The West Canyon Campaign

The West Canyon Chronicles

Last spring, while working on a way to incorporate Boot Hill into my play-by-post fantasy campaign, I started bouncing story ideas around for a crossover.  I was also looking at tourist-y things to do with my kids when they came out to visit for the summer and I learned that the area I was living in was rife with possibilities for a mixed supernatural and historically-themed Wild West campaign with mystery and adventure around every bend.  I used the basic geography of the region (Spanish Fork Canyon) as the basis for the setting, converted the town of Glister into Cactus Brush, and used the old Boot Hill modules Mad Mesa, Ballots and Bullets, and Burned Bush Wells as a starting point. 

As I began to write, ideas literally flowed through me.  I wanted more than the standard Western setting that Boot Hill reflected and began incorporating horror elements with a little bit of Deadlands and Fistful of Zombies thrown in for good measure.  I filled an entire single subject notebook in just over a month.

I decided to go with D&D 3.5 (for compatibility with my ongoing campaign – I do not want to devote the time or energy converting characters to 5^th edition) and used the standard classes from the Player’s Handbook but changed weapon and armor proficiencies to reflect the time period.  I picked up a baggie of those little plastic Cowboys and Indians to use as minis and was ready to go.  The game proven to be pretty entertaining so far and I am considering both a pre- and sequel based on Colonial Gothic, Gangbusters, and Cthulhu by Gaslight and another using that combines the Weird War II product line with Godlike – A World on Fire.

Background:  

The party members are all living on or near a modestly-sized horse ranch in the Utah Territory in 1875 in West Canyon about 30 miles from the rough and tumble railroad town of Mad Mesa and 75 miles from what will eventually become Salt Lake City.  The Black Hawk War ended five years ago and a tentative peace has been established between the White settlers and Native American tribes living in the area.  The remains of the town of Cactus Brush stand at the mouth of the canyon 20 miles north of the ranch.  Cactus Brush had been a railroad maintenance town and boasted smithies, water towers, a roundhouse, switching station, and several sidings where trains could be repaired off to the side of the main line.  It was abandoned after a landslide destroyed the tracks and several buildings, prompting the Union Pacific to reroute to higher ground further north and move its repair yard to Mad Mesa.

The ranch, known as Frostborn, is operated by Ezekiel “Zeke” Kane.  Zeke raises and sells horses and his buyers include the railroad, cattle drivers, and the US Army/Utah militia.  He is on cautiously-friendly terms with the Timpanogos Utes and has more tentative relations with the Black Hawks.

Zeke is a widower (his wife Beatrice died of consumption 12 years ago), is roughly 58 years old, and has deeply tanned and weathered skin.  His once brown hair is almost completely gray and worn short.  He shaves once every three or four days in the summer but not at all in the winter.  He and his wife never had children of their own but his brother Job's sons, Noah and John, came to live with him after the Civil War and started working on the ranch.  Their habit of calling him Uncle Zeke soon spread to the other ranch hands and their families.  Zeke has never been particularly religious believing that “folk should be allowed to believe what they want to believe” but has little tolerance for “them polygamous Mormons” after an incident with them (shortly before his wife passed a traveling preacher suggested that Zeke could select a new wife from his congregation).  He has little tolerance for government, which he admits is somewhat hypocritical considering the Army buys over half of the horses he raises, and even less for banks as he is still paying off the mortgage on the ranch. 

Mule deer, elk, coyotes, and wolves are frequent sights in the canyon and there are always rumors of mountain lions and bears filtering in from neighboring cattle and sheep ranches in the canyon.  Still, the rumor Zeke pays closest attention to is that of “Caballo Diablo”, a coal black stallion who is said to live in the canyon's hidden gulches.  Dozens of men have died trying to catch this legendary horse and the Utes hold the beast in awe.

Characters:

• Carter Blackburn (Rogue) – a would-be novelist from Philadelphia arrives in Mad Mesa to gain life experience and learn about the “Frontier”.  He has an inquisitive nature and a highly romanticized vision of “Cowboy Life”.

• “Croatoan” (Ranger) – Zeke's main ranch hand, half-White/half-Native American, responsible for tending the herd and the training of the horses
• Damian Mulholland (Paladin) – born in St. Louis, Damian began his career as a deputy but decided to pursue a more divine path and entered the seminary to become a priest.  A man he had arrested several years before was released from prison and set fire to his house, killing his parents and younger brother.  Damian tracked the man west, finally catching him in Mad Mesa.
• Jedediah “Jed” Smith (Barbarian) – a mountain man living along the edges of the canyon.  He trades fur and meat to the ranch or in Mad Mesa for things he cannot make or acquire in the wilderness.  He is the grandson of the famous frontiersman of the same name.

Note: To further establish the setting in its time frame, reference famous works (books, music, art, etc) as being “new releases” or landmarks that are under construction.