Q&A with Dustin Clingman

[Havard]

I decided to drop back by to see how things were going and realized I had missed some questions!

Always good to see you here Dustin!

CA Suleiman was a core contributor to the vision of Age of the Wolf. The concept was very cool, but a strong departure from the core of Blackmoor. Dave had always insisted on the framing of any stories set in the land be considered "A version of Blackmoor" as he strongly believed that the world belonged to those who played there. It really took me a while to fully understand that sentiment. On those grounds and without a sound of bias, Age of the Wolf would have been a different"version of Blackmoor" from those that had been seen before.

Thanks for confirming the rumours I had heard about Suleiman's role in all of this. I like Dave's thoughts on "versions of Blackmoor". Too bad we never got to see Age of the Wolf, but I am thankful for what we got from ZGG.

Regarding the Wargame. Our hopes were to generate miniatures to allow players to combat between the forces of the Afridhi, Blackmoor and the Egg. The system was derivative of the BATTLESTORM property that was produced by my friend Will Nesbitt. We had run Dave through a version of play and he enjoyed it. It was disappointing that we were not able to realize that as a product.

That would have been great

About the "Grandfather Paradox"... I don't recall specific insight from Dave regarding how time travel would influence the game aside from the obvious. I think a more telling thought is the "A version of Blackmoor" idea mentioned earlier. It would seem entirely possible if not required for Mystara Blackmoor to be it's own space. In general, anything that would have slowed the game down was largely hand waived. I strongly approved of this.

That certainly makes sense. As I see if, if the campaign's starting point is Blackmoor, then Mystara and Greyhawk could represent possible futures, but not predestined ones.

Another question: I see that the MMRPG forum has disappeared
hock: Is it permanently gone? Does this mean that the rest of the site will also disappear?

-Havard

[Havard]

Hi Dustin!

How are you doing in the new year? Any plans of getting back into pen & paper publishing in 2011 (fingers crossed)?

-Havard

[TheMystic]

Hi Havard!

I'm still around and kicking. I'm still keeping clear of pen and paper for the time being. I'm waiting for some true inspiration before I go back into the fray!

Uther, Once and Always!

Dustin

[Havard]

Happy birthday Dustin!

-Havard

[aldarron]

Hey Dustin,

Lord knows when you will see this question, but I'm curoius, why the name change from Sahaugin to Sar Aigu?

On a lesser note, Do you still live in Florida?

[TheMystic]

It's been a little bit since that came up, but I recall a couple of things that informed this change. First, I could be wrong, but I recall Sahaugin being a reserved term that WoTC held on to, similar to Beholders, etc.

In addition to a change for this reason, Dave was very big on a huge ranges of elves and dwarves. There was conversation about inclusion of aquatic elves. Changing the name provided the option to create a new race, even if variant, that could fill Dave's interest on this front.

As for my residence, yes I still live in Orlando, Florida.

Cheers!

[Rafael]

Hey Dustin! How have you been doing?

Any games to recommend us here?

[Big Mac]

I just noticed I missed Dustin's reply. :oops:

Thanks for all the info. It was all interesting, but your comment on your Wargame was especially interesting:

Regarding the Wargame. Our hopes were to generate miniatures to allow players to combat between the forces of the Afridhi, Blackmoor and the Egg. The system was derivative of the BATTLESTORM property that was produced by my friend Will Nesbitt. We had run Dave through a version of play and he enjoyed it. It was disappointing that we were not able to realize that as a product.

I have noticed that, although WotC opened up the D&D core (with the SRD) and got a lot of publishers to support a single rules system, they did seem to be pretty resistant to the idea of people making miniature combat rules. I really do think that was a shame, because D&D evolved from wargamming.

Wargamers generally buy more miniatures than tabletop players and I think they make it possible for a manufacturer to have a bigger range of figures. So I think a Battlestorm-like game would have really helped to make tabletop minis more viable.

I wonder if WotC were worried that your system would have competed with Chainmail. It is a shame they didn't just make a Chainmail SRD and ask you to make something compatible with their own rules. At least that would have made your wargame possible (even if the ruleset was different).

[TheMystic]

I believe the principle concern on the limitation of our Blackmoor license was to keep another large publisher from coming in and building a large publishing business around a property that was the trademark and property of WoTC. Our license was strictly for books and could not include any other items. This essentially limited the product upside and kept us from being able to really capitalize on the interest that the fans had in the world.

In the end, we had a great time rejuvenating Blackmoor, but our plans to have made a CRPG in the setting were fairly quickly squashed.

[Big Mac]

I believe the principle concern on the limitation of our Blackmoor license was to keep another large publisher from coming in and building a large publishing business around a property that was the trademark and property of WoTC. Our license was strictly for books and could not include any other items. This essentially limited the product upside and kept us from being able to really capitalize on the interest that the fans had in the world.

In the end, we had a great time rejuvenating Blackmoor, but our plans to have made a CRPG in the setting were fairly quickly squashed.

That is a real shame. WotC (or maybe Hasbro) seem to want to focus on a tiny part of the D&D IP and do as little as possible with the rest of it. I'm of the opinion that campaign settings are of much more interest than rules, and that they could have been (and still could be) using several settings as the basis for other types of games or entertainment.

There are a lot of classic D&D stories (either in adventures or novels) and I still can't believe that Lord of the Rings was not followed up by a movie version of a D&D story that was already a cult hit.

I think that a computer game based on the dungeons under Castle Blackmoor would probably be something that would have appeal outside the hard-core of fans that have followed the RPG since the first days of D&D.

Maybe you could see if your new company could make a computer game for Robert S. Conley's Blackmarsh Campaign Setting instead. I'm sure that Castle Blackmarsh could do with some love. :wink: