I’d choose Aces & Eights for detailed frontier life, Deadlands for supernatural action, or Frontier Scum for fast, brutal outlaw play. All 3 use invented settings - not faithful history - so I’d start with the tone your group wants.
The next question: What do you want to do at the table? Run a ranch and plan each shot? Investigate monsters? Scrape by through robberies and strange jobs?
Quick Comparison
| Game | Setting and characters | Combat and rules | Main dangers |
|---|---|---|---|
| Aces & Eights: Reloaded | Alternate frontier; classless characters with varied careers | Detailed gunfights; heaviest rules of the 3 | Injuries, scarce supplies, and frontier disputes |
| Deadlands: The Weird West | Haunted frontier; gunslingers, occult heroes, and inventors | Cinematic action; moderate rules; requires SWADE | Monsters, magic, and fear |
| Frontier Scum | Surreal Lost Frontier; classless wanted outlaws | Light rules; firearms usually hit automatically | Sudden damage, dwindling resources, and body horror |
I’d compare setting, characters, combat, danger, and GM prep before buying. Then I’d agree on limits around violence, racism, and horror and how much character loss the group wants. If the choice still isn’t clear, I’d try one session before committing to a campaign.
Western TTRPG Comparison: Aces & Eights vs. Deadlands vs. Frontier Scum
1. Aces & Eights
Setting and tone
This section covers Aces & Eights: Reloaded. Its setting, Shattered Frontier, presents an alternate nineteenth-century North America shaped by an earlier Civil War, foreign intervention, and a tense stalemate. Governments, Indigenous nations, settlers, businesses, soldiers, and outlaws struggle for control of its disputed frontier, the Cauldron.
Characters and campaign activities
Characters develop through skills and talents, not fixed classes. Campaigns can follow ranchers, doctors, miners, law officers, or traders, with everyday work, travel, and frontier disputes driving play. Skills improve through use, so what characters do at the table shapes how they advance.
Combat and rules weight
Combat runs on a detailed action-count system. Weapon speed and action costs determine when characters draw, aim, move, and fire. The Shot Clock uses a target overlay, dice, and a playing card to show where a shot lands if it misses the aim point. Cover, hit location, and weapon handling all matter, but that detail makes gunfights more deliberate and hands-on than in a lighter system.
Danger and the supernatural
Every fight can come at a steep cost. Firearms, exposed positions, hit locations, and limited medical care make the game dangerous without a built-in supernatural layer. Ammunition, food, water, transportation, and money matter, too: surviving the frontier carries as much weight as winning a duel. The focus stays on survival, logistics, and tactical gunfights rather than spectacle. That rules-driven approach sets it apart from the horror of Deadlands and the harsher surrealism of Frontier Scum.
2. Deadlands
Setting and tone
Aces & Eights sticks to frontier grit. Deadlands adds horror and the supernatural. Pinnacle’s Deadlands: The Weird West takes place in 1884, on an alternate frontier that split from our timeline on July 4, 1863. Railroads, outlaws, and six-shooters share the West with monsters and ghost-rock inventions.
Characters and campaign activities
Play a gunslinger, lawman, scout, huckster, shaman, blessed, or mad scientist. Campaigns center on frontier jobs, monster hunting, and investigations. It’s a good match for groups that want occult clues, monster hunts, and cinematic shootouts.
Combat and rules weight
Savage Worlds Adventure Edition (SWADE) uses polyhedral dice, a Wild Die for Wild Cards, Bennies, and initiative cards for cinematic action where luck can turn a fight. Cards determine turn order, with Jokers adding a bonus. Hucksters tap into supernatural power through poker-inspired gambling mechanics.
Expect moderate rules weight. Combat options, conditions, powers, and fear effects support both action and horror, but take some learning. You’ll need the Deadlands setting book, the SWADE core rules, dice, a standard deck with both Jokers, and Benny tokens.
Danger and the supernatural
The Reckoners feed on fear, making monsters, cults, and other threats a constant menace. Frightening encounters call for Spirit-based Fear rolls, often with penalties from terrifying enemies. Fail a roll, and your character could end up Shaken - or worse.
Compared with Aces & Eights, Deadlands puts more weight on monsters, dread, and occult stakes. That makes it the better fit for groups looking for horror-infused Western action.
3. Frontier Scum
Setting and tone
If Deadlands makes the frontier uncanny, Frontier Scum makes it rotten and absurd. Karl Druid’s Frontier Scum is the least historical and most surreal and chaotic of these three games. Its Acid Western tone makes the Lost Frontier a grotesque wasteland shaped by greed, ruin, and body horror.
Characters and campaign activities
You play wanted outlaws: discharged deputies, undertakers, habitual jailbirds, or eccentric inventors. Robberies, bounties, scavenging, and odd jobs keep you scraping by. The focus is desperate outlaw play and violent dark comedy, not frontier professions or monster hunting.
Character creation is fast and classless. Four abilities - Grit, Slick, Wits, and Luck - usually range from -3 to +3, alongside freeform skills and character-defining gear. Build your outlaw first, then choose skills and equipment that fit.
Combat and rules weight
The rules are light. Players roll to act and avoid danger; the GM usually doesn’t roll for enemies. Each round starts with a group initiative roll. Firearms usually hit automatically, so players roll damage rather than accuracy. Only extreme shots need accuracy rolls. Damage dice can explode: roll the maximum, and you roll again for more damage.
Aces form a limited pool of rerolls. A natural 20 can add one, while a natural 1 can wipe them out. Saving them for a bad moment makes sense - but hold on too long, and everyone could end up empty-handed. These fast rules put the danger in positioning, timing, and sudden damage spikes rather than detailed attack math.
Danger and the supernatural
At 0 hit points or below, nonlethal damage requires a drop check. Fail, and you fall unconscious. Lethal damage starts death procedures that can leave you with minutes to weeks to live. The Hat Rule offers a possible reprieve: a hit can ruin or knock off your hat instead.
Uncanny relics and industrial horrors make the supernatural part of everyday survival, rather than a separate high-fantasy spell system. Play stays fast and vicious, with survival and improvisation mattering more than accuracy.
Compare Setting, Characters, Combat, and Danger
Use the table for a quick comparison, then check the notes for what each game asks of your group.
| Criterion | Aces & Eights | Deadlands | Frontier Scum |
|---|---|---|---|
| Setting | An alternate frontier for grounded, historical-style adventures | Recognizable frontier history that diverges after July 4, 1863, when supernatural forces reshape the West; horror, pulp action, and occult conspiracies | An intentionally unreal Lost Frontier built around surreal outlaw fiction and black comedy |
| Character creation and advancement | Detailed, classless characters; skills improve through use, and professions can change | Attributes, skills, Edges, and Hindrances shape characters and their development | Quick, classless creation with four broad abilities and freeform skills |
| Campaign activities | Travel, ranching, trade, law enforcement, and town-building | Investigations, monster hunting, and faction conflicts | Desperate jobs, theft, wandering, and escape |
| Combat | Detailed gunfight procedures, hit locations, and tactical positioning | Action-focused gunplay complicated by powers and supernatural enemies | Quick resolution with severe consequences |
| Rules weight | Heaviest of the three | Middle ground | Lightest, with more reliance on rulings |
| Danger | Supplies, terrain, social pressures, and specific injuries | Frontier hazards plus fear, curses, and monsters | Immediate threats and mounting resource pressure |
| Supernatural content | Limited or optional | Central, with an established mythology | Flexible; strange events don’t need a shared explanation |
| Ideal group | Players who enjoy logistics and long-term frontier campaigns | Players who want horror-infused gunslinging | Players who favor improvisation and chaotic survival |
Tone shapes your choice - and your prep. For Aces & Eights, establish shared goals and work out supplies, ranges, and cover. For Deadlands, prepare a posse mission, faction motives, clues, and threats that account for character powers. For Frontier Scum, leave some causes vague. Focus instead on visible consequences, job complications, and escape options.
Set boundaries around horror and violence before play. Treat these games as fiction, not history: separate invented institutions from documented harms, portray Indigenous nations as specific peoples with agency, and don’t use sacred traditions as monster lore.
Pros and Cons for Each Game
Use this recap to compare each game’s tone, prep work, and demands on the group.
| Game | Advantages | Tradeoffs | Best-fit group |
|---|---|---|---|
| Aces & Eights | Varied careers and detailed combat reward careful play. | The rules can slow tense scenes. | Players who enjoy mastering rules and want grounded frontier careers to matter. |
| Deadlands | Mixes shootouts with horror-driven investigation. | Balancing horror and gunplay takes care, and your edition changes the prep work. | Groups that want supernatural mysteries with gunslingers at center stage. |
| Frontier Scum | Fast setup and built-in tables reduce prep. | The brutal tone can wear on some groups, and advancement guidance is thinner. | Players comfortable with short arcs, sudden setbacks, and grim, surreal comedy. |
Match the workload to your GM’s comfort level: mastering rules in Aces & Eights, planning around an edition in Deadlands, or making table rulings in Frontier Scum. Before play, agree on a tone that fits your group, including the balance of investigation, dread, and shootouts.
Set lines and veils before play, too. Racism, colonial violence, forced displacement, body horror, torture, sexual violence, and substance use all need explicit limits.
Final Recommendation: Choose Tone First
The best choice comes down to tone, not setting labels alone.
Ask your group what they want: a grounded frontier, a haunted frontier, or an outlaw nightmare. Then pick the rules that support that experience.
- Aces & Eights suits grounded frontier life with tactical detail.
- Deadlands fits games where monsters, magic, and fear drive play.
- Frontier Scum delivers fast, brutal, surreal outlaw play.
Before committing, agree on tone, rules weight, how much character loss players can accept, and off-limits themes. If the group is split, run one session in the favored tone and use that experience to decide.
FAQs
Which Western TTRPG is easiest for beginners?
Frontier Scum is the easiest pick for beginners. It’s rules-light and classless, so you can get a game running fast with little prep. Gunfights keep things simple with automatic hits and scarce ammo.
Can these games support campaigns without frequent character deaths?
Yes, but it depends on how each game handles danger. Frontier Scum is fast and rules-light, with scarce resources and tough choices. The text doesn’t frame constant character death as a core part of play, so a GM can adjust the stakes to keep deaths less frequent.
Rules for replacing characters or using softer consequences can help keep campaigns going. Games built around frequent character death are a less natural fit for low-death play.
How can I test each game's tone in a one-shot?
Build a self-contained scenario that puts the game’s core mechanics and emotional stakes into play. Give the group a clear mission: scarce resources can drive a gritty survival story, while an investigation can set the stage for horror.
As you play, watch whether the rules create the mood you’re after. After the session, ask which moments stuck with players and whether the pacing and rule complexity met the group’s expectations. Use that feedback before committing to a campaign.
