Mega City One Spring Clean Challenge

Now that the buildings are done, it’s time to get a few games in. Obviously my three newly painted buildings will be the centerpiece of the table, but I did need to fill it out a little bit with some papercraft buildings from Dave Graffam. Since the mat features a road going through the middle, I’ve also added some cars – most are from Black Site Studios, with one of Warlord’s Hover Vans. We won’t be using the vehicle rules in this first game, but we came up with a simple house rule to move each vehicle 6” after each character activation, rolling a die when they need to decide whether to turn left or right. It’s a nice simple way to make the game feel like it’s taking place in a populated area.

We’ve chosen the Ambush scenario from the Judge Dredd rule book. It doesn’t seem too complicated and I like the idea of one side setting up in the center and the other in the surrounding area, rather than starting on opposite sides and running to the middle. The scenario’s win conditions seem a little lopsided – the defending player just has to move half (rounding up) of their models off any board edge, which seems pretty easy. The attacking player has to stop them, which presumably means incapacitating or subduing over half of the opponent’s force.

The rules describe a 50 point game as mid-sized, but in reality that only gives us 3 models each – the average model seems to be in the 15-20 point range, with only nameless block gangers and citi-def soldiers coming in at under 12 points. Looking over the models we have available I’m drawn to SJS Judge Gerhart and Wally Squad (undercover) Judge Aimee Nixon. My opponent wants to play street Judges, so we settle on a story where Aimee Nixon has received dubious information about a group of corrupt Judges, leading Judge Gerhart to set up an ambush for them. Whether or not they are actually corrupt probably doesn’t matter to Judge Gerhart, he’s a bit of a zealot when it comes to rooting out bent Judges…

My force is rounded out by a 12-point Citi-Def trooper with a rocket launcher (Gerhart and Nixon clearly can’t trust any Judges to back them up). My opponent’s force consists of a Veteran Street Judge, a regular Street Judge, and Cadet Giant, who is in for one hell of a training day.

My opponent starts in a pretty good position, with all three Judges in cover. I get to start the game with one of my models off the table, to be brought in from any table edge later in the round. I figure this will be helpful since my opponent’s win condition is simply to leave the board – once I know which direction they’re headed I can move my reinforcement to intercept. I start with Nixon and the Citi-Def trooper on the board and Gerhart in reserve.

My rocket launcher gets off one good shot before getting taken out by a Seeker round, which ignores line of sight rules. The game uses cards to add flavor, with each player staring out with a handful of Armory cards (such as the aforementioned seeker) which tend to modify attacks and defenses, and “Big Meg” cards that introduce the general chaos of Mega City One. We both get some good use out of our Big Meg cards – my opponent uses “Munce for Brains” to limit the Citi-Def trooper to a single action on his turn, but since one of my models is a member of the undercover Wally Squad, I get to start with an extra “Wally Squad” card that allows me to steal my opponent’s turn and activate one of my models instead.

I decide to bring in Judge Gerhart on the opposite side of my opponent’s position to try for a flanking maneuver. It is somewhat successful, and I am able to immobilize one of my opponent’s Judges using a “Boing” armory card, which traps the target in bouncy plastic. That’s one Judge immobilized, if I can just trap or eliminate one more I’ll have this game. Neither of my opponent’s remaining judges is within a move action of the board edge, however…

This is where the somewhat egregious nature of this game comes in. Judge Dredd determines activation order by drawing chips out of a cup, so my opponent is able to activate both characters before I get a chance to go again. For Cadet Giant my opponent plays “Crazie!” which allows him a free Charge action ahead of his normal activation, which he uses to get down the stairs from the roof of Mac’s Mek repair. He is then able to use his activation to double move, allowing him to get off the board. Similarly, my opponent’s Veteran Street Judge gets lucky with a Sprint action, which allows the model a double move with an extra d6” of movement – my opponent rolls a 6, and the Veteran Judge is off the board, ending the game with a win for my opponent.

Since the game ended so abruptly, we’ve decided to play a second game.