Judge Dredd - Life in the Big City

Life in the Big City

Our little campaign set in the amazing world of 2000AD is based in and around Mega City One.

I have always been a fan of the 2000AD comics and of course Judge Dredd.  When Mongoose publishing launched its kickstarter campaign for 28mm metal figures I was of course duty bound to jump on board.  In fairness the kickstarter took a very very long time to deliver, in fact as I type this the remaining bits from the campaign have only just arrived and Mongoose Publishing no longer hold the licence to produce models for the range.  I believe that role will be taken over by Warlord Games at some point in the future, something that I am very excited about.

I think one of the best parts of the Judge Dredd setting is that you can pretty much use anything you want.  Want to field a Dinasaur, no problem, want WW1 Germans attacking Mega City One.  Why not.  With so many crazy cults and fads going on in this massive city nothing would seem out of place.

I also really like that you can use lots of nice bright colours.  I like the comic book feel on the figures and it suits my preferred painting style.

Finally I can use the same terrain as I use for Infinity for street fighting, or can use desert ruins for fighting in the harsh cursed earth.

Anyway, enough of my ramblings and onto some figures.

Fatties

Fatties form a formidable meatwall as they rumble across the city on their belliwheels.

Fatties are bored citizens who have turned to gluttony as a means to pass the time. They are so gigantically fat that they need a belliwheel to prop up their prodigious gut.

In the future, fatties can count as athletes: competitive eating is an international sport, ranging from the Olympics to criminal back-street eating games. Some contests even have fatties eat items like bedspreads and car parts. Mega-City One has fat camps where parents send juves to gain weight and poor citizens may try to bulk up in the hope that eating games might be their ticket for prosperity.

City-Def

City Def prepare to attack a rival city block.

Citizen Defence Groups (or Citi-Def) are formal militias in Mega-City One and Texas City, with a different group for each city block. The idea is that they will defend their blocks from disaster or attack and assist the Judges.

In practice, the Citi-Def's are often badly trained, full of bored and belligerent citizens, and are often the cause of problems: Citi-Def's have been involved in block wars, disastrous training exercises, or secession. The Chief Judge only places them on active alert during emergencies, for fear of what they might do otherwise.

The Dark Judges

Hailing from a dark dimension called Deadworld, the Dark Judges are a dark and twisted parody of the Judges as we know them. To them, all crime is committed by the living and therefore life itself is a crime. They originated as a cabal of human Judges based around the sociopathic Judge Sidney De'ath and used their position to murder thousands 'legally' before gaining supernatural power.

After many years of genocide, they finally wiped out every living being in their homeworld and turned their attention to Mega-City One.

Judge Death - The first and their leader. Wears a helmet similar to that of a traditional Judge, with a modified visor resembling a portcullis. His mouth is pulled into a permanent rictus. In place of the Judges' eagle-shaped shoulder pauldrons, Death sports a pterodactyl on his right shoulder; his left shoulder and elbow pads are festooned with bones. His jacket is fastened with crude stitches rather than a zipper, and his badge and belt buckle are each shaped like a human skull with extended fangs, the latter is also adorned with bat wings. Death most often kills his victims by reaching directly into their chests (in an intangible state) and squeezing their hearts until they burst, without ever breaking the skin. Among the Dark Judges, Death and Fear wear a helmet of any kind.

Judge Fear - An imposing figure who wears a black great helm accented with large, bat-like wings. When passing judgement, he opens his helmet's faceplate and frightens the accused to death with whatever lies within, whilst reciting his catch phrase, "Gaze into the face of Fear!" The actual face under the helmet has only been revealed twice: once as a mass of eyeballs, and on another occasion as several grotesque mandibles.No explanation has been given as to whether these monstrosities are indicative of Fear's physical face, or if they are simply manifestations of his victims' fears. Fear sports an assortment of tools on his belt, notably miniature bear traps, which he is known to throw at his enemies in order to immobilise them; and an enormous padlock which he uses to secure his victims' potential exit routes. His belt buckle is a shrunken head. He wears a heavy black cape with large, bear trap shoulder pauldrons.  Judge Fear is seen to exhibit powers similar to Judge Death's "phasing" ability, thrusting his hands through victims' bodies.

Judge Fire - Immersed head-to-toe in ethereal flame. He wears no helmet, and instead has a human skull for a head. He wields a flame-spewing trident. As a human, Fire was an undercover Judge named Fuego who had infiltrated a resistance group, which he eventually led to sacrifice at the hands of the newly-created Judge Death. He earned the name "Judge Fire" when he was still alive, after he burned down a school for violating noise regulations.

Judge Mortis - In a perpetual state of disintegration, and his touch causes his victims to spontaneously decay at a rapid rate. His head is a sheep skull and he has a bony tail. His uniform's right shoulder pauldron is a bird skeleton, and his left shoulder is protected by a perforated mantle. His badge is a stylised sheep skull with his name emblazoned in wood. Like Fire and Fear, Mortis spent his early years as a rookie Judge at Law School, Deadworld's equivalent to Mega-City One's Academy of Law, and graduated after Death. He developed an admiration for Sidney's methods and beliefs, and shares his comrades' zeal for passing arbitrary death sentences. He is sometimes employed by Judge Death to prepare the Dark Judges' host bodies.

Civilians - Vigilantes

The citizens are shown to be a mixed bag. 98% are unemployed (due to advances in robotics) and range from lazy and sloth-like to highly rebellious violent criminals, bent on destroying and killing as much as they can for whatever reason they can think of at that time, if any. Most of the Judges seem to view them like a well-loved dim cat, stupid, greedy but with an unseen value that's worth protecting with everything they have. Although at times they've shown a huge lack of empathy towards them, such as when Chief Judge Francisco asked them if a large number that were on welfare could commit suicide in his Christmas message in order to help balance the budget for the following year.  Some Judges openly view them as a nuisance to be removed, or like Judge Manners, as a sub-human race to be used and abused as the Judges see fit.

The citizens occupy their time with many strange and outright bizarre hobbies, such as simping (recreational stupidity), bat gliding, sky surfing and peeping (spying on people at home and in public), which is illegal when done for sexual purposes, but legal when done under the authority of a Judge. If any of these ever get out of hand, and there is no legal justification for banning, the Judges simply impose a heavy tax on them, restricting them to only the few very wealthy citizens.

Most are poorly educated and many can barely read or write, some sectors are said to be entirely illiterate, but Judges aren't that concerned, as it makes it easier for them to control and they can weed out the more intelligent simply when major crimes occur.  Those that can read though are not much better, for example, when a book that detailed how to commit suicide was released, thousands of previously non suicidal citizens (including the book's author) killed themselves since they had read how to do it in the book.  At one point in some of the more dangerous blocks, the Judges took to putting sedative drugs into the air systems to help keep the citizens more docile and easier to control.

Some though do show huge promise, intelligence, and have extremely useful skills, many top scientists and engineers are not Judges. Most of the cities biggest advancements in areas such as food, new materials, non weapon or military technology, medicine and architecture and construction design (including the Halls of Justice) came from ordinary citizens. All the major businesses and entertainment (apart from Justice Department propaganda channels) figures are citizens as are a lot of the city's diplomats, but they always report to a Judge before making any decisions. But not all valued skills are the same as the real world ones, examples of this are human taxidermy and professional gluttony. Most of the highly intelligent citizens end up in crime such as PJ Maybe, and Nero Narcos, as they are very limited in the wealth or power they can attain (the amount of real power a citizen can gain though is very limited) legally.

Soviet Judges

Sov Judge law is harsher than even Mega-City One, with the Sovs sending their athletes to gulags for being caught cheating (even though they'd been ordered to cheat).

Justice Department

The Mega City Justice Department is in control of all law and justice in a mega-city.

The role of Street Judges combines those of judge and police officer, thus avoiding long legal wrangles by allowing for criminals to be tried and sentenced on the spot.

The Judges themselves are not above the law -- a violation that would earn a citizen a few months in an Iso-Cube would get a Judge a twenty-year sentence, to be served at hard labor on Saturn's moon, Titan , after modification to enable the convict to survive outside there without needing an expensive space suit.

Judge Cal's Retinue

Judge Cal, a one time Chief Judge who went insane and abused his power. 

A group of Kleggs are hired by the insane Judge Cal to help enforce his mad teachings; since Kleggs have little use for money, Cal pays them in meat. After the death of Deputy Chief Judge Fish, their leader Grampus was made the new Deputy Chief Judge and they became Cal's brute force and slaughtered hundreds of citizens in Mega City One. 

The Special Judicial Squad (SJS) is the Internal Affairs unit of the Justice Department. They are the Judges that judge the Judges.  SJS investigates allegations of corruption, unjudicial conduct and criminal activity within the ranks of the Mega-City Judges.

Brit-Cit Judges

The Brit-Cit Justice Department is based in the New Old Bailey. It is very similar in structure and effect to the Mega City One justice system, with uniforms that appear based on their American counterparts. Compared to the modern day, the Judges are highly fascistic. Compared to Mega-City One though, they're quite lenient: Detective-Judges are allowed to marry, tea and sugar is legal, crime blitzes and lie detectors are not yet legalised.