Gambling in El Dorado County
Some Boot Hill modules have specific rules for gambling, where that is not the case the 3rd Edition Gambling rules are below for future reference.
Gambling
Gambling was an accepted profession in many parts of the West. The two most popular, both card games, were poker and faro.
To represent poker, set a wager for each hand. Each participating player bets that amount every hand. The “pot” is then the wager multiplied by the number of players. Each player rolls one 20-sided die, with the pot going to the highest roll. If the high rolls are tied, both players double their wager and roll again.
To represent faro, the Judge (or one of the players, if his character is the dealer) acts as the “house.” Everyone wagers the same amount of money, including the house. The dealer rolls one 20-sided die. Every other player also rolls one die. Anyone who beats the house score wins, taking the wagered amount. The house wins ties.
Professional gamblers have an edge. Besides having vast experience with the possible card combinations and knowing the odds on each, they can manipulate cards and often take advantage of information they are not supposed to know. Such cheating was accepted as part of the profession, provided that the cheater was not clumsy enough to get caught.
Professional gamblers in the BOOT HILL® game (anyone with Gambling skill) have two advantages. The first represents their knowledge of the game, rather than actual cheating. If a character with Gambling skill rolls a number less than his Gambling skill score, he gets to split the difference (and round fractions up). For example, a character with Gambling skill 15 who rolls an 8 gets to add one-half of the difference to his roll. The difference between 15 and 8 is 7, half of 7 (round up) is 4, and 8 plus 4 is 12, so the gambler has a roll of 12 for that hand. This is relatively safe in that, since the character isn’t cheating, no one can catch him doing anything underhanded. Still, a liquored-up cowboy who’s just lost his month’s pay may not care too much about the formality of evidence.
Alternatively, a gambler can cheat. This works the same as usual, except the gambler gets to roll twice, modifying each roll if it’s less than his skill score, and use whichever roll he wants. Every time the gambler does this, however, he must make a Gambling skill check. If this check fails, then every other character at the table (even those who aren’t playing!) makes an Observation check. Characters who have Gambling skill make a Gambling check as well. If any one of these checks succeeds, that character has detected the cheating. At that point, it is up to the character how he handles it. Customarily, NPCs will demand that all of their losings for the night be returned before going for their guns.
Other games were played, including keno, roulette, and three card monte. If roulette or keno is played, only the house may cheat. If a professional gambler can find a sucker to play three card monte with him, the gambler will never lose, but must make a Gambling check every round, with a +3 bonus.
This message was last edited by the GM at 09:40, Fri 22 Apr 2022.
