(Dredd) Scenario Ideas

numanti

Mongoose
Since I have been GMing Judge Dredd since 1988, I actually have a lot of scenario's I have played hanging around at my friends house (that is where we play). I am not one for writing up tons of stats (only where they are important in the game! I tend to use generic stats for minor characters, making major perps stronger where Judges are stronger, for the sake of game balance), so if I were to post any of the ideas here they really would just be outlines and would require some work.

I tend to use very rough hand drawn maps for most encounters and just randomise locations on the spot (using the old GW Citi-Block floorplans) - so I won't be posing any maps, just brief descriptions of areas where the action takes place.

What I do have are plenty of outlines for adventures that I have played. As they are handwritten and I don't have them at home, I can't post an example here yet, but if there is interest I will grab my old notes and type them up and post them here.

What do y'all think?
 
It’s great to see other people’s ideas and personally I love a bit of plagiarism, I can’t see the point of re-inventing the wheel.

So I would be very interested in seeing your overviews, I am always in need of some mental stimuli, I have been gm’ing for many years now and it’s always nice to see what other people are up to and get some new ideas.

Also I have only just started running JD, so seeing what a more experienced guy is up to would be nice, one of my main concerns with the game, is if your not careful it will turn into a continuous gun-fest.

BigSteve
 
I second the motion!

Yes, adventures, please.

I run JD pretty irregularly, but I love the game dearly. I am of the opposite school of GMing, as I write everything up in detail before running.

But to do that I need decent ideas to base it all on.

My biggest JD game of the year is this coming weekend. After it, I plan on posting some of my stuff here as well.

Thanks for offering, by the way.
 
I did used to plan out things meticulously, but then in-game the players would always go somewhere I hadn't anticipated and so I started to concentrate more on just plot - I now tend to use outlines and know my story well enough to allow it to go off at tangents. I was looking through the first adventure I ever wrote earlier today and was surprised at how linear and organised it was.

So I have a plot outline, major perps as fully formed as I need, and a whole lot of generic perp stats. I used to use a index card system for a perp/citizen database, where i wrote name, address, blood group, criminal record and so on on every card. Most of the cards were for characters I never intended to use, but I would also put perps in there that I knew would come up in the game. I didn't put stats on the cards - this was for the Judges to look up any names I mentioned - so if the team were trying to arrest some creep for spitting and asked his name and he said, 'Archibald Snazz,' they could look him up and see if he had any previous convictions.

I still use this box of cards as it works pretty well in-game - the Judges themselves update the criminal record bit when they make an arrest :) Since we have been playing pretty regularly for so long, a lot of perps the players have arrested have got out after serving a 5 year stretch and sometimes, just for fun, I have them come looking for revenge >:}
 
Numanti, this sounds great. I've been away this weekend but just got back. I would love to see your overviews of your games. I am pretty new to DMing, though I've been a Dredd fan for years. It sounds like you've come up with some great interactive ideas like the index cards, and I'd love to hear about any other ideas you have to keep the game running smoothly.

How many perp/citizen cards do you think you have, all in all?

Arabin
 
Hi there...I am an experienced GM who runs Conan every Friday night and switches off on the gming in various games on Monday night. I have just recently got into the Dredd setting and really like it and am planning to run it for monday night group when my turn comes around. I would love to hear your stories as Meag-City One is still a new place for me. Thanks
 
Ridick,

Though it's off the point a bit, how did you find Conan, does it play well, good and bad points?

Cheers,

BigSteve
 
Hi B...I've been running various rpgs for a long time, from Storyteller to D20. I have no problem in saying that Conan RPG is the best game out there. Mongoose did an unbelievable job in putting this system together, from character types to changes in the way combat is done, Conan RPG creates the right mood for swords and sorcery adventures in Hyboria. The only exposure my players had to Conan was the movies and toons, but they are loving the game and i am enjoying running this game. This will likely be the first game i run from 1st to 20th lvel, my players are now 5th. I've got adventures maped out for the next year at least. So far all the resource books have been top notch, with Road of Kings being one of the best GM resources i've come across. I highly recommend Conan RPG.
 
I'll take it you liked it then, did they pay you to say that? :D

Cheers for the feedback.

Steve
 
I have about 1000 perp / citizen cards in all, in a big a-z card box. I was going to transfer it all to a database but thenI thought having pc's access a real computer during a game might badly affect the flow of the game - it might work, with one player going off to the computer to 'look up a citizen on MAC', but the index card box works really well as it stands and once the initial work is done (i'd suggest writing about 50 or so to start off, and just keep adding).

I also have a big a - z map in progress of a sector which is on graph paper, and details of every block that is on the map. Whenever I need a new block I just add it to the map and to my block details book (containing overviews of every block in my game) - it is quite a detailed sector, I think having all this background stuff worked out and available to the players at all times is what enables me to run games with a minimum of planning.
 
That sounds fantastic Numanti. I really like your ideas, and will try to incorporate some of them into my own games. Would you mind scanning in a section or the whole of your sector map? I'd love to see an example of how you are doing it, along with the details you store in your Block Details Book.

If you don't want everyone to see it, I could PM you my email address... but this might also make a really nice S&P article detailing how you handle a long term JD campaign.

Arabin
 
I don't have scanner, unfortunately. I have been thinking for a while about how I might be able to make a map on a computer, but it is proving difficult. The map is the easy bit, though. What I can type up s all the block details I have which ae all recorded in the following manner - (I'll put details in as I go along, as far as I can remember them off the top of my head)

Block - Maggie Thatcher Block
Type - Post Apocalypse
Location - Sector 69 central, Grid ref G3 (II) (This refers to my map, which I split into a grid from A - H and 1 - 4, (i) and (ii) being facing pages - it's hard to describe but really simple to use - it is set up just like an A - Z book which I don't know if you are aware of)
Floor area - (cannot remember as I don't have the books to hand, but I still use the ridiculously big GW rules to work out block sizes, allowing me to have blocks over 1,000 stories high!)
Levels - 397
Meg-Way Intersections & vehicle parks - Level 50 (slipzoom to Billy Connolly Megaway) & Level 255 (John Foxx Overpass)
Allies - Ronald Reagan Block, Charlie Windsor Block
Enemies - Neil Kinnock Block, Lady Di Memoial Con-Apts
Juve Gangs - The Maggie T Milk Snatchers. They absolutely HATE the Kinnock Block gang NUT-ty Boys, and specialise in bullying anoyone they think is beneath them, which is just about EVERYBODY.
Famous Residents - Ponsonby Smythe - Vid-soap star and sneering Brit-Cit snob. Floppy-haired and overly apologetic on screen, loved by ladies over 40. In private has a huge sugar habit and a weakness for slabwalkers.
Enterence Plaza - a huge mall occupying the first 3 levels of the block.
Turbo Lifts, Grav-Chutes, Stairs and Elevators - located all together right by the main doors. Grav Chutes out of order most of the time (60% chance)

I could post more once I have got all my notes back from Alan's (I keep everything there as that is where we play) - it becomes much more interesting once you can see all the other blocks - just having small details like this generates a whole heap of complex seeds for adventures just in it's own right, as obvious tensions between blocks rise and other blocks take sides...

Blocks I want to detail more are also ther. I generate them using the Citi-Block rules from Games Workshop (I still use a lot of their rules - I m still getting used to te D20 rules!) - some blocks (including the sector house and surrounding blocks) I even have drawings of the blocks themselves and breakdowns of what is on every level) and I also have several Juve Gangs far more detailed than the Milk Snatchers, but I do find that whenever I am going to introduce a new location, these are the kind of details the players ask for.
 
Thanks for sharing, Numanti. This is great. Since all my players are American, they don't get all of the humor when you go as deep as you have, so I have to tweak things a lot.

I'm still trying to decide on the best ways to keep everything together but so far, I love you ideas. I do know what you mean by th A to Z since I lived in London all my life until 3 years ago. That's a good way of doing it.

Do you keep the maps fairly simple with just a square area marked off with a label, or do you make them various shapes and sizes, and include all the winding roads between them?

Arabin
 
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