Building the Old West

The Sheriff’s office and the gallows are natural story elements for a Western themed game. But our town needs a reason to be there and each building needs a reason to exist.

Water is a major reason for towns to exist. With regular access to water, you can grow food, raise livestock, communicate and trade along rivers and railroads need water stops for the steam locomotives. And access to water resources caused more than a few fights. Water features would probably be better suited to a rural or wilderness area.

But gold rushes did create a lot of boom and bust towns. A gold mine could be a project unto itself but a town with an assayers office and maybe a lawyer to transfer claims and deeds would add a reason for rough and tumble types to come into town. And gold robberies and claim jumping gives more narrative reasons for gunfights in our town.

The general store is self explanatory. Our citizens need a place to get their supplies. And the real money in a gold rush town is selling to the miners.

A saloon is of course nearly mandatory as a place to gamble, get liquor and start fights. And of course separate miners from their gold.

I think our town also needs a telegraph and post office. By itself it implies the existence of other communities. And if you’re getting mail and telegrams, then the Sheriff can send for help or be warned of the imminent arrival of bad hombres. And a post office is a Federal government responsibility so now we can add a Federal presence in the form of US Marshall’s or the US Cavalry.

I’ll add more buildings later on but I’ll try to come up with narrative reasons to add new ones.