Picked Rat Queens up after your review, and I loved it. I really like the adrenaline-junkie angle on the adventuring party, something my regular group has used in the campaign I am running (5th edition). It gets kind of hard to justify going out on dangerous adventures when you have a small fortune in gold and diamonds at home, unless you are just really into that sort of thing.

@Stennets
You should also look into the “worlds” games too then. Dungeon World is loads of fun as well as Monster of the Week (Buffy, X-files, Supernatural type game), the system is also very good at preventing munchkining.

@Luke
I recently bought the first two volumes of Saga and was hooked. I’ll definitely check out Rat Queens too. I’ve discovered quite a lot of cool stuff through your blog (especially China Mieville!) and this seems like a good place to say thank you :)

I tried a couple of times last year to try and get back into pen and paper roleplaying but just never really felt satisfied. I mainly played through Roll20 (which is absolutely amazing in my opinion) but consistently had problems with no-show players. I also kind of get tired of getting paired with munchkins when I’m more into the role-playing aspect (if I wanted a number crunching game, I’d go play a co-op CRPG or something). Pen and paper is just really dependent on the people you play and it’s hard for me to find people that have the same interest.

Maybe I should give a different system a shot. Different systems attract different people I guess. I was mainly doing FATE last year since I wanted a system that placed less emphasis on number crunching. I’m thinking about doing Shadowrun, Dark Heresy, or maybe Call of Cthulu this year.

Anyways, back on topic, Rat Queens looks really cool and I’ll definitely pick up a copy. Thanks for the review!

@ Robert:

Uh, I think there was supposed to be a barbarian, or a paladin in there somewhere. ;)

@ Max:

Yep, it was a good role playing on his part. :)

And yeah, I think most settings assume that Dwarf women do not grow beards. This might very well be a nod towards Pratchet.

@ IceBrain:

The last few issues of Saga were kinda slow but I think it’s picking up again. Gwendolyn and Lying cat are back. Prince Robot is back in action. The family is in danger again, and the plot thickens. I’m still enjoying it.

Rat Queens is pretty good; light and funny. Saga, on the other hand, has been disappointing – the whole marital disagreement is just a moldy cliché, which is a shame coming from the same comic that brought us Lying Cat and the royal Robots.

In the realm of fantasy comics with strong female lead characters, I’ve been really enjoying Umbral. It’s dark rather than funny, but it has some great artwork.

By the way, the wiki says a TV series based on Rat Queens is being planned; I wonder what they’ll do with it.

The dwarf forcibly dragged me outside yelling “You are a warrior, you see walking dead, you hit’em with yer sword!”

To be fair, that’s exactly how I’d imagine a dwarf to act in that situation ;)

By the way, there’s a popular German RPG (“Das schwarze Auge”) which specifically points out that dwarf women don’t grow beards. I blame Terry Pratchet.

“[…] five person teams composed of a warrior, rogue, cleric and a mage are a common sight.”

Uh, Luke, I’m pretty sure that’s four….