Pushing figures around

A sprawling conurbation had sprung up in the 2020’s, stretching from New York City to Washington and growing. Crime had skyrocketed in the overcrowded sprawl, leading to the roll-out of the Judges in 2031. The American government would turn this into Mega-City One: the first Mega-City. The perceived success of MC-1 would lead to the construction of Mega-City Two and Texas City. The population continued to grow as people moved to the city.

Justice Department would split into three autonomous branches, with one covering Mega-City One, and in 2052 the city was given sweeping powers under the Autonomy Act. Now, only foreign affairs and the military were outside of the city’s remit. It flexed its muscles in 2055 when it imposed harsh immigration laws on American citizens that wanted to move to the city.

The problems with housing, infrastructure, and crime only became worse after the Atomic Wars. Mega-City One was spared total destruction due to experimental laser defence screens but most of the rest of America was in ruins. The Judges took control of the city, citing the Declaration of Independence to turf out President Robert L. Booth to public approval.

Millions streamed into the city, and it ramped up its immigration laws: mutants were forced out under the genetic apartheid laws. Mega-City One was going it alone.

The 2070’s saw harsh rationing and drinking water had to be checked for radiation.
Mega-City One had more fully covered by 2080 and tried flexing its foreign policy muscles. An attempt to secure Texas City’s resources led to war between MC-1 & MC-2 and their southern neighbour, ending in a truce by 2086; to improve relations, Luna City One was constructed by the “United Cities of North America” in 2088. More successful, Mega-City One installed a friendly Judge regime in war-torn Brit-Cit and was able to dominate the surviving European Union and resulting Euro-City into following its lead.

Mega-City scientists were able to engineer apes (or “uplifts”) to be human-level intelligent. Having achieved this, humans promptly stuffed them in the Apetown ghetto and ignored them until they began forming crime syndicates.

By the 2090’s, robot slave labour meant that most of the city was on welfare instead of having to work. People were often desperate to have work and extreme crazes sprung up to deal with boredom, starting with the laz-knife craze in 2089.  The Judges, however, believed that the citizens would balk at having to work more than ten hours a week.
A decadent youth culture arose around drugs, the pinstripe sound, and illegal comics.

Mega-City One had grown to the height of its size and power, with 800 million inhabitants and stretching down the east coast to Miami & east to annex Canada’s Quebec City-Windsor Corridor.

In 2095, Chief Judge Clarence Goodman announces a policy of mass interstellar colonisation to give Mega-City One the resources it needed. This would bring the city great wealth over time but also embroil it in constant wars against alien empires, indigenous alien races fighting conquest, and insurgents on the colonies. The Space Corps constantly saw action.

Another regime change took place in 2100 when the insane Cal, head of the Special Judicial Service, assassinated Chief Judge Goodman and seized control. Only a few Judges had escaped his brainwashing program and under Dredd, they formed a dedicated rebel force that eventually brought him down. Chief Judge Griffin and a new Council of Five took control. A sharp increase in the cold war with the Sov Block began under Griffin, as East Meg One began to test the city for weaknesses.

The brutal Apocalypse War with East Meg One saw the population slashed by half, the entire south destroyed, all but one of the Council killed, and all of the north-west and upper north lost except for a small Northwest Hab Zone. The city had to renumber its surviving sectors to make sense of the new setup.  (The isolated Hab Zone would descend into crime and corruption and become known as “the Pit”) A few years of hardship – starvation, disease, homelessness, and the segregation of fatties – was endured before the city was able to recover.

A democracy revival movement had grown in strength in the mid-2100’s and by 2109, tens of millions were peacefully demanding a return to an elected government. Chief Judge Silver called this “the greatest threat to the city since the Apocalypse War” and authorised a horde of dirty tricks to stop and discredit the movement.

From 2104 to 2133, the city’s population remained roughly at 400 million. Part of the reason for this was recurring emergencies that could kill millions of citizens: the Dark Judge takeover of “Necropolis” in 2112, the zombie invasion “Judgement Day” of 2114, the meat virus in 2115, “The Doomsday Scenario” robot war in 2121, and the nuclear bombings of Total War in 2126. Sixty million citizens died in Necropolis and the population was counted as 350 million the year after, but this swiftly climbed back to 400m.

The twin hits of Necropolis and Judgement Day in two years left the city weakened.  The Judges were weak for several years and its space policy shaky. It recovered and, during the early 2110’s, entered a short period of glasnost with the Sov Block. The Justice Department briefly fell into chaos as Chief Judge Hilda McGruder suffered from increased dementia, with no legal way to remove her.

So, it’s about here that our little campaign is set.

An unfortunate side-effect of the technological advances that have been made is soaring unemployment, which has led to extreme boredom, crime, and general disgruntlement and despair. The citizens have invented a wide variety of pastimes, both good and bad. Some of the big ones include the fatties who overeat to fill their time, which turned competitive eating into a sport; the ugly craze, where people deliberately try to look like hideous freaks; and simps, who try to look and act as bizarre as possible (no mean trick in Mega-City One).

“Crazes” also regularly and briefly sweep the city, often changing by the day. Crazes known to have swept the city in the past have included Synchronized Leaping, PowerBoarding, and Boinging. These are often disruptive and dangerous but are also necessary to distract the citizens from the boredom and horrors of Mega-City One – in the case of atrocities like Necropolis, necessary so people can bury the mental scars.

Transportation systems exist in Mega-City One that accommodate every way of travel, from pedestrian to public transit to hover vehicles. Baffling though these different systems may be, each is surprisingly efficient a vast majority of the time, typically becoming troubled only during large-scale emergencies.

A side effect of the intensity of megacity life is Future Shock Syndrome, or “futsie”, where a stressed citizen will experience something that causes their mind to finally snap: reality seems too absurd to exist. The first case was Michael Kerrigan in 2089 after he saw a las-knife.

Once dead, all citizens become the property of the city. It’s possible to be buried but this is an expensive process: it costs a 950 credit release fee just to get the corpse back.  Most citizens will be sent to Resyk and turned into a variety of useful products (some available from Resyk’s giftshop).

Mega-City citizens are often very, very stupid.

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 and Mongoose Publishing no longer hold the licence to produce models for the range.  That role was taken over by Warlord Games.

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 action.

A Day in the Life of a Mega City Judge

Somewhere in a quieter part of Sector 4 a small gathering of orange robe wearing figures start to assemble.  By day, normal everyday citizens of Mega City One, but as the day turns slowly into night these strange figures are anything but normal.

You see, Perry Pipkin, is the Grand Warlock of the Order of the Carrot.

Bored with day-to-day life Perry has embarked on a dark and dangerous path.  With a few simple-minded accomplices, Perry intents to summon forth the power of a ferocious beast from a dark dimesion.  A creature so foul and powerful that he will bind to his will to wreak havoc upon those that have shunned him throughout his life.  Mwahahahahaha!

Judge Allen is conducting routine traffic patrols and spots a sky surfer breaching a speed limit.  Unbeknown to Allen that just around the corner a huge beast of immense power is about to be drawn into this dimension.

It turns out that our hapless Mr Pipkin is not quite the Grand Warlock he has led the rest of the Cabal to believe he is.  Rather than a mighty Demon a small, irritated Imp is summoned.  “erm, well, the greater demon is currently busy doing horrible things elsewhere.” Perry tells his followers.

In a bid to get away from the pursuing Judge our lone Skysurfer decides to go contraflow to traffic.  This simple traffic breach draws our unsuspecting Judge ever closer to the Order of the Carrot Cabal.Seeing one of MC-1’s finest so close, one of the Cabal loses his nerve and lets loose a shot at Judge Allen.  The shot bounces harmlessly off his trusty Lawmaster but draws Allen’s attention to the pedestrian area above him.

With a simple voice command, he orders his bike to continue the pursuit of the surfer whilst he dismounts to face this new threat.

In a state of panic the Cabal attempts to circle Allen.  Surely one man is no match for so many armed crazies, not to mention one rather short and irritated imp.

From above the street one of the Cabal gets a good vantage point to use his laser rifle.

Barking his orders to surrender, Judge Allen informs the Cabal that they are all under arrest for attempted murder of a Judge, unlawful gathering, discharging a firearm without a permit and summoning an entity from a third dimension.  There are probably many other charges to be had but our hero is interrupted as he is assaulted by three members of the Order of the Carrot.

Having slightly more common sense than the rest of the Cabal, Perry decides that it’s better to flee whilst the Judge is tied up.

Laying down the hurt with the full force of the law, backed up by a few well-placed nightstick smacks, Judge Allen easily subdues the armed Cabal members.  One armed with a chainsaw puts up a bit of a fight but is no match for the well-trained Judge.

The remaining members of the Order of the Carrot make a dash for freedom.  Their hasty retreat covered by one angry imp gnawing on the Judges boot.

It won’t take long for Perry to recruit more followers.  With such a massive city filled with bored and depressed civilians just waiting for a little excitement the Cabal will be back up to full strength in no time.

With the Order of the Carrot now on the Judges radar there will no doubt be more engagements as Perry Pipkin attempts to unleash hell on earth, but for now Judge Allen must turn his attention to a protesting mob of fatties.  Angry at food shortages in sector 4.

Just another day on the beat.