Thursday 12 January 2017

JDMG Scenario 02 - Scaring the Scabies

The second instalment of my Judge Dredd Miniatures Game campaign follows on one week in game time and real time from the first one. Now that Judge Scott has disposed of the Barko Brothers, who were in control of a shanty town territory in a slum district of Sector 13, the residents are undefended. Lurking just below them in the Undercity are a gang called the Scabies, led by Scab Scabie. With immediate access to the shanty town, Scab decides to cause mayhem to the local residents by blowing up their power generator. This scenario is based on the Demolition standard scenario found on page 21 of the Blood on the Streets supplement.
THE FORCES - MEGA CITY ONE JUSTICE DEPARTMENT
Street Judge Burnett - Level:1 Infantry Hero with 0 Experience Points and worth 160 Credits.
Stats - Move 5", Agility +1, Shoot +3, Melee +1, Melee Dice 2D, Will +1, Armour +5, Hits 2.
Equipment - Boot Knife, Daystick, Lawrod Rifle, Stumm Gas Grenades and Standard Issue Armour.
Talents - Accurate and Boom! Head Shot.

Street Judge Moore - Level:1 Infantry Hero with 0 Experience Points and worth 150 Credits.
Stats - Move 5", Agility +2, Shoot +2, Melee +1, Melee Dice 2D, Will +1, Armour +5, Hits 2.
Equipment - Boot Knife, Daystick, Lawgiver Mk II Pistol, Stumm Gas Grenades and Standard Issue Armour.
Talents - Accurate and Close Combat Shooter.

Street Judge Webb - Level:1 Infantry Hero with 0 Experience Points and worth 150 Credits.
Stats - Move 5", Agility +2, Shoot +1, Melee +1, Melee Dice 2D, Will +2, Armour +5, Hits 2.
Equipment - Boot Knife, Daystick, Lawgiver Mk II Pistol, Stumm Gas Grenades and Standard Issue Armour.
Talents - Agile and Stealthy.

Med Judge Nash - Level:1 Infantry Hero with 0 Experience Points and worth 150 Credits.
Stats - Move 5", Agility +2, Shoot +2, Melee +1, Melee Dice 2D, Will +1, Armour +5, Hits 2.
Equipment - Boot Knife, Medi-Kit, Lawgiver Mk II Pistol and Standard Issue Armour.
Talents - First Aid and Medic.

THE FORCES - THE SCABIES STREET GANG
Scab Scabie - Level:2 Punk Infantry Hero with 2 Experience Points and worth 220 Credits.
Stats - Move 5", Agility +0, Shoot +1, Melee +2, Melee Dice 2D, Will +0, Armour +3, Hits 3.
Equipment - Double Barrelled Stump Gun Rifle, Sword, Respirator and Leather Armour
Talents - Luck of Grud, Skilled and Deadly and Voice of Command.

Squama - Level:1 Punk Infantry Hero with 1 Experience Point and worth 155 Credits.
Stats - Move 5", Agility +1, Shoot +1, Melee +0, Melee Dice 2D, Will +0, Armour +3, Hits 2.
Equipment - Grenade Launcher (use stats for Hand Bomb but increase range to 20" and double cost to 60 Credits, Respirator and Leather Armour.
Talents - Maximum Firepower and On Their Knees.

Scatty and Scurf - Level:1 Punk Infantry Heroes with 0 Experience Points and worth 110 Credits each.
Stats - Move 5", Agility +0, Shoot +2, Melee +0, Melee Dice 2D, Will +0, Armour +0, Hits 2.
Equipment - 2x Sawed Off Stump Gun Rifles and Respirator.
Talents - Brave and Dual Shooter.

Branny, Crusty and Flaky - Level:0 Punk Infantry Minions with 0 Experience Points and worth 35 Credits each.
Stats - Move 5", Agility +0, Shoot +0, Melee +0, Melee Dice 2D, Will +0, Armour +0, Hits 1.
Equipment - Stump Gun Rifle and Respirator.

The Justice Department fielded a force worth 610 Credits against the Scabies street gang who were worth 700 Credits. With a Level:2 Hero leading them and comprising three Level:1 Heroes and 3 Level:0 Minions the Scabies had a slight advantage.
SET UP
I played my fight on a four feet by two feet battlefield using gaming mats, buildings and scenery items from my Battle Systems Urban Apocalypse Shanty Town sets. The Scabies deployed their force 10" in from one of the short edges. The Judges deployed 10" in from the opposite short edge. I used the generator from my Battle Systems terrain sets as the objective and it was placed in the centre of the board. As written, the attacking force (the Scabies) are meant to act first. However, when I played the game that way, the Scabies destroyed the objective far too easily before the Judges could even reach them. That was boring and would have made for a very poor batrep. So I decided to replay the game with the Judges going first. It made for a much closer contest.
SPECIAL RULES
Every model in the attacking force (the Scabies) is assumed to be carrying a high explosive device. In order to destroy the objective, a model must move into base contact with it and perform eight Special Actions arming the explosives. These Special Actions need not be performed consecutively and the model is permitted to perform other actions while setting up the explosives. If the model is removed from the table or leaves the objective, keep a track of how many Special Actions he performed arming the explosives. Another model is free to move into base contact and continue the task until a total of eight Special Actions have been performed.
VICTORY CONDITIONS
If the attacking force destroys the objective, it will be victorious. If the defending force destroys or drives off all of the attacking models, it will gain victory instead.
NOTE
If you find the pictures and captions are too small to see or read, don't worry. There are a few simple solutions. The easiest solution is to left click on that icon at the far right of your menu toolbar at the top of your screen. It's the one with the three parallel grey lines. That will give you a pop up menu. Left click on the plus symbol (+) to the right of the percentage number and keep pressing until the screen picture is big enough for you to read. My default setting for my blog is 170%. For reading the comic, I'd suggest going up to 200% or higher.
The second method is a bit more involved. First, left click on any of the pics. This will take you to a new screen showing all of the pics without the text. Next, right click on any of the pics, say for example page 1 of the comic. This will give you a menu of options. Left click on the top one, View Image. If you hover your mouse over the picture, you'll see a plus sign in a white circle. Left click it and the picture will double in size, making it very easy to read. If you press the arrow key at the top left corner of your menu toolbar that will take you back to the blog. Sadly, you'll have to go through this procedure for every picture you want to magnify but it's only a few clicks so it shouldn't be too much of a hassle. 






AFTERMATH
Scab Scabie took a crippling wound to the head (suffers a -1 penalty to his Psi, Shoot and Will stats). He served a full sentence in the iso-cubes. Squama and Scurf were both killed by chest shots. Scatty's wound was just a scratch. He served time in the cubes. As did Branny and Crusty. Branny was also injured in the right arm (suffers a -1 penalty to his Agility stat). Flaky, who ran away, was never seen or heard of again.
The four Judges did well with the experience they gained from this mission. All advanced to Level:2.

Judge Burnett earned the following Experience Points:
+1 for surviving the battle.
+1 for slaying a level:1 Hero.
+2 for slaying a Level:2 Hero.
This earned him 4 Experience Points, enough to raise him to Level:3. However, as I told you last time, a Hero can only advance one Level per game, so Judge Burnett became a Level:2 Hero with 3 Experience Points. He added +1 to his Agility stat, to give him a score of +2 and +1 to his Hits, bringing them up to 3. He acquired a new Talent from the Sniper Judge list - Timed Fuse, which allowed him to detonate a High Explosive round in mid-flight instead of on impact. Properly adjusted, this can allow a round to explode above the head of a target behind cover, depriving them of their shield. He also put in a requisition request for a Rifle Scope for his Lawrod Rifle. This was accepted and now his Lawrod has a range of 36" instead of 24". The downside is that he can only fire one Standard Executioner round at a time instead of three. It cost 20 credits and with his +25 Credits Level increase made him worth 205 Credits.

Judge Moore earned the following Experience Points:
+1 for surviving the battle.
+1 for slaying 1 Minion.
+1 for slaying a level:1 Hero.
This earned him 3 Experience Points, enough to raise him to Level:2. He added +1 to his Shoot stat, to give him a score of +3 and +1 to his Hits, bringing them up to 3. He acquired a new Talent from the Gunslinger list - Crackshot, which gives him a -1 bonus to the AP score of any shooting weapon he uses. His Credits score increased by +25 to 175.

Judge Webb earned the following Experience Points:
+1 for surviving the battle.
+1 for arresting 1 Minion.
This earned him 2 Experience Points, just enough to raise him to Level:2. He added +1 to his Shoot stat, to give him a score of +2 and +1 to his Hits, bringing them up to 3. He acquired a new Talent from the Sneaky Does It list - Infiltrator, which allows him to be placed on the table after all the models of both forces have been deployed. He may be placed anywhere up to 15" away from another member of his force, so long as he is not in Line Of Sight or within 15" of any enemy model. His Credits score increased by +25 to 175.

Med Judge Nash earned the following Experience Points:
+1 for surviving the battle.
+1 for slaying a level:1 Hero.
This earned him 2 Experience Points, which was just enough to raise him to Level:2. He added +1 to his Shoot stat, to give him a score of +2 and +1 to his Hits, bringing them up to 3. He acquired a new Talent from the Hands of a Healer list - Nurse, which allowed him to automatically negate two characteristic penalties that have resulted from injury, except those resulting from a body part being torn off. His Credits score increased by +25 to 175.
CONCLUSIONS
I do hope that Clint (Judge Burnett), Simon (Judge Moore), Roger (Judge Webb) and Andy (Med Judge Nash) were all satisfied with the performances of their alter ego characters. It pleased me enormously that all four advanced to Level:2. I certainly enjoyed playing this scenario and creating the comic is almost as much fun. The comic format has proved so popular that it will remain a part of all of my JDMG batreps.
Oh, and if you're wondering why the Judges had such limited success in their arrest attempts it is because a Hero will automatically resist any attempt to arrest him unless he decides to voluntarily surrender. However, despite this, a Judge must still attempt to make the arrest challenge before resorting to more violent measures. Minions, on the other hand, are far easier to arrest. Only if a perp (whether Hero or Minion) uses a Melee, Psi or Shoot action against a Judge or resists arrest, may a Judge use force to subdue him.

43 comments:

  1. Great batrep Bryan, the alter ego's performed well and justice was served. Enjoying my weekly comic read and look forward to it arriving as I did as a kid with 200AD

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    1. Many thanks, Dave. The team worked well together and yes, justice was served. I've got the stats worked out for your own alter ego Judge and I plan on featuring him in my next batrep.

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    2. I hope my alter ego can live up to those who have gone before !

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    3. I am certain he will perform just fine. Behave, be pure, be vigilant! I may have my 2000AD quotes slightly mixed up but the sentiment still applies. :-)

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    4. What's a word in the wrong place between friends ! ;) Nemesis the Warlock was one of my joint favourite stories, along with ABC Warriors which had the crossover as well which was a double bonus for me

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    5. I, too, was (and still am) a big fan of both the ABC Warriors and Nemesis the Warlock.

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    6. Due to limited space, have started collecting the graphic novels of these rather than the huge stack of 2000 AD's I used to have. This way I may miss some stories that could be interesting but get to read my favourite in easy chunks

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    7. Having collected 2000AD since prog#1 I still get my weekly fix. Graphic novels are a great alternate. I buy a lot of them instead of the comics for a number of series that interest me. Yes, it is nice to be able to read the stories in one binge.

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  2. Poor engineer but I don't recall Judges any having qualms about civilian casualties in the strips. The forces of law have had two very convincing and decisive victories. One wonders how the scum of the underworld would be taking all of this. The scabies followed the Barkos and nature abhors a vacuum. I'm interested to see what new threats await the stalwart Judges.

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    1. Thanks, HP. Not all Judges are unfeeling but I take your point. There are still plenty of threats yet to come to my Judges of Sector 13. The next scenarios will be moving away from the shanty town but I've no doubt I will be returning there soon.

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  3. Have you Increased the size of the FONT as it seems easier to read now.

    Firstly it look great.
    Secondly of course I am happy to have 1)survived 2) dealt with the perps. 3) Dealing the law is what a judge does and they should be happy with that!
    Thirdly) It also read well
    Fourthly) I do like this style very much
    Fifthly) keep it going we all want more

    This is tipping me ever closer to painting my ape gang!

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    1. Bryan I can read it fine on my pc, though when I do my comics I do try to go a bit bigger for those viewing on phones. I usually put a text block in the middle, bu your conversation bubbles have me thinking of trying that next report. Are you using comic life or another program?

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    2. My eyesight is not good I have worn glasses since I was 4 and cannot drive as my sight is so bad.
      In the past people (with normal/good sight have thought that glasses completely correct eyesight... If Only it were that simple!
      I am not using any programmes just enlarging the image on Blogger.

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    3. Oh sorry Clint all that was directed at Bryan in reference to your comment. That is some great insight though I will take in mind for my comic reports. I always try to upload at least 150-300dpi so people can enlarge them if they want.

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    4. @Clint. I'm so glad you can read it just fine, especially since Judge Burnett performed best of all out of the four Judges. Sorry you couldn't make it to Level:3. I haven't changed anything in the way I present my posts but perhaps Blogger was playing up when I posted my first batrep. The comic style is here to stay and there will be lots more JDMG batreps. I'm really motivated to do lots more. Finally, do paint your ape gang soon. My own ape gang will feature in my campaign.

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    5. @Airborne. First, hi and welcome to my blog. Secondly, the comic was created using Comic Life 3, a wonderful program, in my humble opinion. I save the comic pages at 300dpi, which is good for enlarging the images. I did think about putting blocks of text between the pages but ultimately decided it A) detracted from the look of the comic and B) I could explain everything with speech bubbles and caption boxes. On the other hand, with extra text between the pages I could explain what happened with the rules, who rolled criticals and who rolled badly. In the end, I decided to let the comic tell the story without any reference to the rules.

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    6. @ Airbourne No worries mate. I have lived in glasses for 49 years now. I will I am sure also die in glasses. We all have problems the trick is learning to dance in the rain when you have no rhythm! I can laugh at myself a great deal. So no insult taken at all.

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    7. @Bryan.
      Re the ape gang. I have several things in the queue before I do them but they are edging closer. What I really need is a simple set of rules I can use and if possible some appropriate terrain I can transport to the club. Then I need the club to decide if they will want to play... I think they will though so that is less of a worry!

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    8. Glad to hear that Clint! You guys had a rousing game and it shows in the story. Looking forward to more! Been getting a lot of inspiration from here lately. 😉

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    9. @Airborne and Clint. Good news all around. Clint, the JDMG rules are very simple to use. I guess 7TV could work for you, instead. Airborne, it gladdens me that you can find inspiration here.

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  4. That was absolutely wonderful! I love seeing other comic reporters. Really nice job, I know what handwork goes into them. ;)

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    1. Many thanks, Airbornegrove 26. I am really impressed with Comic Life 3. I've seen it used on some other blogs and so I was keen to try it out myself. I'm so glad I did. It is hard work putting the comic together but I find it a lot of fun so I have no complaints to make.

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    2. I still use Comic Life 1. I find it a bit quicker then Comic Life 3. Your comics is perfect though. Either way Comic Life is a blast and I love making comic reports with it. Looking forward to more here in the future. 😉

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    3. I only discovered Comic Life last month. I don't know how much it differs from its previous versions but I do know that I like it a lot. Do you have a link to your own comic work? I'm always keen to see what other comic creators are doing.

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    4. I'm glad to hear it. It is a really fun program and adds a cool element to our hobby. My blog is: http://givemlead.blogspot.com/ Please feel free to follow and comment. I got zombie comics coming up in the future as well as some more fantasy type stuff. ;) Hope to see you over there.

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    5. I've just had a quick look at your blog. Oh, wow! I'm going to spending a long time going through your posts. It looks superb, mate! I've also added your blog to my list of favourites. I hope that helps increase your followers. I am now one of your followers and will certainly comment on your work once I catch up with everything.

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    6. Awesome! Much appreciated! Have fun reading through everything. 😉

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    7. Me too, added and following :-)

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    8. Hey thanks. ;) I knew I liked it over here.

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  5. For a med judge - Nash kicks ass!!! Oh yeah :-)
    Fun filled and very nicely done. I've got a feeling this sector house will be returning good crime report figures this quarter.

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    1. Med Judge Nash performed admirably, Andy. He certainly did kick ass. The new Sector 13 Judges are off to a flying start. Let's hope their good fortune continues.

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  6. Great Batrep Bryan, the set up looked stunning and nice to see Judge Webb again some experience points too. Good all round.

    Cheers Roger.

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    1. Cheers, Roger. The set-up was truly amazing and the game could not have gone better for the Judges. Judge Webb worked very well with the others. You should be proud of his performance.

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  7. You've started a great new campaign here. I'm hooked.

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    1. Much appreciated, Cedric. Part 3 will appear soon.

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  8. Terrific stuff, Bryan, absolutely terrific. I was especially pleased with Judge Moore gunning down a perp at point-blank range - that's how tough mega-City justice should be in my books. I reckon Judge Webb needs to go back to the Academy and practice his voice command though. If I hadn't given Scurf three in the head for good measure, we'd have had endless pages of Judge Webb meekly asking him to surrender ;-)

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    1. Many thanks, Simon. Judge Moore's response at shooting Scurf was entirely appropriate. I had to chuckle at your ribbing of Judge Webb. To be fair to him he stuck to the letter of the Law by attempting to make arrests before shooting. Once a perp resists arrest, he's fair game for any Judge. Judge Webb's arrest attempts allowed your Judge to shoot Scurf and Clint's Judge to shoot Scab in the head. It's all teamwork. Yes, I know you're only kidding.

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    2. True enough O'Tharg. But you must admit Judge Webb kept asking and they simply kept saying "In your dreams, drokker!" I can't see old stony face being terribly impressed. It'd be desk work for poor Roger if that Senior Judge had been about ;-)

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    3. I can't argue with that, Simon. Dredd would not be happy. Judge Scott will see that Judge Webb gets more voice command training.

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  9. Well, the judges didn't seem to have much difficulty with that lot of perps, did they?

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    1. Yes, it did turn out to be a cakewalk for the Judges.

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  10. Loving the new comic strip format Bryan. It makes the story look less static, particularly the graphics that go with the firing of weapons. It can be difficult to make a battle report look dynamic and difficult for the reader to follow the action some times but this format works really well. Nice work.

    DEW

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    1. Hi and welcome to my blog DEW. The comic format works a treat for my Judge Dredd batreps. Having trained as a graphic designer I did have a lot of insight into how to put a comic together. You will see the batreps evolve as i learn more about what Comic Life 3 has to offer.

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