Jeff Grubb On the Life of a Game Designer

First time accepted submitter Synchis writes "Fantasy Author Thomas A. Knight continues his 29-day blogfest today by posting a special interview with Author and Game Designer Jeff Grubb. Jeff has been involved in projects ranging from the original D&D Unearthed Arcana and Monster Manual II, to more recent games such as Guild Wars Nightfall, and is also the author of various novels set in DragonLance, Forgotten Realms, Magic: The Gathering, Warcraft, StarCraft and the Guild Wars shared universes."

I should see what he's written recently

[Tawnos]

Jeff Grub was one of my favorite "dabbling" fantasy authors. He wrote some of the first canonical M:TG books, e.g. The Brothers' War. Totally OT, but it reminded me to check out what he's written since then, since I haven't read anything by him in a long time.

Re:

[Tawnos]

Also, he's the entire reason my username is Tawnos.

Re:

[myrdos2]

I strongly recommend Lord Toede.

Re:

[c1t1z3nk41n3]

I read that book when I was in high school. A quick peek on Amazon seems to suggest it's out of print. Maybe I'll pick up a used copy. I remember enjoying it immensely. I never knew at the time what an impressive resume he has. I can't begin to recount how many forgotten realms books I've read to say nothing of our own adventures in the setting. On the upside it looks like he's got a star wars book coming out in a couple months so I'll be able to give that a go.

Re:

[Asmor]

I loved The Brothers' War. Great novelization of some poorly-codified mythology.

He's also quite the artist...

[PRMan]

If I'm not mistaken, way back in the day (80s), he drew almost every character in the Marvel Universe for the Marvel Super Heroes Role Playing Game character books. He has a very clean style that's good for that type of work.

Re:He's also quite the artist...

[Anonymous Coward]

Alas - You're thinking of Jeff Butler as the artist. I and Steve Winter were the co-designers of the game.

Jeff Grubb

Re:

[Ihmhi]

Please. Bitches love polyhedral dice.

Oh man!

[DC2088]

I loved Liberty's Crusade.

Re:

[loufoque]

That kind of games is not primarily targeted at children.

Re:

[RatherBeAnonymous]

When you put it like that, it sounds WAY better than the life of a Slashdot troll.

Rare instance of someone who likes what they do...

[LateArthurDent]

I read the interview and every answer seemed peppered with excitement about the industry he's in. Jeff doesn't just design the games, he plays D&D and enjoys it. When he writes his novels in an already established world, he looks at the existing lore and tries to see how it all fits together to re-imagine it, instead of the re-imagining version of so many other authors, which is essentially to do their own thing and slap the name of the characters and locations in there.

It's refreshing and it makes me want to check out his stuff. It feels like one of us, albeit with a lot more talent than most, is out there writing these stories and designing the games. It looks like he has a blast doing it, and cares about the end result, not just the paycheck.