Games Workshop’s Judge Dredd RPG and Warlord Games’ Judge Dredd Miniatures Game
Introduction
I was thinking of running some of the old classic Games Workshop scenarios for Judge Dredd: The Roleplaying Game (JDRPG) but I wanted to make use of Warlord Games’ Judge Dredd Miniatures Game (JDMG) for the combat. So it got me thinking about how I could merge the two systems…and here’s what I came up with!
You will need to own a copy of the JDMG rules and combat dice and owning a copy of the JDRPG is highly recommended as well to make best use of this system.
Players of the JDMG should note that while Notoriety can still be used as a tool by the GM to roughly calculate opposition, the intent of these rules is to give the Judges the edge, and many of the concepts and skills would imbalance a standard game of JDMG. To reiterate, the Judges in the JDRPG should feel like the heroes and these rules are not intended to be used in the JDMG.
Stats
The Judge Dredd Roleplaying Game has the following stats:-
Strength, Initiative, Combat Skill, Drive Skill, Tech Skill, Street Skill, Medical Skill and Psi Skill
Meanwhile, the Judge Dredd Miniatures Game has the following stats:-
Move, Shoot, Fight, Evade, Resist and Cool
To combine the systems, the following stats are used:-
Move, Shoot, Fight, Evade, Resist, Cool, Drive, Tech, Medical and Psi.
Strength is directly replaced by Resist stat.
Initiative is largely replaced by the Evade stat.
Combat Skill is subdivided between Shoot and Fight stats.
Street Skill is directly replaced by Cool stat. Cool now represents the Judge’s ability to operate under fire and his street smarts.
The new stats of Drive, Tech, Medical and Psi are direct counterparts to those from the JDRPG.
Creating a Character
When creating a Judge, a player starts out using the Cadet Judge Stats from the JDMG. These assign the Judge with a Move of 6” and all other stats are 2. All new stats - Drive, Tech, Medical and Psi - should also be marked as 2.
Because the Judges are the heroes of the story, they may increase four Stats of their choosing up to 3. Unlike the JDRPG, players may choose to become Psi, Med or Tech Judges. However, if they choose to do so, they must allocate one of these starting boosts to the relevant Psi, Med or Tech stat. Note that at this stage, they do not receive any of the associated skills outlined for specialist judges in the JDMG. See the experience section below for more on this. Like the JDRPG, it is at this stage only that players can become specialist Judges as they choose their specialisation when training at the Academy of Law. Most Judges do tend to be Street Judges though. Players can also increase one or more of these stats to 3 but choose not to become a specialist Judge.
The Judge may also select skills worth up to 2 Notoriety. Most skills from JDMG are worth 1 Notoriety but a number of those brought across from the JDRPG are valued at 0 Notoriety (as they do not increase combat effectiveness as JDMG skills usually do). For the purposes of starting stats, the Judges can exchange 1 point of Notoriety for two 0 Notoriety skills. For each point spent on 0 Notoriety skills, reduce their character’s Notoriety by 1. Do not increase or decrease Notoriety for choosing skills which cost Notoriety.
Notoriety: Including the above bonuses, the starting Notoriety for a Judge is 9 Notoriety. This is deliberately lower than they would be in the JDMG as the Judges are the heroes of the story and should have more of an edge than they would in the JDMG.
Going forward, each time a stat is increased by 1, add 0.5 to Notoriety (rounding down). When a skill is added, increase Notoriety by the relevant increase (see Skills post).
Stat Tests
Stat tests occur fairly regularly in the JDRPG. Instead of rolling percentile dice for the stat test, roll the special combat dice for the JDMG. If a 2000AD result is rolled, then the stat test is passed.
Note: The average starting stat in the Judge Dredd Roleplaying Game is 30 which represents a 30% chance of success. In a happy coincidence, the probability of rolling a 2000AD result with 2 dice is 30.56%!
Note: The limit is 5 for most stats which means that players have a 59.81% chance of success. This maximum is much lower than the potential in the JDMG of 99% for a stat, but when Judges get that powerful, much of the fun is lost and the game can feel broken. Note that for characters with stats of 5, there are skills which can improve certain rolls above that which is something which would rarely occur in the JDMG.
Time
Combat Rounds in the JDRPG represent roughly 10 seconds of real time. Turns in the JDMG replace Combat Rounds but are equivalent to the same time period.
Distances
For the sake of simplicity, 1” is equivalent to 1 metre.
Actions
The JDMG rules apply for all combat situations. Therefore, the JDRPG rules about Initiative, Combat Rounds, etc are no longer in use.
Initiative roll: Before each encounter, make a Cool test for each Judge PC. The roll which generates the most 2000AD results means that player has initiative. Having the initiative determines which Judge is leading the squad for the duration of the encounter. As such, the player with initiative draws the chips from the bag and it is this player who allocates which Judges in the team these are applied to. As the Judges are working as a team, the player with the initiative should want to apply it to the PC with the greatest need, but it is their decision as to who activates first. Once the chip is allocated, the player whose Judge it has been allocated to then takes their actions. If, when making the Initiative roll, the results are tied, no player has initiative and players draw from the bag at random.
Note: This is an optional rule. If preferred, a team can nominate a permanent team leader who will always draw and allocate chips from the bag.
No Leader: The PCs can also choose to have no leader and fully draw chips at random. If there is no leader, you will need to customise each Player Character’s chip and Hero Chip (see below) so that they are identifiable when drawn and assigned to the relevant PC. It is more advantageous to the team to have Initiative in play because having the freedom to allocate chips to the PC most in need is better than having to allocate them to a PC who is too far away from the action to help another character.
New Mechanic: The Hero Chip
In the JDRPG, the Initiative rules typically result in the starting Judges taking 3 actions for every 2 that the perps take, and they usually act before the perps. Perps also usually outnumber Judges by at least 2:1. With Perps receiving as many actions as the Judges in the JDMG, being outnumbered 2:1 in is a bad place to be, especially when starting Judges are not Star Chip characters and due to the number of chips in the bag, perps will more often than not activate before them. Star Chip or not, the Judges are the heroes of the story and so the Hero Chip mechanic seeks to address that point.
Each Judge now places an additional standard “Hero” chip in the bag, meaning that they should have as much of a chance to activate first as the perps do. In addition, Judges can activate using this chip even if they have already activated this turn and even if they failed in their bid to Go for Broke. If the Judges have more than one Star Chip in the bag, no PC can have two Star Chips placed beside them in a given turn, only one Star Chip and one standard/Hero chip. This prevents one player misusing Initiative to hoover up more than their fair share of the Star Chips!
Note: As usual, a Judge who has returned a Star Chip to the bag as a result of Going for Broke can activate using a Star Chip drawn from the bag later in the turn.
Example: Judge Starr is Cool 4 and Judge Stripes is Cool 3. They place a Star Chip and a standard chip in the bag as usual, and add a further two Hero (standard) chips to the bag.
Note: The Hero chip is always a standard chip, even if PCs progress to become Star Chip characters.
Note: if one Judge is Cool 4 and another Cool 3 or lower, the Star Chip generated by the Cool 4 character can, as per the usual JDMG rules, be played on a character who does not usually generate a Star Chip. The chances of Going for Broke will be reduced accordingly, but they can opt to Go for Broke if desired.
Turn example: Judges Starr (Cool 4) and Stripes (who is also Cool 4 now in this example) are ambushed by a block gang. Along with the perp chips, two Star Chips and two Hero (standard) Chips are placed in the bag. Both Judges take a Cool test and Starr rolls two 2000AD results while Stripes rolls none. Starr has the initiative.
The gang are first to draw a chip and Starr suffers a Stun as the result of a shooting attack.
Next, the Judges draw a Hero (standard) chip. Starr opts to take the chip for himself and uses a Shake It Off action to clear the stun and return fire, taking down a perp.
The gang get lucky and draw the next two chips. Stripes is now targeted and he suffers two Injury Markers.
A Star Chip is drawn from the bag. Seeing his comrade in distress, Starr allocates it to Stripes and the player in control of Stripes opts to Hunker Down. He manages to remove an Injury Marker. However, he is still in a vulnerable position as another perp has yet to activate - and Stripes fails in his bid to Go For Broke, so is Pinned!
Another Star Chip is drawn. While Starr would prefer to hand it to Stripes, no character can activate with two Star Chips in a given turn. He therefore uses it on himself and takes down another perp. Starr succeeds in his bid to Go for Broke.
Starr redraws the Star Chip and, because he doesn’t already have a Star Chip allocated him, he can act again! This time he fails to deal any damage and he also fails in his bid to Go for Broke, meaning he is Pinned and now has both the Star Chip and a Hero chip allocated to him, ending his turn.
Stripes draws the second Hero chip. He activates, manages to shake off the Pinned marker by passing a Cool test before shooting the perp still to activate! He then makes a Move action behind another piece of cover. Now having two chips allocated to him, Stripes’ turn also ends.
There are still some perp chips in the bag, but all of the perps who are still in the fight have already activated, so the turn ends.
Actions
All of the actions listed in the JDMG are still performed as originally described, except:-
Hunker Down: make an unmodified Medical test instead of Resist. All Judges are trained how to apply field dressings and the like in a combat situation, allowing them to attempt to treat their injuries themselves.
Drive: any time the JDMG rules indicate a Cool test should be made while driving, make a Drive test instead.
Psi Skills: any time the JDMG rules indicate a Cool test should be made for a Psionic skill, make a Psi test instead.
In addition to the actions outlined in the JDMG, PCs have other actions they can perform as well.
New action: The Challenge
As outlined in the JDRPG, Judges must issue a challenge to persuade perps to surrender. The range of the challenge is 20” or metres. A Cool roll is made and each 2000AD result will lead to a target perp surrendering. The GM may apply a +1 or -1 dice modifier to this roll. Judges can also gain a +1 bonus if a weapon is aimed at a perp or if a warning shot is fired into the air (a Snap Shot action is required for this but no roll to Shoot is made), or if the challenge is issued directly to one perp only. Much like Respect the Law, this is a free action, although a player can choose when during their activation they use it. Subsequent attempts to persuade perps to surrender require a Single Action to be spent, but it is recommended that subsequent attempts suffer cumulative -1 penalties.
Note: This reduces the chances of all perps surrendering as often happens in the JDRPG, but I felt that perps, even hardened criminals, surrendered too easily in that system. And it’s more fun for the Judges to see some action… That said, if it feels appropriate to you as GM, feel free to apply the original rule, in which case any 2000AD result will see all perps surrender. GM’s may also use their discretion to have perps who will never surrender. Obvious examples of perps who would refuse to surrender would be the Dark Judges, Orlok the assassin and the Angel Gang, but really any hardened criminal fearing a stretch in the Cubes would have good reason to be immune to challenge.
Note: Judges with Respect the Law still benefit from that skill. Even perps who will refuse to surrender can still be intimidated by the presence of Judges.
New Action: It costs Judges a Single Action to draw their weapon.
New Action: Aiming a Weapon. Aimed Shot is already covered on p18 of JDMG rulebook, but a Judge can aim a weapon (but not Shoot as well) for a Single Action. This may aid a Challenge as outlined above, but provided the Judge does not perform any other action other than issuing a Challenge or speaking, it may confer +1 to a Snap Shot subsequently taken. Note that the aim bonus will also be lost if a Judge has to Evade or suffers a Stun or Injury Marker from an attack. On the plus side, Judges can aim multiple times to chain up a large bonus. Use the numbered biochip counters or a dice to keep track of the bonus. If the target moves but does not leave the Judge’s line of sight, the Judge can maintain their aim, but will suffer a -1 to Shoot modifier, cumulative to the bonuses received. The Judge may opt to apply Aiming a Weapon bonuses to either their Shoot or the weapon’s Power and can split multiple dice, if desired, between both.
Note: Unlike the JDRPG, the Aim bonus only applies to the first shot taken. This is because Aimed Fire should remain the default option for Aiming.
Most of the actions listed in the JDRPG Judges Manual have equivalents in the JDMG. For convenience, here are their equivalents with page numbers from the JDMG book listed:-
Walking: Move, p17
Running: Sprint, p18
Jumping, Climbing & Swimming: Leaping/Climbing, p36
Stand, Sit, Fall Down or Crouch: counts as a free action
Speak: brief exchanges are free, longer conversations will require actions, Single or Double at the GM’s discretion.
Listen or Observe: Single Action, or Double if a Street roll is being made.
Open or Close Door: Doors and Windows, p37
Pick Up or Use Object: See Armoury Cards for actions required to use a Judge’s equipment. Usually a Single or Double Action, but can be longer at GM’s discretion, eg disarming a bomb may take many actions.
Aiming a Weapon: Aimed Fire, p18 & new action Aiming a Weapon above.
Fire a Weapon: Snapshot, p17 or Aimed Fire, p18
Reload/Unjam a Weapon: Ammo, except Special Rounds is unlimited in the JDMG, but, should the GM deem it necessary, reloading requires a Single Action. It also costs a Single Action to unjam a weapon.
Strike a Blow: Fight, p17, Charge, p18
Enter or Leave (Mount or Dismount) a vehicle: Passengers, p31
Drive a vehicle: Vehicles, p30
Halt a vehicle: Vehicles, p30
Armoury Cards
As with a standard game of the Judge Dredd Miniatures Game, Armoury Cards are in use, albeit with a few minor modifications.
Each Judge can carry 3 Armoury Cards. Judges can freely choose their Armoury Cards but the items selected must be items which would be Justice Department-specific equipment, e.g. Special ammunition, cuffs, med-packs. Items that cannot be taken include the likes of Stims and the Culinary Cooking Laser. The Ammo Pouches rule is in operation as per JDMG rules, p67.
The Lawmaster carries all Justice Department approved equipment. The Lawmaster holds 1 set (or Armoury Card) of each type of special ammunition along with 6 sets of Cuffs and 3 Med Packs. It takes a Single Action to retrieve 1 Armoury Card of equipment from the Lawmaster’s storage.
Lawgiver Standard Execution & Armour Piercing: This ammunition is effectively infinite in the JDMG, but that is not the case in the roleplaying game. The Lawgiver clip holds 20 bullets which players should note down. For simplicity, players can declare in the moment whether the bullet is SE or AP but, if realism is preferred, either carry specific clips or designate how many bullets of each type the player wishes in each clip. Judges always carry a spare clip in a belt pouch and carry another 3 clips in their Lawmaster. It requires the expenditure of a single action reload a clip.
Stun Pulse Ammunition: The battery in the Lawgiver can fire up to 20 Stun Pulse Rounds before needing to be recharged at Sector House.
Limited Resources: Unless the adventure requires a return to the Sector House, these are the (more than ample) supplies that the Judges have to last them the duration of an adventure. Justice Department resources are not infinite and Judges are expected to make their supplies last for an entire shift.
Should the PCs return to Sector House Armoury to replenish their supplies during an adventure, they may fully restock but the GM should reduce the total experience points awarded at the end of an adventure by 20%.
Special Ammunition: Hi-Ex, Incendiary, etc can now be fired with a Snap Shot Single Action.
Game Note: PCs have a lot more Armoury Cards at their disposal than is the case in the JDMG. This is to encourage more use of Armoury Cards. Med-packs in particular will become critically important in order that Judges are able to patch themselves up throughout a long and gruelling shift.
Perps and Armoury Cards: Each combat perps receive their usual allocation of Armoury Cards. The GM takes them and can play them when desired.
New Mechanic: Weapon Jam. When rolling to hit, if two 2000AD results are rolled, the weapon jams. If the roll to hit still would have delivered a hit, then the weapon jams after the shot was fired and Evade, Power and Resist rolls are still made as usual. If the shot missed anyway, it jammed before firing. Lawgivers are particularly reliable so it is only 3 or more 2000AD results that will jam those.
Chicanery Cards
In each combat, Judges receive a pool of 3 Big Meg Cards as usual. However, if players and/or the GM prefer, they can limit the use of Big Meg Cards to 3 per adventure or simply prohibit their use altogether. The Big Meg cards are a lot of fun but can deliver particularly random and sometimes devastating effects.
Perps and Chicanery Cards: As with the Armoury Cards, the GM takes these and can play them when desired. As with the Judges, the GM can limit their use, but if the Judges are restricted in their use, the perps should face at least the same limitations.
Stealth Rules
Judges may use stealth to close in on perps. When this occurs, the sentries rule on page 135 are in force.
Moving Silently: Judges who declare they are Moving Silently subtract 2 from their Move and make an Evade test. If successful, a Judge in heavy cover will be undetectable, while in light cover will only be spotted on a 2000AD result and with no cover only on a Armour result.
Hiding: A Judge who does not move is harder to detect. If the Judge takes a Move action but remains still, they make an Evade test. If passed, the Judge cannot be detected when in any type of cover and will only be detected when in no cover with a 2000AD result.
GMs can apply modifiers to these rolls dependant on lighting or any other relevant factors.
A failed roll when attempting Moving Silently or Hiding means that the Judge does not gain the relevant bonus, but neither is there any penalty, i.e. the enemy isn’t alerted to their presence.
As usual, a perp will always detect an attacker in their Focussed Front arc if they are within their Cool value in inches, regardless of line of sight or a Judge’s success in making Cool tests while performing Stealth moves.
Spotting Hidden Items or Traps: Spotting clues, or concealed items, including traps require the passing of a successful Cool test. The GM may modify the roll as they see fit, depending on the efforts of the NPC to conceal the item from the Judges. Conversely, PCs who declare that they are looking for such items may gain a bonus.
Subdued
Any Judges subdued can be revived at the end of a battle without penalty. Alternatively, if the Judges lost the encounter, the GM will use their discretion based on what they believe the perp’s motives are; most flee after subduing Judges, some may take them to their lair, in which case they revive at the criminal’s hideout and may have to plan an escape. The most vicious perps will attempt to execute the Judges. In such a case, they make a free Ranged Attack and, whatever the outcome, they will treat the Judge as dead. If any Injury Markers were inflicted, the Judge is now treated as incapacitated.
Incapacitated
As per JDMG rules, p142.
Note: Most Judges increase their Medical Skill to 3 to learn the Emergency Resuscitation skill. The chances are that they’ll need to call upon it to save their teammates’ lives.
Experience Points
Gaining Experience: Judges gain experience exactly the same way they traditionally do in the JDRPG and, if running any of the published scenarios, experience should be allocated as outlined there. However, PCs now gain additional Experience Points for taking down criminals.
For each perp who surrenders due to a Challenge: 1 Experience Point.
For each perp who is incapacitated by a PC: Notoriety value in Experience Points.
For each perp who is subdued by a PC: 2 x Notoriety value in Experience Points*
For each Deed earned: 5 Experience Points**.
Visiting the Sector House Armoury: -20% Experience Points for that adventure only.
Calling for Med-Team: -10% Experience Points for that adventure only.
Calling for Backup: at GM’s discretion, depending on the scale of the task at hand. A -20% penalty may be appropriate if the Judges call for backup to deal with a few juves, but no penalty should be incurred should the Judges call for backup in the event of a block war!
Note*: Judges are meant to send perps to the Iso-Cubes rather than Resyk which is why more value is placed on Subduing perps. It’s also harder to Subdue perps because Stun Pulse only operates at short range and getting that close to perps means that the Judge is putting themselves in harm’s way and acting in a heroic manner! It is purely up to the PCs how they will deal out their brand of justice, but GMs may wish to consider the involvement of the SJS to investigate particularly murderous Judges!
Note**: Deeds are the only element retained from the JDMG Campaign Rules and only operating to provide extra experience.
Spending Experience Points
Improvement Points (IP): 100 Experience Points can be exchanged for 1 IP. There are two ways that IP can be spent, the first is on stat increases and the second is on learning new skills.
1. Stat increase: It costs 1 IP to increase a stat by 1 point but 2 IP to increase a stat from 4 to 5. In addition, when increasing a stat, you may learn a 0 Notoriety skill as well. If possible, the skill learned should relate to the stat increased, but if that is not possible, then they can learn a skill from another stat.
Remember that if your Cool is increased from 3 to 4, you will become a Star Chip character which has significant benefits in being able to Go for Broke.
Maximum Stats: Judge Dredd is the ultimate lawman so you cannot increase your stats beyond his. The maximum stats you can have, including for Drive, Med, Tech and Psi is 5. The two exceptions are Move which never changes from 6 (except while carrying Stuns and/or Injury Markers) or Evade which cannot exceed 4.
2. Learn a new skill: You may spend IP to learn a new skill. See our Skills post for a full list of all skills and the IP costs to learn them.
Note: While Judges can increase their Med, Tech and Psi stats, they may not spend IP on any skills which cost 1 or more IP unless they are a specialist Judge in that particular field.
Note: When spending IP to learn new skills, 0 skills cost 1 IP point but do not increase Notoriety. It is therefore more economical to learn 0 costed skills when taking a Stat Increase. If the PCs are fortunate, they may max out their stats and so this means that such characters do not suddenly unlock the whole tool box of skills for free. Instead, they will have to keep on spending IP to learn those skills one at a time.
Note: Due to the nature of the roleplaying game, there is no limit on how many skills you can take which means that if your PCs max out all of their stats, their skills can make them more powerful than Dredd himself!
Notoriety: As stated previously, each time a stat is increased by 1, add 0.5 to Notoriety (rounding down). When a skill is added, increase Notoriety by the relevant increase (see Skills post).
Maximum Notoriety: While PCs may not have a main stat line that exceeds Dredd’s, they may end up more powerful than him due to having a lot more skills. However, no Judge can use all skills at once, so there are limits as to how effective the PCs have the potential to become. For that reason, no matter if your PCs have maxed out all of their stats and have a whole host of skills they can call upon, Dredd is the benchmark and no PC’s Notoriety can exceed 35.
Designing Combat Scenarios (GM Notes)
As mentioned above, the players receive some starting bonuses which have not been costed in to the Notoriety the way they usually are in the JDMG. The intention, along with the Hero Chip rule and amended Armoury Card rules is to ensure that the Judges are able to fight on a level playing field and may even have the edge in encounters. This means that when you cost perp forces, you should be able to field forces of the same total Notoriety as the PC’s combined force and, while the battle may still be tough and require some good tactical play from the players, the battles shouldn’t be completely overwhelming.
However, if you find that the Judges are still struggling, use the Chip Cap rule to avoid the PCs being out-activated - but, if the GM feels things are a little on the easy side, they can also use their discretion to build NPC forces with a Notoriety that exceeds the combined total of the PCs’!
For NPC stats, many of the criminals in the JDRPG adventures are fairly weak, so you may find their equivalents are Gang Punks and the like. Probably most important is that you will want to keep as many perps starting in the encounter as are shown in the published adventure and build your NPC force accordingly. Depending on how many are shown, you may even find that some perps only have basic citizen stats or, if you have a lot more Notoriety at your disposal, that key NPCs are higher Notoriety, possibly even Star Chip characters. Feel free to use different stat cards for different NPCs, even where they don’t feel directly equivalent.
For example, the PCs are facing off against a Juve Gang consisting of 4 Juves. With decent Notoriety to play with, the GM decides to include a Gang Leader, 2 Gang Punks and a Fattie. Even though the Fattie isn’t part of the Block Gang Factions, it may be appropriate to have one as part of the gang. Another gang member may have been thrown out of the Citi-Def for being overly violent and so fights alongside the Block Gang members. Similarly, you may wish to give a perp the stats for a named character such as Karl Raider, even though the PCs are not actually facing Karl himself.
Finally, you may also want to balance encounters firmly in the PCs’ favour a reasonable amount of the time, particularly for encounters occurring early on in an adventure. This is because you do not want every encounter to threaten the lives of your Judges and also to build threat throughout the adventure. Therefore, get into the habit of further restricting the Notoriety of your NPC forces until the climax of an adventure. In a roleplaying game, even more so than in a tabletop game, the Judges are the heroes and should feel pretty powerful most of the time!
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