First Play: Bad Day at Buena Roca

"You awaken in the morning to the sounds of thunder."

That is how your bad day at Buena Roca begins. The game sets the story of a town that has sprung up due to mining activities in the area. Actually, the town was built by one main mining outfit and you are a deputy that the company pays to keep the peace. Things have been going pretty well with only the minor trespasses that one would see in any town. But on this day, that all changes. The thunder isn't from the skies, it's from the guns of a bloodthirsty gang that has ridden into town. And they are looking for you...

Bad Day at Buena Roca is based on a larger and more detailed RPG called Aces & Eights. There are some paragraphs I skipped over that I assumed were instructions on how to use Buena Roca in a larger campaign. As new as I am to RPGs, I have never played it, much less heard of it, before now. It is one of the games that came in my Bundle of Holding purchase.

The style of Bad Day is that of a Choose Your Own Adventure book. The only difference to a CYOA book is that here, some of the paths you take are decided by a die roll. The rolls are made using dice rolls against attribute scores your character has: Strength, Wisdom, or Dexterity. The die roll might be negated by your previously finding some other clue or object. Inevitably, you will find yourself in a shootout. Shootouts are resolved via d20 rolls against a Dexterity attribute value to hit, alternating between you and the opponent, and d6 rolls for damage on successful hits. If you survive, you move on. If not, well, consider yourself the Bill Murray of a western-themed Groundhog Day.

I used to read those Choose Your Own Adventure books when they were at their height. I even remember a couple of them being western themed. Playing this game brought on a small portion of of nostalgia. Not enough to make me want to run out and acquire a bunch of those books, but enough to remember the "good ol' days".

Actually, I don't recommend printing it, unless you just gotta. Just use the PDF file and use the page up/down buttons to find the next section to read. All you need beyond that are a d20 and d6 dice, a pencil, and piece of paper to keep track of your gun fights. If you aren't the kind who just happens to have some of them fancy dice sitting around, Google has a simple dice roller app thingy at the top of the search results if you search "dice roller".

No, I won't be providing a play-by-play of how my first attempt went, it gives too much away. I will say I had tied up two men, and shot three others, then got killed. Actually, I have yet to win the game, so the attempts are ongoing. It won't scratch the role-player's itch, but it's a pretty solid diversion for someone looking pass some alone time with some dice rolling and hp counting wrapped in a shoot-em-up western story.

And while I am on this subject, I got to wondering if there were any solo games made for D&D along these same lines, and I found one! So if that's more your style, check out The Saint's Tomb. It's a short game though. Shorter than Buena Roca. In fact, it took me about as long to make up a new level 1 character from scratch (it's made specifically for a level 1 adventurer) as it did to play the game to a successful completion. Maybe it's not so short if I had tried different paths. For those who are have never played, there is a link on the page to where you can get a pre-made character sheet. I might have to remember that link for later.