This is intended to be a game of the mythic or Hollywood West. It should be a stage upon which the characters of the Howard Hawks and John Ford westerns could stride. Perhaps even the stereotypical characters of Silverado. However, it should also welcome the darker, angrier, disillusioned characters typical of the Clint Eastwood westerns.
The eastern half of what would become New Mexico became part of the union in 1845 as part of the Texas Annexation. The rest was ceded to the United States by Mexico as part of the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo which ended the Mexican-American War in 1848. In 1850 the Territory of New Mexico was designated containing most of modern New Mexico, Arizona, and smaller portions of several other states. The modern southern boundaries were drawn in 1853 when Mexico, under pressure, sold about 29,000 square miles of territory to the United States as the Gadsden Purchase. In 1863 the New Mexico territory was partitioned in half to create the Arizona territory. New Mexico would finally become the 47th state in 1912. Arizona became the 48th state that same year.
In 1875 the New Mexico Territory was one of the last bastions of wide open free range cattle ranching. The best lands in Texas had been claimed for over a decade and the barbed wire and railroad heads in Wichita and Dodge City, Kansas were starting to section off that land. The Apache wars had ended two years before in April, 1873 when the last of the war chiefs surrendered in Arizona. The great war chief Cochise had gone back to the reservation a year before in 1872. Although, there were disturbing rumors coming out of the Sioux reservations in the Dakota Territory. The first trans-continental railroad was completed in 1869 but the railroads wouldn't be extended into the New Mexico territory until 1878. There are two major players in Lincoln, New Mexico in 1875. The first is John Simpson Chisum the so-called King of the Pecos. He was the first to drive cattle from Texas to New Mexico in 1867 blazing what would become known as the Chisum Trail. In the early 1870's, Chisum settled in the Pecos Valley and carved out a ranch that extended for 150 miles along the Pecos river and dominated the water rights for most of Southeastern New Mexico. The other is Lawrence G. Murphy a former Major in the US Army who had only recently arrived in Lincoln but with enough money to establish the only general store in town. He had also arranged a very lucrative deal to be the local beef subcontractor for the Santa Fe government contractor. The feud between these two men would ignite the "Lincoln County War" and create the legend of Billy the Kid.Historically the factions of the feud that started the Lincoln County War were led on one side by Murphy/Dolan and on the other side by McSween/Tunstall/Chisum with Chisum not playing the largest part. Essentially both groups where there to make their fortune and get out pretty much no matter who got in the way. There were no real "good guys" although the Murphy/Dolan are generally accepted as "bad guys". They built their cattle herds off "strays" from Chisum's herds and had Henry Tunstall murdered. They escaped any prosecution because they virtually owned the law. This was what drove Billy the Kid and the other Regulators to the actions that branded them outlaws.
For the purposes of the game, I am exacerbating the beginnings of the feud and heightening the tensions between Chisum and Murphy. The Chisum group will be mostly considered "good guys" and the Murphy forces "bad guys". Please note this shouldn't be viewed as an "uber-plot". There will be as many things going on as we can possibly make and include. It will be very possible to not be involved in the Chisum/Murphy issue at all. Having said that, the feud is becoming a polarizing issue for the county and most, if not all, characters will have an opinion of some sort.
Intro