Today is the first strip in a brand new storyline called “Into the Chasm of Night!” and is a perfect jumping on point for new readers of MeatShield! Welcome aboard, folks, it’ll be a lot of fun, I promise! Take care, ~Rob Chambers

Every time my wife and I have moved, she will ask me what I’m looking for in a new place.Invariably I will respond by saying, “Batpole. It has to have a batpole or no deal.” You would think she’d stop asking me that question. Kind of like Dhur’s waterslide. Hang in there, big guy, you’ll […]

And so it begins… heh heh heh (Evil DM Laugh). By the way, where is Vorpal? 😉 Take care, ~Rob

Okay, I need a little hairstyling advice. Jaine is, in my mind, due for a hairstyle change and I need suggestions. I’d like to keep the ponytail because, like a lot of guys, I’m a sucker for ponytails, but I’m not married to it. Essentially, if you were were a female adventurer tromping around the […]

One thing that I’ve been remiss about is telling you all exactly what Philo is, class-wise. However, instead of just spelling it all out for you guys, I have elected to take Stephen King’s advice and show, not tell readers about a character. The first clue has been laid in this strip. Let the wild […]

I think someone had commented that Jaine tends to poo-poo the idea of looting treasure from dungeons and such, which is a prime motivation for many an adventurer. I’ve never really addressed it within the strip itself, but she did grow up as royalty, sort of. Jaine has never really had to worry much about […]

And now, in a continuing service, an entry from the Encyclopedia Ardrisia… THE CHASM OF NIGHT Few locales inspire as much deep-seated fear as The Chasm of Night. In the first age after the world was created, two of the greater gods waged a terrible battle. On one side was Kelamane, God of Honor, Light, […]

It looks like the better question wasn’t “what is Philo’s class,” but instead “what is Philo?” (Insert Evil DM Laugh here). Found out something interesting the other day. Not through any conscious effort on my part or anything, but MeatShield passes the Bechdel Test.The Bechdel Test was created by Alison Bechdel of the comic strip […]

Dun-dun-DUNNNNN! See you all Friday, ~Rob

UPDATE – 6/12/13: My kids are finishing school and I have house guests in from out of state, so site updates will be sporadic until probably after July 4th. Thanks for understanding. 🙂 Hey, some of us are not morning people. It takes us a little while to get into the flow of things. Philo […]

As I said in the last blog post, strip updates will be irregular until after July 4th, mostly due to my girls getting out of school for the summer, house guests, and the fact that in my immediate family, there are five birthdays (including my daughters’ 9th) and one anniversary in June, along with Father’s […]

Just in case anyone else out there is thinking the same thing my wife asked me the other day: Yes, this is the REAL Philo. I wouldn’t do that to you guys twice. Once is a nice little plot twist; twice is just plain mean. I am a tough but fair DM! Thanks for your […]

Annnnnd…. we’re back! Sorry for the lengthy hiatus, folks, but no more of that! As of this week, we will be back to three times a week! Woo Hoo! So, now you know exactly what Philonoth Rhieune is: a changeling artificer. For those of you who haven’t played D&D in the past 10 years or […]

This blog post title comes courtesy of Blue-Hand Troll. I don’t quite remember who asked me or when, but someone asked me what the voices of the various characters sound like in my head. For example, Jaine is usually either my wife or Scarlett Johannsen, Dhur’s voice is my impersonation of Torq from the Critical […]

Hi, Blue! I missed drawing you. I almost forgot how! ~Rob

Ah, the best laid plans… I had planned to return to producing 3 strips a week as of last week; then I and the rest of my family all contracted the stomach virus from hell. Did it hit us all on the same day? Noooo, that would have been somewhat merciful; two days of misery […]

I have a question for the Group Mind (that’s you guys): I just wrapped up the first chapter in the Pathfinder Adventure path that I was running my group through and one of the Robs (there are three guys in this group named Rob, including me) volunteered to run a Dark Sun game to give […]

I shared this on the MeatShield Facebook page earlier, but I thought it bore mentioning here too: What was black, white and red all over? As of 6:45PM Thursday night, my dog! When the family and I came home from from my belated birthday dinner at Buca di Beppo’s, Kathy and the girls went into […]

Yay! I put up a new cartoon on the day I planned!  Go me! 🙂 Question: Do you folks like that map in the first panel? I worked very hard on that and was wondering if you folks might like it as a wallpaper. Here’s the full image (click to enlarge it): Let me know […]

Yes, Jaine named her horse “Buttercup.” One of my players once named her paladin’s warhorse “Althielas” (or something like that – memory’s hazy), which translated into Elvish as “Cupcake.” True story. 🙂 Take care, ~Rob

Yay! Three comics this week! Getting back on the horse that threw me, folks! That’s all I have to say today. 🙂 Have a good weekend, everyone! ~Rob

Heck, I write this strip and I’m surprised I haven’t cracked up yet. 🙂 Nope, nothing profound today, folks. See you Wednesday! Take care, ~Rob

Remember me asking you all if you’d played Dungeon World a while back? I finally played it tonight, and it wasn’t anywhere near as confusing as I thought it would be. I’ll provide a better write-up later on, but it’s 12:30AM as I write this and I’m going to bed. See you next week! ~Rob

Must be pretty bad if animals that are known for eating their own poop are complaining about your body odor. By the way, I just added some social media buttons down at the bottom of this post. Do me a favor: click the button for the site of your choice (Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, etc.) and […]

I know I promised a more in-depth review of my first time playing Dungeon World last week, but I have pulled another late night and I am really tired. I will catch you on the flipside with that. 🙂 Take care, ~Rob

As I said last time, I was going to write my Dungeon World review in this blog post. However, I will be playing Dungeon World again this weekend with my usual gaming group and I wanted to have a second session under my belt before I actually weighed in with my opinion. My preliminary opinion; […]

Woo-hoo! Today marks the fifth anniversary of MeatShield! Back in ’09, I started this little strip with a couple of jokes in my head and a song in my heart. Well, that’s partly true, except for the song part. I can’t sing – or rather, I can sing, but it tends to make small children […]

And now, in a continuing service, an entry from the Encyclopedia Ardrisia… DARVANA Darvana is the goddess of luck, humanity, fate, and adventure. Darvana is much beloved by most humans throughout Ardris; she is commonly acknowledged to be the creator of humanity. When she chooses to manifest herself on the material plane, Darvana often appears […]

As promised, I am now presenting my mini-review of the Dungeon World game. I remember when I was a kid, I found that the rulebook to Advanced Dungeons & Dragons (yes I’m that old) was great reading but the sheer density of the text in that book made trying to completely understand the entire game […]

Sorry for the short week of strips, folks. Real Life intervened, presenting me with a broken down car. It’s a 2003 Ford Windstar with over 150K miles on it with an air conditioning system that decided to seize up and explode. Since a good deal of that system runs off of a serpentine belt that […]

This is something that has always stuck in my craw about MMORPGs. Whenever you make a character on, let’s say Warcraft, you always end up doing these little quests for non-player characters who ask you to go kill 17 zombies or whatever. These zombies that you have been asked to go kill to preserve the […]

The theory I have about Dhur’s ability to navigate is this: his ability to get around is inversely proportional to how large of an area he has to plot a course through. If we are talking about Dhur having to follow a trail, track someone, or otherwise get someplace on foot with little information, he […]

UPDATE: 10/4/13 My hands hurt. A lot. Here’s why: My in-laws live on property in North Texas that has a lot of mesquite trees on it and recently I asked them to mail me several good-sized sticks that I could carve into wands for my family’s Halloween costumes (this year we’re Harry Potter themed – […]

My hand is better now, although still not 100%. Fortunately, I’ve now finished all the wands for our Halloween costumes. Anyway, I figured you folks would like to see what I darned neared ruined my hands making. Presenting the Wand of The Mighty Rob: You can’t tell because of the light I used, but there […]

Man, Dhur can’t catch a break. First he gets in trouble for not warning them about traps, then when he does try to warn them, he’s ignored. It’s almost like he has some sort of track record of not being very bright. Oh, wait. Take care, ~Rob

And now, in a continuing service, an entry from the Encyclopedia Ardrisia… KOBOLDS There are many monsters in the world of Ardris that are mighty enough to topple pillars and crush diamonds in their bare hands, that inspire fear in kings and heroes alike. Then there are the kobolds. Kobolds are wicked and evil creatures […]

I have been wrestling with something for the past several months. As you may have noticed, I have not been terribly timely with updates to the strip. I think the primary cause of this is my tendency to obsess over tiny little details that no one will ever see, or they will see them, but […]

Cheef doesn’t miss a trick, does he? Here’s a funny thought: Since this strip began, Dhur and Company have encountered goblins, drow, giants, a lich (sort of), evil cultists, a couple of gods and a demonic dragon, yet it may well be that the enemies that’ll vex them the most are… kobolds?? Heh heh heh. […]

Halloween 2013 has now come and gone; I hope yours was a good one. This year, my family and I dressed in costumes from Harry Potter. My daughters were Ginny Weasley and Hermione Granger, my wife went as Sybil Trelawny, and I was Mad-Eye Moody, complete with wands that I hand-carved for each member of […]

I don’t have anything witty to say today. I promise, the next blog post will be something extremely funny. Okay, somewhat funny. At least mildly amusing. See you next time! Take care, Rob

Hi folks, A little bit of housekeeping: as anyone who has used the comments section on this site knows, you need to provide a valid email address to have your comments show up on the site. If you are a first-time commenter, I receive a notification email telling me that a new comment is awaiting […]

Yep, you heard me, Hipster Kobold. You might not have heard of them, they’re really rare. *grin* “Hipster Kobold” is also the name of my new Paul and Storm cover band 😉 Take care, ~Rob

We haven’t had a good dungeon crawl in a long time, have we now? By the way, Poxgut is a hipster; I toyed with the idea of giving him handlebar mustaches, but each time I drew him with them, it just came out looking weird. Well, weirder. Take care, ~Rob

A while back I had mentioned that I wanted to change up how I drew the strip. Today’s strip is the next step in the evolution of MeatShield. From this point forward, I will be drawing the strips in this format. The way I figure it, with my current productivity being what it is, if […]

This is it, the last MeatShield comic for 2013! I am now on my way cross-country to Texas for the holidays. The next MeatShield comic will be posted on January 7th, 2014. Here’s wishing all of you a happy holiday, whatever holiday it is that you observe. Take care!! ~Rob

Happy (belated) New Year! We’re back! I hope you all had a good holiday season like I did, hopefully without the 1400 miles worth of interstate driving in snow storms. It was all worth it and we got to see many family members that we only really get to see once every other year. On […]

Rings of Decapitation: does wearing them enable you cut the heads off of other people, or do they simply cause your own head to fall off once you put one on? It’s kind of like how many licks does it take to get to the center of a Tootsie Roll Pop? The world may never […]

Thus ends the short life of Poxgut, son of Wartfinger. In lieu of flowers, contributions may instead be made to KHA, Kobold Hipsters Anonymous, in order to fund the much needed work they do in the kobold community. BTW, for the D&D purists out there: Yes, I do know that gelatinous cubes are transparent, not […]

Sometimes I really have trouble coming up with clever blog titles. So sue me.:) I realize that it’s now February, but I never got around to discussing the traditional New Year’s resolutions. Here are my resolutions, in no particular order: Lose weight. I have been trying to lose weight off and on since I was […]

New Year’s Resolutions Progress Report Twice a week update schedule? So far, so good. Book Two: Half of the illustrations are now done for the Encyclopedia Ardrisia excerpts. After I finish the remaining illustrations, I will then sit down and make up the Pathfinder statistics for each member of the group so far, except for […]

… and you know, it’s good enough for me. 🙂 No real news or anything this time, folks. See you on Friday! ~Rob

Let’s hope that Cheef doesn’t notice that one member of the party is missing. Then again, he probably doesn’t care. See you on Monday, ~Rob

So, how did everyone do surviving Ragnarok?I had a mild charlie horse when I woke up that morning, but I think that’s the extent that the Midgard Serpent made its displeasure known. Besides, Thor seemed to go through Ragnarok at least every other year in his comic book and the world turned out fine each […]

All right, I have a question for you all. This is something that has been on my mind for a number of weeks now, ever since I heard Chris Oatley’s podcast, which you can listen to here. For those of you who do not have the time to sit down and listen to an entire […]

Progress is being made on Book Two. I have finished all of the illustrations for the Enyclopedia Ardrisia pages and I am currently in the process of creating the Pathfinder stat blocks for Dhur, Jaine, Ch’p, and Becky. All that remains after that is to lay out all of the “business” pages; things like the […]

Oh, the sacrifices that Philo makes as an agent of the Elvish crown… 😉 I’ve obviously always had a soft spot in my heart for bards; often the butt of jokes in the gaming community, bards can actually be pretty fun to play. My wife ran one for the Eberron campaign I ran when I […]

Cool changes coming on April 1st! Don’t worry, it’s a good thing. No, I’m not quitting. Stay tuned!! ~Rob

Jaine has a kind of love/hate relationship with the whole princess mishegas. Exciting news still on the way! Be here April 1st! ~Rob

OKAY! Here’s what I’ve been sitting on for the past few weeks! http://youtu.be/jBR38P8sbl4 MeatShield now has a Patreon campaign! I’m really looking forward to this, folks, as not only would it really help me out, but it’ll make available a whole bunch of neat stuff for all of you, like the sketch blog, Google Hangout […]

Side note: Khalinor was the name of a ranger I used to play in a friend’s D&D campaign in Las Vegas. My Khalinor was human, but the GM, Frank, could never remember that and kept assuming that I was running an elf. So, with this Khalinor, I just decided to give in and make him […]

You can support this comic through Patreon! Would have had this strip up much earlier on Friday, but my web server was down and didn’t get fixed until 9:30PM. Oh well. Not much to talk about right now, folks. I’ll see you all next week! Take care, ~Rob

Ch’p hasn’t learned how to deflect arrows yet, FYI. 🙂 See you all next week! ~Rob

Y’know, it took me a while to come up with a fitting onomatopoeia for this particular strip. I’m kind of proud of “Vorp.” I have no idea if I invented it or not, but whatever works, right? Oh, and guess what? The map didn’t lead to a treasure. Now it gets weird. Weirder. You know […]

I had mentioned this in my Twitter feed yesterday and the day before, but I really do not know what to think of D&D Next. Like a lot of people, I had high hopes when 4th Edition was released, only to have those hopes slowly dashed over the course of a couple of years as […]

If you met your future self, you’d probably tell yourself the winning lottery numbers, or who not to ask out (or who you should have). What does Dhur tell his past self? Kumquats and prom queen… whatever the heck that means! *Insert Evil DM Laugh Here* Take care, ~Rob

Ch’p is a little trigger-happy. Or bowstring-happy. Whatever. Work continues on Book Two. I have one last thing to do: draw the cover. For some reason, this is giving me a tough time, as I want it to look as good or better than Book One’s cover, so I’ve gone through tons of sketches with […]

That reference in the last panel is for everyone reading this over the age of 40. For the rest of you… it’s a classical reference. 😉 Take care, ~Rob