GATLING GUNS

RAPID FIRE WEAPONS by Walter O'Hara (Burke, VA. USA)

Sometimes I get the feeling that our Wild West skirmish games are simulating the Reel West as opposed to the "Real" item. However, since our objective for using this game in the first place is to have fun, we occasionally throw in an ahistorical item or two that probably had as much to do with our American Frontier era as a 1957 Chevrolet. Which brings us to our subject at hand, the use of rapid fire weapons in the old West such as the Gatling Gun or the British Gardner Gun. Now, we all know that the spectacle of a gang of cowboys pushing a large military weapon down the streets of a typical Western town was unlikely in the extreme; yet for those wonderful Sam Peckinpah-style gory endings, there is nothing like a gun that can spit lead many time promiscuously. Besides, they did exist in this time period, so why not throw them in?

Gatling-style guns can be added to the Rules with No Name relatively easily. The big difference between regular firing procedures and rapid fire weapons is that there are no Aimed shots possible. Every time you fire a rapid fire weapon you are, in effect, Blazing Away. The second major feature of rapid fire weapons is they are an "area fire" weapon; therefore they share some characteristics of shotgun fire.

Procedure:

• Aiming Points
• Range
• Cranking the Gun
• Checking for Jams

Aiming Points: Choose a left and right aiming point for a firing area, similar to the shotgun aiming points. The aiming points need to be 6 inches apart. At long and extreme ranges, the aiming points are 8 inches apart. All potential targets within that area suffer from the result of the impact of gunfire within the firing area.

Range: Check the range to target "area." Use following range table to determine the number of dice to roll per individual within the firing area:

RAPID FIRE WEAPON	POINT BLANK	CLOSE	MEDIUM	LONG	EXTREME
RANGE	2"	6"	9"	12"	20+"
NUMBER OF DICE	4	5	4	3	2

Modifiers:
Target in cover	-1		Shootist or Legend	+1		Flesh wound on either arm	-1
Firing after moving	-2		Citizen	-1		Serious wound, anywhere	-2
						Target knocked down/out	+1
Characters firing a Rapid Fire weapon receive no Blazing Away bonus - that's what these weapons do all the time.

Cranking the Gun: Roll the number of dice per stand in target area, and check versus the standard Hit Location & Effect table. If the character rolls a 5 OR a 6, that counts as a hit.

Jamming: If a character rolls more 1s than 6s, the gun isn't out of ammo, it's jammed (we assume that prodigious amounts of ammunition are available). Early weapons of this type were notoriously unreliable. Use the "Fix Gun" action to fix the weapon.

>Ammunition: We assume that a plentiful supply of ammo exists for this weapon. They were loaded on their own special caissons that could hold a relatively large amount of ammo. If you choose to limit the ammo to the rapid-fire weapon, and thus incorporate running out of ammunition into the game, it will take 2 actions to reload it as opposed to one.

Other effects of Rapid Fire Weapons: If a large group of cattle are located near the weapon (within 12") when it fires, immediately check to see if the cattle stampede. If Citizens are located anywhere near a firing area (10"), they will immediately Panic as if they have lost their NERVE (as described in the existing HATRED & FEAR rules). All Gunmen, Shootists and Legends must perform a Nerve Check when located in the firing area of the rapid fire weapon; otherwise they perform a Duck Back (or run for cover) during their next action. If they pass the nerve check, they may perform other actions as normal.

Return to The Rules With No Name

Return to The Foundry