This is an awesome book, brimming full of fresh roleplaying ideas to sink your nasty wooden hobo teeth into as you roll around in a filthy 1930s railyard. The rich setting is fleshed out pretty well for jumping in without anything feeling tedious or over-explained. The idea of "the songlines" sets up an appropriately fantastical trip by train through a magically corrupted dustbowl, populated by a healthy smattering of cool and unique monsters. I haven't gotten a chance to start playing yet but I'm impressed with how inspiring and fresh the setting is. Hobomancers do everything normal hobos do, plus they practice a special kind of hobo magic, and each PC also gets to choose from a nice list of special gimmicks and powers, as well as character weaknesses. The QAGS ruleset itself feels a little backwards at first but I imagine with time it gels nicely. A little bit more info on how the actual mechanics of the rolls would have been helpful, but Hex made the quickstart and the full QAGS2e rules free, so no compaints there. If you're itching for a break from classic fantasy or other common rpg tropes, take a swig on some bad hooch, throw on some Blind Willie Johnson, and enjoy Hobomancer.

Without question or doubt, this is the best RP suppliment ever written. It does what no other suppliment does: I inspires the imagination with a whole new realm to role play in. The idea of 1930s hobos secretly being magical defenders of the realm is innovative but the idea that players would want to have a hobo for a character is totally unique. What I see in reading this, is that the author knows role players and understands them well enough to craft a world that you wouldn't even think is worth playing it. I actually took the world ideas and played them using D20 modern, but there is nothing wrong with the system the game comes with. When I urchase a product, I am usually looking for idea, in this book, I found them and the game that followed was fun for everyone.

It's true that I'm a little biased when it comes to Hex Games products, since I know several staff members on a personal basis, and I've been running Hex Games events at conventions for several years now. Having said that, I picked up “Hobomancer” last week.