D20 Random Questions with Ezra Claverie

 

What is going on inside the heads of our favorite creators?

    You may know of a slim, purple grimoire, penned by one Ezra Claverie, named 6x6x6: The Mayhemic Misssile Method (Tenscore and Sixteen Ways for Sorcerists, Witches, and Other Thaumatrophs to Defend Their Indefensible Persons), or other erudite OSR offerings such as The Crypts of Indormancy, and the Slow Sleigh to Plankton Downs. 

    Check them out if you don't. 6x6x6 is one of the most idiosyncratic and chaotic books in a catalogue known for its chaos and idiosyncrasy. 

    There is also The Shadow Out of Providence, a non-RPG book for the more discerning bibliophiles out there. (Seriously, check it out.)

    I'm not sure anything is going to prepare us for the madness Ezra is going to unleash with A True Relation of the Great Virginia Disastrum, 1633. James Raggi has teased the 3 volume slip-cased boxset on Facebook, and Ezra was gracious enough to answer my questions about this upcoming work, and many more besides.

    Me: Can you say anything about the inspiration for this project? And what has been most exciting for you to work on?

    EC: At Gen Con in 2018, Jim Raggi was challenging people to pitch scenarios set in the Virginia Colony in 1633. I struggled to come up with weird stuff that wasn't Indians or English or folklore (i.e. you can't just stat Bigfoot). By playing "What would Blackwood/Lovecraft/Merritt do?" I came up an answer that Jim liked, then spent the next few months planning a scenario around it (and the next three years researching, writing, and testing it). As I worked, I found myself haunted by an image of the Earth splashing outward like a fluid, only to realize later that I was remembering the McDonnell Planetarium in my home town of St. Louis, a hyperboloid structure that looks like a milk-splash coming up from the Earth.

    Most exciting: I'll say drawing on the nonfiction works of Charles Fort to create tables of weird stuff that happens in the skies, because Fort does not get enough love.

    Me: I agree!

    Me: When did role playing games first come into your life? What was it like for you to discover this hobby? Do you think they impacted your development as an artist?

    EC: When I was nine, my childhood best friend talked up D&D. I felt reluctant to try something that looked so much like schoolwork, but the dice fascinated me. The next summer, I used birthday money to buy the Mentzer D&D red box at Dragon’s Lair, in the Old Orchard strip mall, Webster Groves, Missouri. My mother had just taken us to see The Muppets Take Manhattan, which opened on 13 July 1984, so I suspect that was the day I crayoned in my first set of dice.

    Me: What galvanized you to start being creative in the first place? Was there a certain moment, any early memory?

    EC: I always loved monsters, but one moment stands out with primordial clarity. In the old Schnucks in Hampton Village (before they rebuilt it on the south side of the strip mall), my mother bought for me a copy of Devil Dinosaur #4, where Moon-Boy and Devil, the red Allosaur that Moon-Boy rides, meet alien robot-people. This first encounter with Jack Kirby and with ancient astronauts rewired my brain. For years, I doubted my own memory of the two-page spread of the Sky-Demon as too weirdly apocalyptic to get approved by the Comics Code Authority, but some nurse bought it for her three-year-old son.

    Me: What was your start in TTRPG publishing? What was it like for you to get your foot in the door? How has it been since then?

    EC: In 2013, a friend urged me to submit to an open call for an OSR collection that I won’t name. The editor accepted my submission, but then I heard nothing further. Four years later, at the North Texas RPGCon, I saw the hardcover book for sale, from a different publisher. That second publisher told me that the original project had collapsed, so he had released the material under his own imprint. But the second publisher had not told contributors that the book had gone into print, and he neither compensated me for my work nor offered me a copy. By 2017, I had already worked with publishers who treat contributors much better than this scavenger, so I let it go.

    Me: Who are some of your biggest creative influences?

    EC: Chinua Achebe, Steve Albini, Nick Blinko, Leigh Brackett, Raymond Chandler, Ursula K. Le Guin, Gary Gygax, Jack Kirby, David Lynch, Nigel Kneale, Thomas Ligotti, Liu Cixin, H. P. Lovecraft, Sam McPheeters, A. Merritt, Charles Portis, James Raggi, Paul Verhoeven, H. G. Wells, John Woo...

    Me: What are some of the biggest illusions you had about the RPG industry that were shattered?

    EC: My only illusion—and it wasn’t a strong one, just an unarticulated assumption—was that people whose names routinely appear on game book covers must write games as their primary living. Many that I admire have day jobs, which gives them the autonomy to make the games they want, not the games that some marketing department thinks will drive a brand’s carousel.

    Me: What do you hope to achieve through the work you are doing now? Fortune? Infamy?

    EC: I want to write game books that I would be excited to read.

    Me: What do you think makes a great RPG book, what elevates it above the others? What makes a book really connect with people?

    EC: To both questions: A great RPG book has a commitment to bold and distinctive ideas, a willingness to sacrifice part of its potential audience to that commitment, and an editor who will not put up with bad prose.

    Me: Any movies/tv that have stuck with you for years that have worked their way into your art? 

    EC: When I was between the ages of five and seven, a local TV station showed Hammer’s 1968 Lost Continent, and I caught about twenty minutes of it on our tiny black-and-white TV. For years thereafter, I assumed that no movie could have as many strange elements as I remembered: giant crabs, flesh-eating seaweed, Hildegard Knef, armpit-balloons and snowshoe-things for crossing “the weed,” lost-in-time Spanish-Inquisition types dressed in capirotes, and more. My first DVD purchase—this film—confirmed my memories and then some. (Now that I think of it, I can’t believe Kelvin Greene hasn’t done this as a scenario for LotFP.) And the Quatermass serials written by Nigel Kneale for the BBC. It’s like Doctor Who for adults, with the cosmic scale and darkness of Lovecraft.

    Me: Tell me about your favorite book.

    EC: Moby Dick. Long, digressive, and experimental, it deals centrally with the 19th-century sperm-whale fishery, my candidate for the most impressive thing humans have ever done.

 

  Me: Has being a published author affected your life?

    EC: “Being a published author” hasn’t affected my life nearly as much as have the years of work that it took me to break into various publishing worlds: fiction, scholarship, and gaming. In no case did a first publication revise my self-image or change how I paid my bills, much as I wanted them to. But publishing in different arenas did help me develop the skills I needed to get a day job as a ghostwriter, which I much prefer to the majority of jobs I’ve held.

    Me: Do you think art in general or RPGs in particular have any responsibilities in this day and age?

    EC: A work of art (including RPGs) should first be good at its ostensible task—telling a story, rendering a scene, simulating a challenging situation, whatever—and only then do anything else as a distant second. Nothing ages faster than an attempt to be relevant to one’s time.

    Me: What do you think is the most awful death you’ve encountered in a particular historical period?  

    EC: For 6x6x6: The Mayhemic Misssile Method (Tenscore and Sixteen Ways for Sorcerists, Witches, and Other Thaumatrophs to Defend Their Indefensible Persons), I did research on unusual ways to get killed in real life, like getting crushed in a human stampede, getting slashed by leaking hydraulic fluid, or getting dissolved by hydrogen-peroxide fuel in a crashed Nazi rocket-plane. 

    The worst source, in terms of its sadness and its pulverizing detail, was Loss of Signal: Aeromedical Lessons Learned from the STS-107 Columbia Space Shuttle Mishap. But those deaths are mercifully quick, and most of us will die slowly in hospital beds, which I consider worse.

    Me: Any favorite RPG heirloom? First set of dice? D&D woodgrain boxset?

    EC: My hundred-sided Zocchihedron has traveled with me since 1986. (Thank you, Josh Boelter.)

    Me: What is your dream TTRPG job? Does it even exist?

    EC: We play games (and read novels and start bands) to escape the instrumental sphere of bureaucracy and the exploitative sphere of capitalism, and I suspect that a day job in the gaming industry would just embed me more deeply in both. If a company hired me as a house writer, they might require me to sign a non-compete agreement, or a contract that transferred to the company the copyrights of my works. (If this sounds not so bad, read up on Jack Kirby.) I would have to pretend to care about things like the spring re-brand of dwarves or the new cover sheets for TPS reports.

I would not mind seeing my books sell well enough that the royalties paid my bills, but I’ll settle for royalties helping pay for my hobbies.

    Me: What is THE RPG book you WANT to write? The one that will change the world.

    EC: Predictably, I want to continue a loose series of scenarios set in my homebrew setting, which first saw print in Crypts of Indormancy (Melsonian Arts Council, 2016). In winter 2024-2025, the Melsonian Arts Council will release Witch War to the Vale of Forbiddiction… and Beyond, which will contain three scenarios, two sets of rules for generating witch hunts, and over sixty new monsters.

    Me: What was the hardest book/project for you to finish?

    EC: The hardest game book was A True Relation of the Great Virginia Disastrum, 1633, because of its length, its complexity, the historical research, and my own fear of failure. I had tried for years to break into Lamentations of the Flame Princess, so I dreaded blowing the chance.

    The hardest non-game book was the monograph based on my PhD research, Copyright Vigilantes: Intellectual Property and the Hollywood Superhero. It was under contract in 2022 when I realized that you can’t publish your way into a tenure-track job that does not exist; structural changes to universities, like the shift to contingent faculty labor and the gutting of the humanities, had turned North America into a wasteland of part-time grunt work, and I’d had enough of living in Mainland China. I finished the monograph in the knowledge that it would get me maybe $200-500 in royalties over about a decade. (University presses don’t have the profit margins to pay well, so they still depend on the tenure and promotion system to provide incentives to faculty writers.)

<Quint>Anyway, we delivered the Bomb.</Quint>

    Me: Can you describe any odd aspects of your creative process?

    EC: I jot ideas on sticky notes and other scraps, then throw them somewhere on my desk, and every few months I sort through the heap. The “good” ideas recur on multiple notes. In my rage against forgetting, I repeat myself.

    Me: Do you have any great failed projects?

    EC: The novel that I started writing in 2005. I stopped when I realized I was still clearing my throat after sixty pages. Then I lost it.

    But ask me again this time next year. I may have some new ones. 

    Me: What’s your personal favorite work you’ve ever done?

    EC: 6x6x6: The Mayhemic Misssile Method (Tenscore and Sixteen Ways for Sorcerists, Witches, and Other Thaumatrophs to Defend Their Indefensible Persons). It started as a d20 table, then bloomed into d100, and then into d216, with illustrations in appalling full color by Yannick Bouchard. Nothing exceeds like excess. [guitar squeal]

D20 Random Questions with Kelvin Green

 

What is going on in the heads of our favorite creators?

 

Kelvin Green, who recently published Winnie-the-Shit with Lamentations of the Flame Princess, along with a host of other delightful titles, like; Fish Fuckers, Magic Eater, & Terror in the Streets, was kind enough to sit down, roll some dice, and answer some questions with me.  His work is often considerably lighter in tone than most of his label-mates. It turns out a lot of his influences aren't horror at all. In fact, you may even have spotted the countless Doctor Who references in many of his books.

 

    KG: So, Doctor Who. It is my favourite TV show by a Gallifreyan mile. My first Doctor? Well, I was born in 1979, and I don't know when I started watching it, but the first story I remember watching was "The Awakening", which was broadcast in January 1984. I have very clear memories of the face in the church wall, and the cliffhanger ending of part 1.

    So technically my first Doctor was Peter Davison, but my strongest memories of watching it were Sylvester McCoy's episodes, so I consider him my first Doctor. My favourite varies, because they are all great in their own way. But gun to head answer now answer? McCoy/Tennant/Capaldi. Separating those three would be very tricky.

Me: You were watching them broadcast straight from the BBC as they aired? I grew up watching reruns on Alaska Public Broadcasting in the 80's.

    KG: Yep, I was watching them on the BBC on Saturday nights, as the gods intended. 🙂 Although funny(ish) story, I was living in the US for a brief time when the show came back in 2005 so I had to acquire the episodes through... dubious means, and didn't start watching them on the BBC again until Tennant's first series, by which time I'd returned home. I'm not sure what my favourite series is, but the Capaldi/Bill series is a contender. It's so good. The Doctor/Donna series is quite strong too.

Me: Dragonfire however, was not. What do you like about McCoy so much?

    KG: Ha! No, it was not. People talk about McCoy's scheming, "dark" Doctor, and yes, that is quite an interesting approach, but I think the main thing I like about him is that he was a comedy actor, so that brought a different edge to the show. At first, they had him playing it as a comedy and it didn't work, but later on they played it more straight although he always had that little twinkle in there, and it worked so much better. Much like Troughton.

    Ncuti? I'm very excited for him. I've liked the bits of him we've seen so far, and he's a strong and likeable actor. Scottish too, and all the best Doctors are Scottish. 😉 In terms of casting he's important too. The Doctor is such a huge character and for kids to be able to see themselves in the character is important. So a black, Scottish, LGBTQ+ Doctor who came here as a refugee is brilliant.

Me: Yeah, that's been RTD's MO from the very beginning.

    KG: Yeah, I know that Jodie Whittaker's series were not massively well received, but I still remember that video of the little girl watching the announcement trailer of the new Doctor and exulting that "she's a girl!" That was important, and it's only fair that everyone gets the opportunity to see themselves in the Doctor.

    The very first episode is a great introduction to the concept, but in terms of production I imagine it would be a hard sell for someone new these days. "Rose" is also an excellent introduction, but even that is looking a bit ropey almost two decades (!) on. Maybe the first Bill Potts episode "The Pilot" as that's also a sort of soft reboot.

    But I suppose one of the great things about Doctor Who is that any episode that introduces a new Doctor or companion is a good starting point, and there are lots of those!

 The Random Questions

    KG: Okay, I'm rolling my very first d20; a piss-yellow gem dice I bought around 1995.

9. Any movies or TV shows that have stuck with you for years and worked their way into your art?

    KG: I'm a huge John Carpenter fan and his films have found their way into my work again and again over the years. There's bits of The Thing and Prince of Darkness in Forgive Us, and The Curious Conundrum of the Conflagrated Condottiero is me trying to work through my feelings about The Fog, which is a terrific film that I have huge problems with.

    And Doctor Who is a massive influence. Not directly, aside from some references in Strict Time Records Must Be Kept, but more in background, creative terms. For example, there's a story about how one of the script editors in, I think, the Tom Baker era set a rule that the monsters should always have a human villain behind them, that ultimately the evil in the show was the result of human failings like greed and ambition. I try to keep that in mind when I'm writing.

Me: I also love The Fog, I'm curious about your huge problems with it. The Conflagrated Condottiero is such a great villain, implacable in achieving its goal. I'm surprised no one has adapted In the Mouth of Madness and Sutter Cane into a setting module yet. That could be an LotFP Modern title.

Still Me: I've always been able to pick up on the Doctor Who references. You even referenced one of my favorite episodes, The Seeds of Doom, in Green Messiah with Harrison Chase. You mention the 'script editor' who, in that era of Doctor Who, was responsible for keeping the tone of the show consistent. I've noticed a consistency in your work, a growing "Kelvin-verse" in Sussex is it?

"I can play all day in my green cathedral." - Harrison Chase

    KG: Well, the main issue I have with The Fog is I'm not sure it plays fair. It sort of sets out rules for how it works in terms of the ghosts' revenge on the town, but I don't think it then plays out according to its own rules. With 4C I wanted to have a go at exploring a similar sort of moral "transaction" and see if I could do it in a more satisfying (to me) way.

    As for the Kelvin-verse, I started to add connections between the adventures as I went on, so they are not as consistent as they could be, but they are a nice easter egg for the loyal reader/player.

Me: Was 4C satisfying to you in play?

    KG: Yes it was, very much so. I talk a little bit about the playtesting in the published adventure, and some groups got it, others didn't, but on the whole it worked. I think maybe it worked better in the framework of a game, because players are already thinking about rules at some level, so when you introduce a monster that works according to "rules" (like a medusa, or vampire) the players are already in the right sort of mindset.

Me: Want to roll again?

    KG: 5! [Who are your biggest influences] Well I've mentioned John Carpenter and Doctor Who. What else? I grew up in Britain in the 80s, so I've got all of that in me. White Dwarf and Red Dwarf, Fighting Fantasy, Blackadder, The Young Ones, 2000AD, comedy and cynicism. I was a bit young to be a punk, but I sort of got the attitude handed down by cultural osmosis. Hayao Miyazaki is a huge influence, and I think he provides a bit of a counterbalance to all that. There's a wonder but also calmness and thoughtfulness to his work that contrasts with the above. And while I don't think Terry Pratchett is as much of an overt influence on me now as he was when I was 14, he's still in there somewhere.

Me: I've actually seen some of those shows! I can see a lot of those influences in your books now that you mention it. There's a notably lighter tone in some of your work than in the rest of the LotFP catalogue.

    KG: Absolutely. I can't help finding the funny side of things. Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay is to me a comedy game. You're playing rat-catchers, stomping about in mud, trying not to die, and all the villains are posh. That is obviously hilarious to me, so I always find it funny when people say it's "grimdark". And all of my adventures are WFRP adventures in disguise. Even if the disguise is sometimes just a false moustache or a newspaper with holes in it. James Raggi has often said that I'm being very arch and clever with this approach, but I'm not sure it's deliberate. I don't know if I could write something "serious" if I tried.

Me: Why fight it? Was Warhammer your first RPG game?

    KG: It wasn't, no. I don't think I played WFRP until quite a few years after I started playing rpgs, although I was sort of aware of it from a earlier. My first rpg was technically the Fighting Fantasy multiplayer rpg, although I didn't really understand how it worked, so we didn't play it properly. But via a sequence of events, I discovered White Dwarf, which by that time had dropped almost all rpg content, except for WFRP, so I was reading articles about the game for a few years before I got to play it. And some of those articles were a big influence. The Marienberg city articles were the template for Forgive Us, and the way I draw maps.

Me: Very cool. How did you get started drawing? And when did you 'become an artist'? Do you have a favorite piece or medium?

    KG: I've been drawing since literally before I can remember. I started when all kids do, but I kept going. There's always been something very calming for me about drawing and I can happily lose myself for hours. Being able to put the results out into the world is a bonus. As far as "becoming an artist" goes, it sort of happened by accident. I drew for myself until I encountered the internet and started talking to people with similar interests. I ran into writers who needed art, and I could (sort of) draw, so we worked together, and I put out a few comics just for fun. Even then it never occurred to me that I could "go professional". I am sometimes a very slow learner!

    Favourite piece? I'll have to think about that, although the fact that I can't name one right now is potentially significant. Favourite medium? I have a very limited skill set so I'd probably go with pen on paper because that's how I'm most comfortable.

    KG: Shall I roll the piss-d20? 15!

15. What is THE RPG book you WANT to write? The one that will change the world.

Me: I'm actually really excited to hear this answer.

    KG: I am very lucky in that I get to write what I want to write when it occurs to me, and LotFP will publish it, so I don't tend to have big dreams that burn away. On the other hand, maybe that would be better because it would drive me to more creativity? But yes, for the most part, an idea pops into my head, I fiddle around with it until it becomes viable, then I send it to James and he sighs internally and then publishes it.

THAT SAID.

    I don't know if anything I write is going to change the world, at least not in any significant sense, but I do have a book I want to write that I *don't* think LotFP would publish, a sort of Call of Cthulhu thing.

Me: Now I'm very intrigued.

    KG: It's a sort of mini campaign setting, and it's sort of Lovecraftian but doesn't use any of the standard elements, except it's vaguely Dreamlands-adjacent. Like most of my stuff it's a jumble of influences and references. I'm just not sure what to do with it. I don't think James would publish it, and it doesn't fit neatly into the Call of Cthulhu catalogue. Maybe I push it out myself, systemless, or with something homebrewed bolted on.

Me: I'm a big proponent of systemless. Put it on Kickstarter!

    KG: Maybe I will! I have to write it first. I'm hoping to have a playtest draft done this year. Tentacles crossed.

Me: That leads into what I wanted to ask you too, what else do you have on the horizon that you're excited about? Is there anything else coming soon you're looking forward to?

    KG: I have a whiteboard covered with project names! In 2024 I've got a few things I want to get done. There's the aforementioned dream (ha ha) project, but then for LotFP I've got what will be my first non-adventure book, and at least one adventure. I'm doing some maps for another project that I'm not sure if I'm allowed to name, and then there's a dungeon project for DIY RPG Productions that got paused for various reasons that we're hoping to get finished in 2024.

    Then there's a whole bunch of mini projects that I hope I can also get done this year, including what should be a really fun take on an equipment/magic item book.

    In terms of stuff other people are producing, I don't seem to be in any of the cool Discords or Whatsapps, so I have no idea what my peers are working on, until they get released, so I don't get a chance to be excited!

Me: Wow, a lot of stuff coming down the pike! I really think the Dreamlands is an underappreciated setting. I'm looking forward to hearing more. And a non-adventure book? Can you give any details?

    KG: Maaaayyyybeeeee? James really liked The Staffortonshire Trading Company Works of John Williams by Glynn Seal, and the book apparently has had a great reception. So he asked me to do a similar "general use" book.

Me: That was one of the best books. You can't just have adventures.

    KG: It really is great, and such a simple idea. James asked me to write a mass battle system for LotFP, so that's what I've been working on here at the beginning of 2024. I don't think anything about it has been announced or even hinted at, so I may get in trouble for saying that! Oh well. 🙂

Me: There's so many exciting possibilities. No don't say any more.

    KG: It's been quite a challenge. I hope people like it!

 

Kelvin's arcane workshop, with spellbook and ritual components.

Keep an eye out for Kelvin's upcoming work at his blog:  

Run From Kelvin's Brainsplurge! 

And pick up some of his books at the LotFP US, EU & PDF Stores.

Kelvin's arts just appeared in: The Halls of the Third Blue Wizard, Issue 1.

D20 Random Questions with Glynn Seal

What is going on in the heads of our favorite creators?

     I wanted to try an experiment. I'm not really satisfied with just dumping my latest shitty dungeon creation onto the web for all to scoff at, or splashing my own fantasy world ideas into the sea of other fantasy world ideas. There's enough creative people out there creating enough badass stuff already. I wondered about the lives of the people behind these games we play, people working feverishly to produce.. art? ..products? *shudder* ..content? What did they think about what they were doing? I decided I would just ask them and try to find out.

    The first thing that jumps into my mind when you mention Glynn Seal is maps, lots of maps. His byline is everywhere, as you'll see in one of the questions, and you probably already know him from The Midderlands or Lamentations of the Flame Princess. As I quickly found out, this a man who gets things done. With something like "20 projects in the pipeline" at any given time, he generously made the time to sit down and answer some of my questions.

 

1D20+3 Random Questions with Glynn Seal

     Me: Besides the random questions, some of the other things I was interested in asking you about are: How "academic" do you get in researching? Take Florence for example, are you flying to the Duomo and unrolling ancient scrolls of schematics or just spending a lot of time on Google?

    GS: It really depends on what I am writing and who for. The most research I did was for The Staffortonshire Trading Company Works of John Williams. It took over 13 months to research the maps. I was working full time outside the gaming industry during that time, so it was evenings and weekends for a year! It was A LOT. LotFP projects generally need some research because it's based on real history. I'm most certainly an Internet researcher rather than a get-on-a-plane researcher.

    Me: I find Faecal Lands fascinating, a solid little adventure setting. How on earth did it come about? In my hometown there was an old lady who fell headfirst down into an outhouse cesspit, because she dropped her phone on accident. I imagine something like that as an entrance to the Faecal Lands.

    GS: I was working on Faecal Lands independently before asking James if he was interested in it for one of the release cycles. I had planned to Kickstart it (lol). I'm a visual creative and many of my ideas come from imagery, so a lot of stuff starts with creating a map or image based on a very rough idea. That work then fuels creativity. I can't recall what prompted the whole poop thing, but I'm very drawn to darker fantasy and horrid stuff. Falling into a cesspit is a solid (or runny) way of getting into the Faecal Lands.

    Me: I know you're super-busy, so what are some of the new projects you're excited about? 

    GS: Well for others, I'm excited about: 

• Gods of the Forbidden North: Volume 2 by Pulp Hummock Press; 
• LotFP's next release cycle, especially:
• A True Relation of the Great Virginia Disastrum, 1633; 
• Autarch's ACKSII
  
• Necromancer Games' Tome of Spell Mastery
• Dolmenwood by Necrotic Gnome
• Shadow of the Weird Wizard by Rob Schwalb, 
• Break!! RPG, 
• Anything by Jeff Talanian for Hyperborea, etc. 
• For my own things, I've always got 20 projects in the pipeline and I never know which one will bubble to the top first once the freelance works quietens down. I've got a new multi-genre rules system I'm working on (3S System), which I hope will support a raft of setting/systems, and be Creative Commons. Most likely to emerge first is: 
• Ryecroft, an OSE adventure location based on a cemetery (but there's very few undead!)
  
• And I started this underwater thing called The Things That Drown
  
• Midderzine 8, Trollfang, Malefica, the list goes on..

Just to illustrate how efficient he is, and how he manages to be in so many places at once it seems, I proposed a dumb game. I had a list of 20 interview questions, you could roll the list and answer a question. I showed him the list. He looked at it and handed it back to me with ALL the questions somehow already answered. Someone else I asked is still just trying to find a D20...

1. When did role playing games first come into your life? What was it like for you to discover this hobby?

     1985, back when I was about 13. My friend had another circle of friends. They had an older DM that used to run games for them, and so my friend wanted to run games and I was the guinea pig. We just devoured it. Red and Blue box (BECMI) followed by AD&D1E. It was like another universe opened up. We played every single bit of spare time we had. I started to run games for my friendship circle, and we all evolved from there. Played Call of Cthulhu, Runequest, Warhammer (1E and Fantasy Battles), etc. I've played every edition of D&D other than original OD&D (although I love Swords & Wizardry). It's had a hugely positive effect on my life, as now I make my living from it.

2. How do you think this hobby impacted your development as an artist, thinker, or person? 

    Becoming a DM when you are young gives you a confidence, which tends to continue through life. Seeing great artwork is inspiring and sparks curiosity, making me want to know how they did it.

3. What galvanized you to start being creative in the first place? 

    I always loved drawing as a kid, and excelled in creative stuff at school. I was accepted to do graphic design at college, but decided to work for a company as a draughtsman (technical drawing) instead. I spent a lot of time on draughting machines with Rotring ink pens.

4. What was your start in TTRPG publishing? 

    I started my journey on Google+, posting pictures of things I was painting (warhammer models/scenery) and maps I was drawing. I had a few enquires about drawing maps from there, and I decided that I wanted to pursue and grow it. Google+ was an amazing space for creatives, and I deeply miss it.

5. Who are some of your biggest creative influences? 

    Conan the Barbarian, Blackadder, Lord of the Rings, Raymond E Feists' Riftwar Saga, Geoff Wingate, Hawk the Slayer, Krull, Beastmaster, Excalibur, Clash of the Titans, The Goonies, The first three Dragonlance novels, Jason and the Argonauts, Sinbad movies, Larry Emore, Jeff Easley, Tony DiTerlizzi, Dave Trampier, 1E Warhammer, 1E AD&D, holidays in Wales, OSR creators, etc.

6. So, Doctor Who, who was your first doctor? Your favorite season? Classic or reboot? Thoughts on Ncuti Gatwa? 

    I've never really cared for Doctor Who. Tom Baker is a legend, but other than that I wasn't interested. More of an A-Team, Knight Rider, Street Hawk, BlueThunder, The Fall Guy, and Air Wolf kid.

7. What do you hope to achieve through the work you are doing now? Fortune? Infamy? 

    Earning a living and leaving some books behind me when I'm no longer here.

8. What do you think makes a great RPG book, what elevates it above the others? 

    Game Juice. I coined this term in The Midderlands projects, where my writing was more suggestive and inspirational. Not saying that these are great RPG books, but it's what I look for. I don't necessarily want to have all the stats and solutions to the what-ifs, some is fine, but I want to give you a vision of something that inspires you to do that or go with the flow and make it up on the fly.

9. Any movies/tv that have stuck with you for years that have worked their way into your art? 

    If we include writing as part of 'art', then Blackadder and all those cheesey sword & sorcery/fantasy films of the late 70s and 80s. Nowadays, I don't watch much TV or watch films, I'm too busy haha! I loved Game of Thrones though!

10. What’s it like publishing with Lamentations of the Flame Princess compared to other publishers? 

    I'm lucky enough to work with some great publishers, as a writer, artist, cartographer, and layout guy. Generally, they are all the same. I try to be as professional as possible and hit my deadlines and offer the best value for money. Each publisher has things they like and ways they operate, so you just adjust your working as you can, to suit their needs. James is top notch though, and a great guy to work with.

11. Do you think art in general or RPGs in particular have any responsibilities in this day and age? 

    I don't think art or an RPG has any responsibility itself. Many contain the responsibilities that their creators want to show other, and align with their world view. All that is fine, as long as it's genuine, and not performative.

12. What do you think is the most awful death you’ve encountered in a particular historical period? 

    What's with that 'brazen bull' shit? I can't put my hands in hot water to wash the dishes, let alone get cooked alive.

13. Any favorite RPG heirloom? Nearest and dearest first edition, first set of dice? 

    When I was having a non-RPG period of my life, I sold a lot of my stuff. Nowadays, I've bought it all back on auction sites for twice the price. I'm an idiot! I've kept a lot of scraps of paper and things I drew when I started playing D&D, which have lots of great memories.

14. What’s the funniest gaming moment you can remember? 

    I never remember anything like this! We've had loads of memorable encounters and laughs over the years. When you play with your long term group of friends, you can get away with laughing about things that you'd never get away with in a streamed games, pickup game, or convention game. The funniest thing would likely be unrelayable :)

15. What is THE RPG book you WANT to write? The one that will change the world. 

    It has to be a ruleset that supports multigenre, is easy to run/play/learn, and each genre release comes with the rules/setting combo! In fact, I'm already working on it. I specifically don't want it to be OSR-based, because who the fuck needs another OSR ruleset based on someone's houserules? That said, I back them all on Kickstarter LOL!

16. What was the hardest book/ project for you to finish? 

    The Staffortonshire Trading Company Works of John Williams. It just took so long whilst I was working full time outside the gaming industry. I very much let my muse govern my own projects, and when I lose enthusiasm I leave the project alone, then wait for the enthusiasm to return. I can't do that with other's work, so it can be hard to motivate yourself on longer projects. You have to be dedicated, committed, and push yourself. People can be a bit flakey when the going gets tough, but you just have to power through it.

17. Can you describe any odd aspects of your creative process? 

    I don't really know if I have any. [I find this suspicious..]

18. What’s your personal least favorite work you’ve ever done? 

    I'm glad you said personal lol. As any creative will tell you, they look back on things they did early on and shudder. I do that. As my skills improve, I pick up more ideas, and software develops, my work improves past where it has been.

19. Do you have any great failed projects? 

    Nothing 'fails' really. It just gets parked until my muse returns to me. Then I get passionate about a project again. Commercially, some things fare better than others, but they don't fail in the conventional sense of the word.

20. What are your favorite drugs? 

    I'm not into drugs. Life is complicated enough, and I haven't experienced people's lives improve from being involved in taking them. My drug is creating things and PepsiMax.

There you have it, its not the amphetamines that makes him so productive after all. Keep an eye out for all the exciting works he cited above, and more D20 Random Questions coming soon. And don't forget to go spend your money at his store Monkey Blood Design.