Just because invitation

Wanted: Outlaws

Three guests turn up as the same outlaw and only one of them brought the hat.

Just because invitation: Scorched cream parchment poster nailed at the corners to grey barn wood, with a dented tin sheriff's star pinned at top right. Heavy black slab lettering reads WANTED, with the date and venue below.

A costume party invitation like this one sets up a barn in late October, not a living room: a wild west costume party where nobody uses their own name after the door. Guests sign in under an alias, pick a side, outlaw or lawman, and answer to it for the rest of the night. The hat rule is enforced by whoever is standing nearest the door. Someone always arrives bareheaded and has to be fitted out of the spare box.

By nine the aliases have stuck and two people have stopped responding to anything else. There is a reward, and it has to be judged, so a sheriff appoints himself and starts taking testimony near the drinks table. Nobody voted for him. He hands over the reward anyway, and the room accepts it.

What goes on it

Every line replaceable

The wording on this card

WILD WEST COSTUME PARTY
Aliases encouraged. Best outlaw wins the reward.
Saturday, October 30, 2027 · 7 PM
THE DRY GULCH BARN · 301 Cattle Drive, Buda, TX

Every line of the wording is an example, and yours to replace. The title is painted into the artwork. Type your own and it is drawn again with your words.

What to actually tell people

Keep a ledger at the door Set out one sheet and a pen and have every guest write their alias as they come in. Use that name for the rest of the night, including when you need someone to move a car.
Stock a spare hat box Hats required means two or three people will arrive without one. A crate of thrifted felt and straw hats by the entrance solves it before anyone has to apologise.
Decide the reward before anyone arrives Make it one object you can hand over: a bottle, an envelope, a tin star. Appoint a judge who is not competing, and announce the hour it gets awarded.
A barn drops ten degrees after dark Run heaters or a fire pit outside the doors, put blankets over the hay bales, and check what the extension cord to the speaker is actually plugged into.

Start from this one

The artwork
Keep this one, or describe your own party and get artwork drawn for it.
The wording
Every line on this card is an example, the painted title included. Change all of it; the design holds.
Sending
By text, from your own number. Guests open a link. Nothing to download.
The price
One credit for the invitation. Six guests or sixty, the number does not move.