I'm a big fan of keeping it simple. Just have them roll initiative and add a boost die for Quick Draw or any other applicible talents. The default initiative skill I'd use would be Cool, but if the player can come up with a convincing reason to use some other skill, such as Vigilance, then I'd allow it.

I might leave room for other factors to modify the roll. If someone hasn't been in a dual like this before, make a fear check. Are they a gun expert, by having more ranks in Ranged Light than their opponet, thus showing how competent they are with their weapon, then give a boost die.

Remember, if you want to be good at a fast draw you should be a Scoundrel. A Scoundrel doesn't win initiative by having a high Cool skill alone. A Scoundrel who wants to will gunfights will invest heavily in Rapid Reaction to buy extra successes in initiative. Rapid Reaction is why the Scoundrel is the quick draw master in the main book.

Well, first... I don't have the book at hand, but I think the wording is "X skill may be used for this situation"; it's not ironclad.

The very ESSENCE of this system is flexibility in use of skills for situations JUST like this. For example... "Cool" has NOTHING to do with how fast you are on the draw. It deals with how efficiently you process information about a situation. Lotta stuff is happening, do you keep your cool and act, or do you get overwhelmed and hesitate?

The point is your expanding the scope of vigilance to step into a situation beyond it's normal scope to be used in any and every combat situation a player could just explain quite simply how to use vigilance instead of cool where as the same could not be done with cool since it specifies needed awareness of the target. This could easily result in a character blowing off cool all together since vigilance would be intimately superior for initiative do to that effect of just stating them being vigilant of when an opponent was going to draw their gun or weapon instead of using limitations for both and thus making investment of both valuable.

Sorry if this was mentioned (I only quickly scanned the thread). There is a cool bit about a duel and running it on the Order66 Podcast a few episodes ago. They pointed out that you can make a fun mini game out of something like this. Doing challenges back and forth where advantages add or hurt future rolls, the winner needs a certain number of successes. Stuff like that.

This gave me an idea for my old west game that I never fully fleshed out. It was going to be a series of checks that would ebb and flow the advantage between players much the way Gain the Advantage does. This would go on until someone felt they had enough of the advantage that they would draw.

Once that happens the person that draws rolls cool, the other vigilance. All of the previous checks would add to this roll in some way... perhaps 2 successes = an upgrade? 3 advantages = a boost die? Stuff like that.

Anyone remember the seminal Boot Hill game, and the stats for various actors and movie characters?

John Wayne used his Toughened-5 as the most important skill in a gun fight.

Anyone remember the seminal Boot Hill game, and the stats for various actors and movie characters?

John Wayne used his Toughened-5 as the most important skill in a gun fight.

Hah, yeah, sadly my luck with dice means that my method of surviving a gunfight is being able to eat more bullets than the opponent.

As far as the whole RAW discussion goes... I think the little sidebar on pg 288 ("Fun first, rules second") trumps specific skill descriptions.

I believe that my own, personal, issue with the way Cool is integrated into initiative is that it pretty much makes it a required skill unless you want to be a Space Barney Fife. I'd at least allow a Discipline check in place of Cool in such cases... Cool representing a natural calmness, Discipline representing the results of a trained and focused mind. And then there's the whole thing about the career that should be pretty much synonymous with setting ambushes not having the critical skill of getting the upper hand in ambushes as a career skill... but that's neither here nor there for this discussion. (It does make for an amusing mental image when you realize that in a RAW ambush, a Trader is more naturally inclined to be able to get the first shot than an Assassin, due to less XP expenditure on Cool, and the tendency to have more invested in Presence due to better synergy. So, with the lethality of ranged weapons, and the 'go first and win' sort of environment it encourages... it's best to hope that the person shooting at you is merely a trained killer, and not a shopkeep that had a bad day.)

Anyone remember the seminal Boot Hill game, and the stats for various actors and movie characters?

John Wayne used his Toughened-5 as the most important skill in a gun fight.

Hah, yeah, sadly my luck with dice means that my method of surviving a gunfight is being able to eat more bullets than the opponent.

As far as the whole RAW discussion goes... I think the little sidebar on pg 288 ("Fun first, rules second") trumps specific skill descriptions.

I believe that my own, personal, issue with the way Cool is integrated into initiative is that it pretty much makes it a required skill unless you want to be a Space Barney Fife. I'd at least allow a Discipline check in place of Cool in such cases... Cool representing a natural calmness, Discipline representing the results of a trained and focused mind. And then there's the whole thing about the career that should be pretty much synonymous with setting ambushes not having the critical skill of getting the upper hand in ambushes as a career skill... but that's neither here nor there for this discussion. (It does make for an amusing mental image when you realize that in a RAW ambush, a Trader is more naturally inclined to be able to get the first shot than an Assassin, due to less XP expenditure on Cool, and the tendency to have more invested in Presence due to better synergy. So, with the lethality of ranged weapons, and the 'go first and win' sort of environment it encourages... it's best to hope that the person shooting at you is merely a trained killer, and not a shopkeep that had a bad day.)

I agree it is more about fun, the argument I was having was more about what the RAW actually said and what it said was that Cool is the stat you use when rolling initiative for players who where aware of imminent combat (such as the quick draw contest). Or in other words houserules are perfectly fine if that's what the group wants but let's call them what they are, house rules, not raw.

My only problem with using a stat other than cool as a house rule in my group is simply that I feel it makes cool become a nearly worthless skill if you can use something else for it as that's it predominant use that only it covers normally. It would seem to me that if a player wanted to be a quick draw specialist they should simply invest in it, as a character should make their bulid reflect their concept not just expect their build to be irrelevant and just shove anything in there to make sure their image is there no matter what.

I agree though it's a bit odd that the Assassin doesn't get cool, however in terms of hoping a trader shoots you than an assassin I wouldnt' want that at all simply for the fact that whilst the trader may be quicker he's bound to be a terrible shot (what with absolutely no combat skills, no combat talents, and agility likely not being a stat as important to focus on for their role), where as that asssisn is not only going to be far more likely to hit but also going to hit far harder with things like precise aim, tergeted blow, lethal blows, anatomy lessons, and deadly accuracy.

Though the lack of cool may be more do the fact that most assassins shouldn't be attacking a target that's aware of them but instead lining up something from a distance with a long range sniper shot where the target doesn't even know they're in the crosshairs until they're dead.