# Haunted West

A Weird West TTRPG by Chris Spivey and Darker Hue Studios that puts overlooked people of the American frontier at the center, with a researched history track, an alternate Reconstruction setting, modular weirdness, and the d100 Ouroboros System (plus a PbtA hack in the back).

## At a Glance

Weird West • d100 Ouroboros with Jacks • 3 rules modes + PbtA hack • Lifepath Paragons • Reconstruction alternate history • Modular magic, Mythos, mad science • 2022 Silver ENnie Best Rules

## Why It Fits

Pick Haunted West when your table wants a western that teaches real frontier history and then lets you decide how weird the West gets. It rewards groups that will invest in Session Zero lifepaths and a dense corebook. If you only want the setting, the Haunted West World PbtA hack is in the same volume.

## Fit Facts

- Prep: Medium
- Price: Paid

## Facets

- Genres: Historical, Horror, Supernatural, Western
- Mechanics: Campaign, Character Customization, Rules Heavy, Skill-Based
- Themes: Cinematic, Dark, Mature Themes
- Decision tags: Award-Winning

## Scores

- Complexity: 4/5
- New GM Fit: 2/5
- Roleplay Focus: 4/5
- Combat Focus: 3/5
- Tactical Depth: 3/5
- Campaign Depth: 5/5

## Best For

- Groups that want a Weird West campaign centered on people Hollywood Westerns erased
- Tables willing to learn a dense d100 system, or to use the included PbtA hack instead
- Campaigns that mix researched history or alternate Reconstruction with optional magic, Mythos, or mad science

## Avoid If

- You want a short, rules-light western you can teach in one session from a thin book
- You want a pulp Weird West that never engages Reconstruction, racial terror, or colonial violence
- You need an official VTT module and a deep published adventure line beyond the corebook

## Explorer Notes

Haunted West is for groups who want a Weird West campaign that treats the real history of the American frontier as the main text, then lets the table dial weirdness up or down. It suits tables that will read an 800-page corebook, build characters through lifepaths, and play people who were usually cut out of Western stories: Black cowboys, Indigenous nations, Chinese immigrants, Mexican communities, Jewish settlers, women with agency, and LGBTQ+ people on the frontier.

Skip it if you want a short rules-light western, a pulp game that never talks about Reconstruction, or a single fixed system with no modes. The default Ouroboros rules are dense. A Powered by the Apocalypse hack sits in the back for tables that want the setting without the crunch.

## What the game is

[Haunted West](https://www.darkerhuestudios.com/shop/haunted-west-corebook-digital) is a standalone Weird West TTRPG by Chris Spivey and a large creative crew, published by Darker Hue Studios in 2021. Spivey also created the award-winning Call of Cthulhu sourcebook Harlem Unbound. The pitch is hope through struggle: an Old West where the people whitewashed out of popular history are the default heroes, with optional magic, Mythos, steam tech, mad science, dinosaurs, and aliens.

The book gives you two history tracks. One is a researched account of the real American West. The other is Haunted West: Reconstruction, an alternate timeline where Reconstruction lasts longer, Indigenous sovereignty has more room, and Black communities get more federal backing, while backlash and violence still shape daily life. You can run either track with no weirdness, light weirdness, or full Weird West.

## Publication history and editions

Darker Hue funded the game on Kickstarter (more than five times its goal) and released the corebook in September 2021. The digital edition is 806 pages. A hardback-and-digital bundle sold for $79.95 on the publisher store and is sold out there; the digital corebook still sells on the publisher site for $29.95 and on DriveThruRPG as a $39.95 watermarked PDF (product [368204](https://www.drivethrurpg.com/en/product/368204/Haunted-West-Digital?affiliate_id=1659151), listed September 21, 2021). ISBN 978-0-9988515-3-2.

In 2022 the game won the Silver ENnie for Best Rules and was nominated for the Diana Jones Award for Excellence in Gaming.

## What you need to play

One book covers the full game: history, alternate Reconstruction, the Ouroboros rules in three modes, twelve Paragon archetypes, lifepath creation, settlement building, a bestiary, magicks, the sample adventure Night of the Aerostat, and the appendix PbtA hack Haunted West World. You need percentile dice for the default system, or two six-siders for the PbtA hack. There is no free quickstart. Print hardbacks are scarce at the publisher; digital is the reliable buy today.

## Core rules and play structure

The Ouroboros System is a d100 roll-under engine with degrees of success. Skills sit on a 1-100 scale. For every full 10 points you roll under a skill, you earn a Jack. Jacks can improve the current success or float "down the River" to bank for later auto-successes or +10% boosts. Doubles are extreme successes. Trait rolls use a d20 against 1-20 Traits.

Characters track Vitality and Lucidity (body and mind), Gumption (damage reduction and recovery), and Grit (a spend/burn resource). Western Codes are paired drives that total a fixed pool; acting against a strong Code can force a roll, and flipping a Code can grant a bonus when the story demands it.

Three built-in modes change the load:

- Dead Man's Hand is the default full rules set.

- Quick Draw is narrative: players narrate until the Balladeer (GM) Calls Their Bluff, then Jacks decide the outcome. The Balladeer does not roll.

- The Badlands adds stamina-spent tactical actions and reactions for map-minded fights.

An appendix adds Haunted West World, a complete Powered by the Apocalypse version with playbooks for the same archetypes, including a 12+ critical success.

## Characters / roles / advancement

Player characters are Paragons. You pick one of twelve flexible archetypes: Academic, Drover, Gadgeteer, Gunfighter, Holy, Hunter, Law, Libertine, Mystic, Official, Practitioner, and Resolute. Each can cover several historical roles (a Holy might be a preacher, rabbi, or medicine person; Law might be a U.S. Marshal or Indigenous Lighthorse).

Lifepath tables walk a Paragon from birth through childhood, adolescence, and archetype-tied adult events across the game's Western eras. Rolls change Traits, Skills, Contacts, and Western Codes. Peculiarities are quirks and small bonuses. Propensities are tiered archetype abilities that climb from skill boosts into clearly supernatural effects at higher tiers.

Session Zero is expected. Full lifepath creation is campaign work, not a five-minute pickup build.

## Signature mechanics

- Jacks and the River. Success margin becomes a resource you can spend now or bank.

- Modular weirdness. Alchemy, Demonology, Medium, Pharaon (magical cards), Psychoscopy, and Weird Science are optional packages. The book avoids turning living cultural religions into spell lists.

- Settlement building. Point-buy and random tables build boomtowns, ghost towns, Hell-on-Wheels camps, and stranger places (including an example crossroads that touches multiple Americas).

- Reputation. As Paragons earn experience, the West notices them. NPCs react with awe, fear, or pressure.

- Adversary tiers. Wranglers, Shootists, Cold-Blooded, and Beyond rate how dangerous a being is, from minions to things you cannot fight straight.

## What play feels like

In Dead Man's Hand, sessions feel like a crunchy historical western that can tilt into monster hunts, secret wars, or pulp gadget fights when you plug weird modules in. Quick Draw plays closer to collaborative storytelling with periodic challenge rolls. The Badlands plays like a tactical skirmish layer on top of the same characters. Reviews consistently say the history chapters are the heart of the book: heavy, specific, and meant to change how the table pictures the West before anyone rolls dice.

## Running the game

The Balladeer is project manager, narrator, and referee. Prep can lean on the settlement generator, historical-figure writeups with plot hooks, location gazetteer ("Stops Along the Trail"), Bags of Nails adventure seeds, and the full Night of the Aerostat adventure. The sample campaign frame Hidden Science leans into ancient alien overlords and a secret war. The book is long enough that many Balladeers will run from a subset of chapters rather than mastering every disease, chase, and crafting subsystem on day one.

## Campaign fit

Built for campaigns. Lifepaths, Reputation, Propensity tiers, and Reconstruction timelines pay off over many sessions. One-shots are possible with pregens, Quick Draw, the PbtA hack, or a single Bag of Nails, but that skips most of what the corebook is for. Solo play is not supported.

## Reception and awards

Critical reception is strong on the history and representation, mixed-to-cautious on rules weight. [Gnome Stew](https://gnomestew.com/haunted-west-first-impression/) (Jared Rascher, November 2021) praises the Reconstruction timeline and lifepaths, and notes the rules can be hard to hold all at once. [Fantasy-Faction](http://fantasy-faction.com/2022/haunted-west-from-darker-hue-studios-tabletop-role-playing-game-review) (Richard Marpole, April 2022) calls the book important and sprawling, loves the bestiary and historical folks chapters, and warns that the d100 rules are a serious investment (with the PbtA hack as a lighter door). Game Industry News called it an eight-hundred-page masterpiece of history, setting, and mechanics.

On DriveThruRPG (checked November 6, 2026) the digital listing averages 4.8 from 24 ratings (20 five-star, 3 four-star, 1 three-star), with 4 written reviews, and holds a Gold best-seller medal. Awards: 2022 Silver ENnie for Best Rules; 2022 Diana Jones Award nominee.

## Where it is strongest

- Own-voices Weird West that centers people erased from the Hollywood West.

- A detailed Reconstruction alternate history that stays hard-edged rather than utopian.

- Modular weirdness: historical western, folk horror, Mythos, or pulp sci-fi without rewriting the book.

- Three Ouroboros modes plus a full PbtA hack in one volume.

- Documented award recognition for the rules design.

## Where it can frustrate groups

- About 800 pages. Learning the full Dead Man's Hand rules takes real study time.

- Lifepath creation is slow; poor fit for casual one-shots unless you use pregens or the PbtA hack.

- Some reviewers find large history chapters dry as game text even when they value them as history.

- Hardcover stock at the publisher is sold out; digital is the easy path.

- No official VTT module called out in primary sources we checked.

## Content and safety notes

Expect slavery and its aftermath, racial terror (including the Klan), broken treaties, massacres, disease, sexual exploitation, and gun violence, alongside ghosts, demons, Mythos entities, and body horror when weird modules are on. The book includes safety-tool discussion and sensitivity-consultant credits. Do a Session Zero before any Reconstruction or historical arc.

## Best starting path

- Buy the [DriveThruRPG PDF](https://www.drivethrurpg.com/en/product/368204/Haunted-West-Digital?affiliate_id=1659151) or the publisher digital edition.

- Read the foreword, Ouroboros overview, and the Reconstruction chapter (or the historical overview if you want the real timeline).

- Decide mode: Dead Man's Hand, Quick Draw, Badlands, or Haunted West World (PbtA).

- Run Session Zero with lifepaths (or pregens), pick how weird the West is, then start with Night of the Aerostat or a short Bag of Nails.

## Research notes

Sources checked November 6, 2026: Darker Hue Studios product and press pages; DriveThruRPG public API for product 368204; 2022 ENnie Awards Best Rules listing; Gnome Stew first impression; Fantasy-Faction review; Game Industry News quote on the publisher page; Deep Cuts / Bobby Derie essay on Mythos adjacency; Ahrefs US keyword and SERP pulls for haunted west / haunted west rpg. No AI-art disclosure found (DriveThruRPG aiStatus human-created). Original Darker Hue setting, not a licensed franchise.

## Links

- Explorer page: https://www.ttrpg-games.com/item/haunted-west
- Agent JSON: https://www.ttrpg-games.com/api/games/haunted-west.json
- Publisher or official site: https://www.darkerhuestudios.com/shop/haunted-west-corebook-digital
- Reviews or retailer page: https://www.drivethrurpg.com/en/product/368204/Haunted-West-Digital?affiliate_id=1659151