're writing Western fiction.

I really wanted to give this 3.5 stars, but rounded up. This is a great resource if you're looking for floorplans and some sketch ideas for certain Frontier town buildings, but it falls short when you're looking at the larger picture of a Frontier town. In other words, they don't give you a good idea of what businesses might be in a town aside from saloons, dance halls, and hotels. It would have been nice (if a bit mundane) to have plans for a typical butcher shop, blacksmith's operation, bakery, and so on, and even a rough plan or two for a complete town. I could easily have lived without the stock NPC section if it was replaced by something like that. It's also worth noting that Frontier towns tended to "look" different based on their economies. This is touched on here, but there's not enough about it for a beginner to understand how many saloons a trail drive town might have in comparison to a more settled farming community, or when compared to a mining camp or railhead town. This will help you create some buildings, but if you're looking for a complete "cowtown creator" you'll have to add some other sources to your list.

The Knuckleduster Cowtown Creator by Forrest Harris is a very detailed, very complete, source for making a Western Town for a Wild West setting. While made by Knuckleduster Publications for Deadlands it can be used for others systems, including the Deadlands d20 system and the Fudge system. Or, if a fan of the Old West, you could just read it from front to back. There are tons of fun facts, short TRUE stories and information you can enjoy. The book deals with town types, gives data on the cattle business, the many stores, hotels and saloons that a town has, the ins and outs of running a railroad or stagecoach line, some points about the facts and myths of law enforcement and even a small bibliography of books.

Great book, fast service.

This was a very helpful book. I would highly recommend it to anyone looking for help designing a western setting or even just looking to get the creative juices flowing. Contains good examples of town types, establishment types, and even different local characters. A good investment!

The Knuckleduster Cowtown Creator is the best Source Book you can get to run a Wild West Roleplaying game. It explains in detail a lot of the living in the Wild West. What a Railhead is and how the living was in this Towns. In detail it explains to you how a cattle trail was done in the old west. Description of Saloons and other establishments give you a good image. I'm not a native english speaker, but it was not difficult to understand this book.