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| Northstar's plastic cowboys are a great box to start playing. | source: North Star Games. |
Wargaming rules can be thick books of hundreds of pages containing a plethora of (in the vast majority of games, useless) rules, sometimes spread over several books, which in theory a player needs several to play (I'm looking at you, Warhammer!). Similarly, rules can be a couple dozen pages long so that one doesn't have to spend a weekend going through the library before one can finally start playing.
And then there's the game Ruthless, which has the official subtitle The Fastest Game in the Wild West. And he's probably right. The game is not only fast to play, but also to read and learn. It has two pages of rules. Yes, TWO pages. So the whole game is actually just a two-sided reference sheet!
The game's author is Mark Fastoso, who also offers it for free on his Fireball Forward website, but it only got more exposure thanks to the YouTube channel LittleWarsTV, which produced a couple of scenarios and a starter box for it. At first glance, it may seem like it's really not enough and can't possibly be enough to cover the rules, but on the other hand, how much would one need for a cowboy shootout that rule-wise?
Even the most famous gunfight (also known thanks to the star-studded film Tombstone) at the O.K. Corral lasted less than a minute, took place on about 15 square meters and less than 30 rounds were fired. One doesn't need fifty pages of dense text with tons of reference tables to do that.
And so it's fair to say that in addition to two pages of rules, Ruthless has three pages on scenarios and character creation, including examples of various character traits that add depth to the gameplay. For example, a drunk can't properly aim a gun, and lawmen can't start a gunfight before someone else starts shooting at them, and so on.
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| Like real cowboys, you'll want to pull aces out of your sleeve! |
Activation is done with poker cards (which is obviously a stylish thing in the context of the game), where players draw 5 cards per hand at the start of the game and whoever lays out the strongest card at the start of the round gets activated. With some cards having special abilities - figures automatically pass morale, sevens give extra activation, and aces wake up stunned figures.
Each character has two actions in the basic and there are classic wargaming actions like moving, shooting, melee, aiming, rolling for morale and a few specific actions like mounting/dismounting and reloading weapons.
Reloading is an interesting mechanic because each character counts ammo and the player must expect to run out of ammo at some point. No one prevents cowboys from shooting like crazy, and the rules also allow for the so-called fanning known from the movies at close range, when the gunslinger empties the entire revolver in the enemy's direction in an instant. But at that point, the shooter is just a target before he reloads again.
Weapons are only divided into basic categories with generic stats due to lack of space in the rules - we have the derringer, short and long revolver, bow, repeating and percussion rifle, and (only) double-barrel shotgun. And that's it. It may not be enough for the connoisseur, but it's the toll of the short rules. But to a person who is not looking for a Wild West simulation, but wants to "just" play a western, it's enough, and for the dimension of the game, it doesn't matter in the end what kind of revolver the cowboy has.
For example, the rules of A Gunslinger's Paradise have about 70 weapon types with their own rules, where you can enjoy 15 different stats and rules for Winchester rifles, but for the average person, I think just the breakdown on weapon types is enough. After all, apart from German machine guns and American self-loading rifles, even the WWII Bolt Action (review) has such generic weapons, and most games from the last hundred years also don't address different rules for the same categories of weapons.
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| You can't have a western without a train robbery! |
As far as the rest of the shooting and movement goes, the game behaves like virtually every other wargame. Movement is slowed down by obstacles or difficult terrain, while shooting is made worse by distance or obstacles between the shooter and the target.
If the target is hit, it is rolled on the table where it bought it and, depending on severity, continues on in the game with a penalty or is outright kaput. Which can be brutal at times, but if you just get hit in the chest with a shotgun in a saloon, it's probably right that you don't get up again.
Which is probably all there is to the rules themselves. There's no point in describing them more when you can look them up yourself and it won't take much more time than reading this review. But what else needs to be mentioned is the additional support in the form of scenarios. Mark has released two official script PDFs for Ruthless, offering a mini-campaign based on the spaghetti westerns with Clint Eastwood and Castro's death at the Little Bighorn. But both PDFs are priced unlike the basic rules, and not for very little money - each costs $25, which is quite a lot for a 24-page digital document.
But if you want to try something for free, you can reach for the scenarios from the previously mentioned LittleWarsTV, who have released the ultimate Tombstone starter set, which includes everything you need to play (cowboy models, trees, buildings, game mat, tokens and character cards), including their own mini-campaign focused on the Earps and the famous shootout in O.K. Coral.
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| Shootout at OK Coral | source: LittleWarsTV |
In addition, though, they have a great Riding Shotgun mini-campaign available for free on the site, where in five acts you take on the role of bandits who hijack a stagecoach with money, which they then try to escape to Mexico and the lawmen who understandably want to stop them.
In addition to this minicampaign, there are two free scripted one-shots. One focusing on the historic shootout in Dodge City and one again based on a western starring Clint Eastwood. Which together will last a person for several hours of fun, which is free. Plus, a paid PDF with several scenarios based on historical shootouts should be coming out soon from LWTV.
Verdict:
With two pages of rules, you won't find a more relaxed and easy to learn game. But even if the shortness looks bizarre at first glance, it's enough to play (and have fun) and it feels like playing a "full-fledged" game with thick rules. Ruthless is thus also suitable as a starter wargaming game for newcomers to the hobby or an ideal game to show your friends who might want to give the hobby a try.
Also, if you find this article helpful, you can buy something from Warlord store with my affiliate link or just buy me coffee. :)
Originally published in Czech on the ZeStolu portal. Unless otherwise stated, images taken from my Hobby Instagram page @Potan_CZ.
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