Judge Dredd: The Role-Playing Game | Rules Breakdown

Please Subscribe to our Channel:    / @rpggamer  

Please help support the channel, here's our Patreon:
  / _rpggamer  

Retro RPG: Shadowrun: Super Tuesday
   • Shadowrun: Super Tuesday | Retro RPG  

Rules Breakdown: Pendragon
   • Rules Breakdown: Pendragon  

Description: Judge Dredd: The Role-Playing Game is a role-playing game published by Games Workshop in 1985.

Judge Dredd is a comic book superhero system in which the player characters are super-police officers, "Judges", in a wretched future society. Based on the popular British comic-book series, the game is grim but humorous. The 1st ed. has a "Judge's Manual" (player's book, 72 pages) and a "Game Master's Book" (128 pages); they are combined in the one-volume 2nd ed. Characters are created with basic skills and learn further abilities as these skills increase. The GM's section covers scenarios, crimes, and criminals in detail, plus there is an index of Mega-City slang. The 2nd ed. is indexed and includes the hand-to-hand and vehicle combat rules from the Judge Dredd Companion.

Judge Dredd: The Role-Playing Game, was published under license by Games Workshop in the 1980s and used a rules system created specifically for the game, which resembled GW's Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay. Players create a starting character by rolling eight Characteristics: Strength (S), Initiative (I), Combat Skill (CS), Drive Skill (DS), Technical Skill (TS), Street Skill (SS), Medical Skill (MS), and Psi Skill (PSI). Strength is rolled on a table using a 10-sided die and is a value rated from 2 to 4: 2 is "Average" (1-6, or 60%), 3 is "Strong" (7-9, or 30%), and 4 is "Very Strong" (10, or 10%); this stat also doubles as the character's Hit Points. The other stats are derived by rolling two 10-sided dice and adding 20 points, generating a result between 22 and 40; there is a maximum of 100 points in each Characteristic. A character who rolls a starting score of 30 or more in a Characteristic starts play with a Special Ability (like Quick Draw Lawgiver Pistol or Jump Lawmaster Cycle) and gain an additional one per every 10 points above 30. Characters who score a natural or enhanced 40 or more in the Technical, Medical or Psi Skills may start respectively as Specialist Tech-, Med-, or PSI-Judges and gain unique Special Abilities.

The box set rules (1985) came with a Game Master's Book (game rules and background data), a Judge's Book (player's manual), 2 maps and a set of cardboard figure sheets, and a set of five polyhedral dice (one each of 4-, 6-, 8-, 10- and 12-sided dies). The Judge's Companion (1987), featuring artwork of PSI-Judge Anderson on the cover, was a rules expansion and adventure anthology that came in softcover and hardcover editions. The later hardbound edition of the Judge Dredd rulebook (1989) combined the Game Master and Judge's Books into one volume and added some content from the Judge's Companion.