JOhnny13

Doomtown: Reloaded contains typical mechanics features in deck building and card games. For starters, players form a deck of cards to use as a play hand and a gambling hand. The gambling hand holds, in the gambling phase, a mechanic almost identical to poker in that the player with the lowest hand rank goes first and collects the ghost rocks betted by other players. This initial gambling mechanic allows any player to potentially win the hand due to the outcome being luck based. However, the players have reaction cards that can alter the outcome based on the whether a hand is honest or cheating. This adds variety to the game so that this phase is not simply a draw and reveal stage.

The upkeep phase and high noon phases give players the chance to build saloons and establishments to gain control points, move their dudes which are their playing pawns, add abilities to their dudes or initiate shoot-outs for territorial gain. The game enforces the behavior of fighting and establishing temporary alliances amongst players to avoid any player from having too many control points at the end of the high noon phase.
The rules do not limit the amount of actions a player can perform during the high noon phase which can have its advantages and disadvantages. In a 2 player game, the flow of taking turns to perform actions becomes seamless as it is easier to keep track of the abilities of an opponent player´s dudes and the strategies said player is following. This immediately becomes more cumbersome in a 4 or more player game as the high noon phase now can span over 30 player turns. In some cases, players decide to not continue playing by passing or run out of playable dudes. This in consequence makes the game a waiting game where only a subset of the group of players are actively participating in the high noon phase of that day.

Once all players have passed, the day is considered finished and the influence and control points of each player are counted. If no player has an amount of control points greater to the amount of influence points of the individual sum of the dudes of each player the game continues. If the opposite happens, the game is over. These winning conditions while simple to achieve are difficult to attain when multiple players are in-game. At the end of each day, a significant amount of time needs to be taken to compare control points and influence points for each player.

Though the high noon phase in its entirety feels long with multiple players, the shoot-outs are more interesting as players can aid others by adding their dudes to the targeted player´s posse. Having companions in a posse is favored because each dude grants an additional bonus to the drawing hand of the player. With these additional bonuses comes the risk of taking more casualties since every dude in a losing posse can potentially get a casualty. However, as in the gambling phase, resolution cards can turn the tables on the outcome which again brings a sense of variety to the game. This allows for players participating in a shoot-out to have, potentially, even odds of winning.

Doomtown:Reloaded invites players to mix and match dudes of different gangs for further experimentation as these cards are paid depending on the amount of influence points the dude has. Adding dudes of a different gang make for more interesting combinations in shoot-outs as normal dudes can be combined with harrowed type dudes. A strategic example would be to use a harrowed dude to take casualties in a lost shoot-out since they take an extra casualty to be discarded. The game does not penalize the player for using both types such as in other card games where attacks can deal damage to characters of a certain type.

Players who are in need of an additional bonus can choose to try and accomplish jobs to get ahead of the curve but these can only be won by a victorious shoot-out which is very difficult to accomplish in a game with multiple players.

Overall, Doomtown:Reloaded offers players a wide variety of game mechanics to experiment with and a plethora of cards to build the ultimate deck. It sticks to its western theme by relying on the traditional gameplay of poker and the mechanics of calling out and initiating a shoot-out.