I AM THE LAW! Judge Dredd First Impressions

A couple of days ago PJ from Shades of Chaos and myself tried out the Judge Dredd minis game from Mongoose Publishing.

After reading the basic rules, which are really easy to pick up, and a couple of the advanced rules we decided to try out the intro scenario in the book called 'The Barko Brothers' (All in the FREE PDF)
PJ started with 1 Judge and I had 4 Punks. Although I used my apes as a stand in.
We tried to copy the scenery as best as we could.

The game play is very simple.
In each turn you activate each model separately. They then have 2 actions. You can Move, Move and Attack, Shoot and use a models of weapons Special action. They can be mixed any way you want. Including using the same ones twice.
As my Punks advanced across the board, the Judge managed to gun the down as soon as they appeared.

PJ then suggested we try again with the Punks playing abit more defensively.
When an enemy first appears in front of a Judge, there is a great little rule. The Judge HAS to tell the model they are under arrest by using a Special action before they can attack. This is unless the enemy has attacked them to start with.

When a criminal is told to surrender you roll a Will check. Each player rolls a D10 and adds their Will stat. The highest wins. If it s the Judge, the criminal is removed from the board but not killed.
If the criminal wins then they don't have to take another one of these checks for the rest of the game and can act normally.

This second game ended with the Punks taking down the Judge in a deadly firefight down a narrow alley.
A shooting attack is very similar to the Will check D10 + Shooting stat v D10 + Agility stat. Any shots that have rolled higher than the defenders Agility total cause damage.
It did take 3 of them to finish him off though!

We then decided to try out a full on game. Judges v Apes. The book says you start with 350pts but to make things a little simpler we went for 375 to fit in rounded models without too much equipment.

After the first couple of turns, most models were in decent positions to attack.

The apes actually managed to take down a Judge again. Massed firepower again.
They didn't do too well after that. The Gorilla Gangster and Sniper Orangutan were arrested and a Chimp was killed.

Both the Judges and the Apes then closed in on each other.

At this point I decided the Gorilla in a dress should charge in and we could try out the Melee attacks.
The rolls are basically the same as the other in the game. Each players rolls an amount of D10s in their profiles and adds their Melee stat. The winner is the highest and each high dice causes damage.

The Gorilla went full boar but seeing I hadn't armed him/her with a melee weapon I had a minus to my rolls. Allowing the Judge to take advantage and take the great beast down.
After that, the final Chimp decided it was a good idea to run and fight another day.

The final gangs looked like this

1 Judge and 1 Rookie still standing. 1 Judge dead.

Orangutan and Gorilla arrested, Gorilla and Chimp killed and last Chimp ran!

Overall I think that Judge Dredd is a great game.
The rules are very easy to pick up. By the 3rd game we were only looking at the , FREE PDF, rules for the stats. It has captured a great Dredd feel as well. Looking forward to out next games and trying out some other gangs and weapon combos. (Including melee weapons this time)

We are going to try out the campaign system next time as well. Had a read through and it seems as easy to pick up as the main rules but lets you add alot more to your gangs including additional members, weapons and skills as the survivors advance.

I would highly recommend checking this game out. Its already ranked up there in my top 6 games after only 1 night!

Over the next 2 weeks I will also be taking a closer look at the model range. Starting with the box sets for Judges, Robots and Punks.

What do you think of the game?

Hendybader awaaaaaaaaaaaaaay!

Legends of the High Seas Game 3 - SHIPS!!!!!!!!!

This week we had a bit of an odd gaming night. After an hour nobody had arrived so I went home. Not long after that, one of the players arrived at my house. So what did we do?
Play Legends of the High Seas with SHIPS!!!!!

Before I start I would like to apologise for the state of the table and my crew.
Haven't had the time this week to paint the boards and awaiting my new GW paints before I hit the crew and ship.
With that out of the way lets get started.

We have played a couple of small land battles since the last report so the crews have advance a little more and we have an even better grasp of the simple yet fun rules.

When playing ship based scenarios, your crew starts with a basic small ship and 2 small cannons for free.
The damage it can take is rolled at the same time. For a small ship you get D6+4 Hull Points.
You then get 20 Ship Wright Points to spend on upgrading it.
We both went for 1 Longboat, 1" extra movement from a Custom Sailing Rig and a couple of extra reinforced Hull Points.
Leaving my ship with 9HP ans Steves with 10HP. (Grrrrrr lucky git)

Steves Privateer crew of the good ship Vamp-Tanic (That name doesn't bode well)
Ship from Minimi. Crew from Black Scorpion and Black Cat Bases

Cap,n Hawks Pirate Crew of the Black Badger.
Ship, rocks and cannons from Games of War, crew from Black Scorpion.
Behind them you can see a Wind Direction template Im testing out for Games of War that will hopefully go into full production soon.

At the start of the game you roll for wind direction. Luckily it rolled  blowing South with was the direct my ship was heading. This is know in the game as Wind Running or Wind Aft.
This gives a nice boost of speed to a small ship letting it move D6+6"

Steves crew had the wind against them. Known as Wind Beating or Wind on Bow.
The wind direction doesn't affect small ships as much as it does large but it still meant the Vamp-Tanic was only moving at D6+3"

With other ships in the water and rocky outcrops around you need to get the hang of changing direction.
Small ships are quite nimble so can make 3 45degree turns per movement phase. Although it does have to travel 2" forward before making each one.
The we found CANNONS!!!! YAY!
Cannons are the only 'guess range' weapon in the game but that makes them all the more realistic.
With a 90 degree arc of fire you need to be facing the right way as the cannon itself cant be moved.
The basic shot from a cannon is a cannon ball. Only does damage to a ships Hull Points, but that's all you need to sink it!
Instead of rolling on your 'shooting' skill you instead roll on the cannon firing table.
This could make you shoot long, short, critical or even a miss fire that may explode!
The Vamp-Tanic landed a couple of killer shots taking 4HP off the Black Badger

 

 Steves crew then shot off before I could return fire. I was also Wind Beating while Steve had Wind Reaching or Wind a Beam. Giving him D6+4" to my D6+3"

Luckily for me the wind the changed direction from South to East. 

Swapping the movements distances over.

The Vamp- Tanic pulled around again to fire off her cannons but did no more damage. (luckily)

If it had, then there is a chance I could have to surrender. When your ship is under half of its HP the you need to start taking Rout tests with your Captain.

The Black Badger did get a couple of shots back to remove 2 HPs though

When rolling for initiative at the start of each turn there is a chance the wind could change direction.

If its a draw the initiative swaps from one player to the other and you roll another dice.

An even number makes the wind turn 1/4 anti-clockwise and an odd turns it 1/4 clockwise.

This gave the movement advantage to the Black Badger once again.

Being able to speed around behind the Vamp-Tanic I was able to test out another cannon shot type.

The Grape shot. This , as you can see, is the teardrop template that affects crew not the hull.

At Strength 5 this took out a couple of the Privateer.

Two more could have been fun though. If you don't have 3 sailors controlling your ship , and not firing cannons and muskets etc, at the start of your movement phase you ship goes out of control until you get you crew into place again.

A sharp turn let me come along side Steves ship. If the target vessel is moving at half distance through having its Hull Points or Sails damaged you can board them. Steves ship still had a couple more HP to go so I had to keep going.

The Vamp-Tanic then pulled in front and loaded their grapeshot.

The template covered all of my crew except the monkey!

Before rolling to damage with Grapeshot you roll 1 dice to see if you get a misfire. This only happens on a 1. Guess what.

 No explosions though.

With the Black Badger pulling along side again the crew decided to fire off a couple of muskets as well as the cannons. This was enough to make the enemy captain 'strike the colours' (rout).

When this happens the winning captain gets extra experience and you can choose to move onto a boarding action.

Oh yes!

With a boarding action the 2 crews go up to the rails and fight it out. You can also move you crew over if you are the attacking ship and there isn't anyone to oppose you.

A fun little part is swinging!

A sailor by the rigging (mast) can try and swing from one ship to the other. You roll 1d6 and see if he makes it.

My Quartermaster rolled a 3 meaning he moved a full 2D6. Which ended up being 9!

Leaving him in the deep blue far on the other side of the ship. When trying to swim you roll on the usual table like you do for climbing and jumping etc. A lucky 6 means he was probably the only sailor on board that could actually swim!

Soon after the crew of the Vamp-Tanic gave in and Cap'n Hawk won the day!

With 2 scenarios being played back to back we had some nice amounts of booty to play with!

Steve picked up some more crew after one died and I went for arming my ship with more cannon and swivel guns.

Now we have played all the rules in the book we LOVE it!

Really looking forward to the next game on the High Seas!

Cap'n Hendybadger out