Michal E Cross - Designer
Where do you live? Currently, deep in the unexciting suburbs of North London. Next year, however, I'll be moving to Amsterdam with my family. Exciting times!
How did you come to work for Modiphius? A board gamer friend of mine said to me, "Oh, you do design. There's this guy I know on an online community who's looking for someone to do some layout." I got in contact and 'this guy' turned out to be Chris!
Where did the idea for the Achtung! Cthulhu layout come from?
I began with thinking about adventures being for GM eyes only. From that premise, I got the idea of a World War Two top-secret file that only the top brass would be privy to.
What other RPGs have you worked on? Mostly, I have done work for Crafty Games. Specifically, I work on the Mistborn and Fantasy Craft RPGs (for lots of the free stuff, check out the Crafty downloads page). I also have a Fantasy Craft adventure published in French by 7ème Cercle, which will be coming out in English next year.
And now your own - Holiday Heroes? Yes, indeedy! This lovely little game began life as an entrant in the fun 24 hour RPG competition on rpggeek.com. I realised that you can try to explain to someone what an RPG is, but the best way to get a true feel of a game is to play one. The rules of Holiday Heroes are designed to be dead simple so anyone can get to grips with it easily, and all it needs is a deck of cards (every house has one!). I'm looking forward to hear what people think!
What is your work day like? Wake up. Yawn. Feed baby. Sleep. Wake up. Yawn. Breakfast. Take son to nursery. Work on layout. Coffee. Go to day job. Get home. Make dinner. Read Mr. Men books to son. More layout work. Bed. Wake up. Feed baby.
How did you get into drawing maps and doing layout? In school. I remember getting marked up in a major English project because it looked great. I slowly got myself into the habit of making everything I did as presentable as possible. I began doing my own cheat sheets and fan expansions for board- and war-games, and eventually got involved in UKCORD - a fan group for the war-game Confrontation. I soon became UKCORD's layout and design monkey for their promotional magazines and posters. This continued through university and my transition to roleplaying games… And here I am! Cartography is a funny one. A few years ago, my friend was running an RPG in which my character was a cartographer. After the first session I offered to draw the world map of the setting. After having a blast with my first map, I began testing myself by making maps that looked better than what I found in many game books… And here I am!
Are you playing any games? Yes, lots! But not enough! The RPG campaign I'm playing in at the moment uses a friend's own world and rules set.
What games do you want to play? Deep breath! Burning Wheel, Fiasco, Fantasy Craft, Tenra Bansho Zero, Fiasco, Maid, Spycraft, HOL, Legend, Fiasco, Mouse Guard, Drifting Through Space, Fiasco, Grimm, Dark Heresy, Exalted, Legends of Anglerre, and Fiasco. Don't get me started on board games...
Where can people find out more about you? The best place is probably my house. Oh, seriously. Check out my website: www.mehow.nl
Where will you be when Cthulhu rises? On his shoulder shouting, "GO, MY MINION!"
How did you come to work for Modiphius? A board gamer friend of mine said to me, "Oh, you do design. There's this guy I know on an online community who's looking for someone to do some layout." I got in contact and 'this guy' turned out to be Chris!
Where did the idea for the Achtung! Cthulhu layout come from?
I began with thinking about adventures being for GM eyes only. From that premise, I got the idea of a World War Two top-secret file that only the top brass would be privy to.
What other RPGs have you worked on? Mostly, I have done work for Crafty Games. Specifically, I work on the Mistborn and Fantasy Craft RPGs (for lots of the free stuff, check out the Crafty downloads page). I also have a Fantasy Craft adventure published in French by 7ème Cercle, which will be coming out in English next year.
And now your own - Holiday Heroes? Yes, indeedy! This lovely little game began life as an entrant in the fun 24 hour RPG competition on rpggeek.com. I realised that you can try to explain to someone what an RPG is, but the best way to get a true feel of a game is to play one. The rules of Holiday Heroes are designed to be dead simple so anyone can get to grips with it easily, and all it needs is a deck of cards (every house has one!). I'm looking forward to hear what people think!
What is your work day like? Wake up. Yawn. Feed baby. Sleep. Wake up. Yawn. Breakfast. Take son to nursery. Work on layout. Coffee. Go to day job. Get home. Make dinner. Read Mr. Men books to son. More layout work. Bed. Wake up. Feed baby.
How did you get into drawing maps and doing layout? In school. I remember getting marked up in a major English project because it looked great. I slowly got myself into the habit of making everything I did as presentable as possible. I began doing my own cheat sheets and fan expansions for board- and war-games, and eventually got involved in UKCORD - a fan group for the war-game Confrontation. I soon became UKCORD's layout and design monkey for their promotional magazines and posters. This continued through university and my transition to roleplaying games… And here I am! Cartography is a funny one. A few years ago, my friend was running an RPG in which my character was a cartographer. After the first session I offered to draw the world map of the setting. After having a blast with my first map, I began testing myself by making maps that looked better than what I found in many game books… And here I am!
Are you playing any games? Yes, lots! But not enough! The RPG campaign I'm playing in at the moment uses a friend's own world and rules set.
What games do you want to play? Deep breath! Burning Wheel, Fiasco, Fantasy Craft, Tenra Bansho Zero, Fiasco, Maid, Spycraft, HOL, Legend, Fiasco, Mouse Guard, Drifting Through Space, Fiasco, Grimm, Dark Heresy, Exalted, Legends of Anglerre, and Fiasco. Don't get me started on board games...
Where can people find out more about you? The best place is probably my house. Oh, seriously. Check out my website: www.mehow.nl
Where will you be when Cthulhu rises? On his shoulder shouting, "GO, MY MINION!"
Dim Martin - Artist
Where do you live?
I live in Athens Greece right now, apart from illustrating Modiphius books I also work for Delcourt in France as a comic artist.
What’s on your table right now and what games are you looking forward to playing?
Table is covered with the Achtung! Cthulhu books and I'm very happy to see all the work the team has invested the past two years delivering as promised. Moments ago I put the finishing touches on the Shadows of Atlantis cover, this is going to be a really massive and epic book I think :)
Recently a friend from my school days, reintroduced me to cooperative boardgaming and we had some great time playing titles like Arkham horror, Dead of Winter and Space Alert. I'm looking forward to playing some from the Modiphius range as well, Thunderbirds, Conan, Shadows over Normandie and of course the Secret War boardgame.
I live in Athens Greece right now, apart from illustrating Modiphius books I also work for Delcourt in France as a comic artist.
What’s on your table right now and what games are you looking forward to playing?
Table is covered with the Achtung! Cthulhu books and I'm very happy to see all the work the team has invested the past two years delivering as promised. Moments ago I put the finishing touches on the Shadows of Atlantis cover, this is going to be a really massive and epic book I think :)
Recently a friend from my school days, reintroduced me to cooperative boardgaming and we had some great time playing titles like Arkham horror, Dead of Winter and Space Alert. I'm looking forward to playing some from the Modiphius range as well, Thunderbirds, Conan, Shadows over Normandie and of course the Secret War boardgame.
Lynne Hardy - Line Manager, Editor, Writer
Where do you live?
The North East of England or, as we prefer to call it, God's Country.
How did you come to work for Modiphius?
Almost by accident, really. My husband, Richard, was chatting with Sarah [Newton] at a Dragonmeet many years ago about how we were just starting on a 1940s live roleplaying campaign (part of an ongoing series run by friends). When I joined them, the conversation veered off into writing for what eventually became Achtung! Cthulhu. Sarah suggested I should contact Chris, who asked me to put in a pitch for one part of the Shadows of Atlantis campaign. He seemed to like it, and asked me to pitch the whole thing. And then the word "Kickstarter" was mentioned; the rest, as they say, is history...
What have been your literary inspirations?
Probably too many and too numerous to mention; I've always been an avid reader. I have a real soft spot for Guy Gavriel Kay's early work (The Fionavar Tapestry, Tigana, A Song for Arbonne) and C.S. Lewis' Narnia stories formed a good part of my childhood reading, as did Enid Blyton's Famous Five books and Susan Cooper's The Dark is Rising series. But I also love "cosy" murder mysteries, such as those by Agatha Christie and John Dickson Carr. If it's a good story, I'm not really bothered which genre it belongs to, and you can find inspiration and odd synchronicities in the most unlikely places.
What motivated you to create Cogs, Cakes and Swordsticks?
We'd been doing Victorian live roleplaying for quite a long time when we started going along to steampunk events as a sort of natural and inevitable extension of that (after all, we already had pretty much all of the costume we needed!). What I saw there were a lot of cosplayers who were interested in gaming, particularly tabletop, but were either unsure where to start or too intimidated by the existing systems to give it a go. So I thought I'd better get my act together and write a simple, introductory game that would hopefully encourage people who enjoyed steampunk into the hobby. Fingers crossed it's working...
What other RPGs have you worked on?
As a writer, I've worked on SLA Industries (Nightfall Games), Tales of Terror 2 (Pagan Publishing), Dying Earth (Pelgrane Press), Victoriana 3rd Edition (Cubicle 7), and Cthulhu Britannica (Cubicle 7) besides Cogs, Cakes & Swordsticks and Achtung! Cthulhu. I also havetwo other indie games in development at the moment, which hopefully I'll get finished sometime in the near future.
As an editor, I've helped out on Chivalry and Sorcery 4th Edition (Britannia Games Designs) and Victoriana 3rd Edition (Cubicle 7). I've was also involved in playtesting Everway (Wizards of the Coast), Deadlands (Pinnacle Entertainment Group), Rune (Atlas Games), Pantheon (Hogshead Publishing), and an awful lot of games for Pelgrane Press (Esoterrorists, Fear Itself, Ashen Stars, Trail of Cthulhu, and Mutant City Blues). I'm bound to have forgotten something, though at times, my memory is like a sieve!
What’s on your table and what are you looking forward to playing?
At the moment, 13th Age (Pelgrane Press) is the RPG on my table and I'm looking forward to developing material for it in the very near future. In terms of other games, we have the reissue of Sherlock Holmes, Consulting Detective (Ystari Games), which looks as if it should be good fun. I've been making a sterling effort to play a wider variety of games lately now that the A!C Kickstarter project is almost over and I'm getting some free time again.
Where will you be when Cthulhu rises?
Sitting on a beach somewhere with a G&T in hand. Or a cup of tea and some cake. It's the only way, you know!
The North East of England or, as we prefer to call it, God's Country.
How did you come to work for Modiphius?
Almost by accident, really. My husband, Richard, was chatting with Sarah [Newton] at a Dragonmeet many years ago about how we were just starting on a 1940s live roleplaying campaign (part of an ongoing series run by friends). When I joined them, the conversation veered off into writing for what eventually became Achtung! Cthulhu. Sarah suggested I should contact Chris, who asked me to put in a pitch for one part of the Shadows of Atlantis campaign. He seemed to like it, and asked me to pitch the whole thing. And then the word "Kickstarter" was mentioned; the rest, as they say, is history...
What have been your literary inspirations?
Probably too many and too numerous to mention; I've always been an avid reader. I have a real soft spot for Guy Gavriel Kay's early work (The Fionavar Tapestry, Tigana, A Song for Arbonne) and C.S. Lewis' Narnia stories formed a good part of my childhood reading, as did Enid Blyton's Famous Five books and Susan Cooper's The Dark is Rising series. But I also love "cosy" murder mysteries, such as those by Agatha Christie and John Dickson Carr. If it's a good story, I'm not really bothered which genre it belongs to, and you can find inspiration and odd synchronicities in the most unlikely places.
What motivated you to create Cogs, Cakes and Swordsticks?
We'd been doing Victorian live roleplaying for quite a long time when we started going along to steampunk events as a sort of natural and inevitable extension of that (after all, we already had pretty much all of the costume we needed!). What I saw there were a lot of cosplayers who were interested in gaming, particularly tabletop, but were either unsure where to start or too intimidated by the existing systems to give it a go. So I thought I'd better get my act together and write a simple, introductory game that would hopefully encourage people who enjoyed steampunk into the hobby. Fingers crossed it's working...
What other RPGs have you worked on?
As a writer, I've worked on SLA Industries (Nightfall Games), Tales of Terror 2 (Pagan Publishing), Dying Earth (Pelgrane Press), Victoriana 3rd Edition (Cubicle 7), and Cthulhu Britannica (Cubicle 7) besides Cogs, Cakes & Swordsticks and Achtung! Cthulhu. I also havetwo other indie games in development at the moment, which hopefully I'll get finished sometime in the near future.
As an editor, I've helped out on Chivalry and Sorcery 4th Edition (Britannia Games Designs) and Victoriana 3rd Edition (Cubicle 7). I've was also involved in playtesting Everway (Wizards of the Coast), Deadlands (Pinnacle Entertainment Group), Rune (Atlas Games), Pantheon (Hogshead Publishing), and an awful lot of games for Pelgrane Press (Esoterrorists, Fear Itself, Ashen Stars, Trail of Cthulhu, and Mutant City Blues). I'm bound to have forgotten something, though at times, my memory is like a sieve!
What’s on your table and what are you looking forward to playing?
At the moment, 13th Age (Pelgrane Press) is the RPG on my table and I'm looking forward to developing material for it in the very near future. In terms of other games, we have the reissue of Sherlock Holmes, Consulting Detective (Ystari Games), which looks as if it should be good fun. I've been making a sterling effort to play a wider variety of games lately now that the A!C Kickstarter project is almost over and I'm getting some free time again.
Where will you be when Cthulhu rises?
Sitting on a beach somewhere with a G&T in hand. Or a cup of tea and some cake. It's the only way, you know!
Nick Fallon - Games Designer & Photographer
Where do you live?
Mostly in my head, or in cyberspace!
How did you first get involved with Modiphius?
I’ve been coming up with game ideas with Chris since the beginning, some of those are now coming to fruition as I have moved away from computer games development and am working on board games instead!
What was the first RPG you ever played? Stormbringer the Elric or Melnibone RPG!
What is your alias in day to day life while you’re not a game designing playing superhero? I have many Alias, as a keen LARPer, I feel it’s taking on an alias allows me to express different parts of my personality. Perhaps my favourite is Woolf McBeast a wild barbarian with a good heart. He allows me to escape my polite considerate day to day persona and cry "Woolf Smash" as I smite my enemies!
What do you enjoy most about working for Modiphius?
We have a very relaxed office environment that suits my personality, and we get to work on some cool products too. Chris is always pushing us to make things better which brings the best out in people!
Can you provide a little teaser about what you’re working on?
I am working on the Modiphius miniatures range at the moment, which is going to be releasing a number of boxed sets over the coming months. Everything from Black Sun troopers to exciting new characters.
We are also developing an Achtung! Cthulhu boxed adventure game which is shaping up to be great fun.
There are some other cool games coming soon too but I can’t say anything more just yet, otherwise the Dark Gods will strike me down.
What’s on your table right now and what do you look forward to playing?
We just played Galaxy Truckers which was a riot, loved the shipbuilding and simple game play! I am looking forward to the Halo Fleet Battle game from Spartan Games, I saw the demo table at Salute and it got my mouth watering!
Mostly in my head, or in cyberspace!
How did you first get involved with Modiphius?
I’ve been coming up with game ideas with Chris since the beginning, some of those are now coming to fruition as I have moved away from computer games development and am working on board games instead!
What was the first RPG you ever played? Stormbringer the Elric or Melnibone RPG!
What is your alias in day to day life while you’re not a game designing playing superhero? I have many Alias, as a keen LARPer, I feel it’s taking on an alias allows me to express different parts of my personality. Perhaps my favourite is Woolf McBeast a wild barbarian with a good heart. He allows me to escape my polite considerate day to day persona and cry "Woolf Smash" as I smite my enemies!
What do you enjoy most about working for Modiphius?
We have a very relaxed office environment that suits my personality, and we get to work on some cool products too. Chris is always pushing us to make things better which brings the best out in people!
Can you provide a little teaser about what you’re working on?
I am working on the Modiphius miniatures range at the moment, which is going to be releasing a number of boxed sets over the coming months. Everything from Black Sun troopers to exciting new characters.
We are also developing an Achtung! Cthulhu boxed adventure game which is shaping up to be great fun.
There are some other cool games coming soon too but I can’t say anything more just yet, otherwise the Dark Gods will strike me down.
What’s on your table right now and what do you look forward to playing?
We just played Galaxy Truckers which was a riot, loved the shipbuilding and simple game play! I am looking forward to the Halo Fleet Battle game from Spartan Games, I saw the demo table at Salute and it got my mouth watering!
Zarina Kadylbek
How did you first get involved with Modiphius?
I met Chris at a casting for an event - I was fashion modeling before I got into games as a career! We were discussing modely-fashiony things first then somehow we got talking about tabletop games and he mentioned Modiphius and the games they publish so of course my geek ears pricked up. I came along to a games evening and then one thing led to another, and now not a day goes by that I don’t think about some character, setting, rule system, dice, geeky shopping. All that dice….
What was the first RPG you ever played?
Dungeons and Dragons, 3rd Edition, a few years ago. I didn’t really know about RPGs before then, though I’d heard of DnD of course, but when I first played with my best friend as DM, I haven’t stopped roleplaying and tabletop gaming since. (How dastardly of him to keep DnD hidden from me!)
What do you do when you’re not handling events and community for Modiphius?
I do a little bit of modelling here and there, mostly requests and arty projects, I sing in a rock band that’s developing - really exciting times! I cosplay and go to the major UK conventions so look out for me there. I’ll be cosplaying characters from my favourite films and TV shows. I have yet to create a gaming cosplay but SOON….I also am getting into LARP, I’ve always been arty and good with my hands so when I’m not working here I am either crafting something, writing music or out at some strange event or other.
What do you enjoy most about working for Modiphius?
I enjoy the fact that I am still pleasantly surprised every single day that I look around the office and see stacks of games, vintage gaming stuff, get to playtest and meet so many lovely people. It’s a very friendly and relaxed atmosphere that promotes wellbeing and discussion, gets the best out of people, the way things should be. I get to express myself truly as it ties in with the other things I do like the cosplay, and what I really love about this job more than any other is that my colleagues are hardcore geeks too and we can get into deep discussions about anything from starship engines, to feminism and responsibility in modern RPGs and films and TV!
Can you provide a little teaser about what you’re working on?
Ooooh, I can but I won’t. Haha!
What’s on your table right now and what do you look forward to playing?
SO MUCH - though a distinctly mutant - themed year methinks… I’m playing Doom trooper the card game from 1995 ( absolute riot), Firefly boardgame - stunning, the silly-fun dungeon building card game Boss Monster where you play the bosses! Mutant Chronicles: Year Zero, gross mutanty post apocalyptic fun, and really cannot wait to play the new Mutant Chronicles 3rd Ed! I feel very lucky to have front seats to this new sparkly corebook we have coming out real soon ;)
I met Chris at a casting for an event - I was fashion modeling before I got into games as a career! We were discussing modely-fashiony things first then somehow we got talking about tabletop games and he mentioned Modiphius and the games they publish so of course my geek ears pricked up. I came along to a games evening and then one thing led to another, and now not a day goes by that I don’t think about some character, setting, rule system, dice, geeky shopping. All that dice….
What was the first RPG you ever played?
Dungeons and Dragons, 3rd Edition, a few years ago. I didn’t really know about RPGs before then, though I’d heard of DnD of course, but when I first played with my best friend as DM, I haven’t stopped roleplaying and tabletop gaming since. (How dastardly of him to keep DnD hidden from me!)
What do you do when you’re not handling events and community for Modiphius?
I do a little bit of modelling here and there, mostly requests and arty projects, I sing in a rock band that’s developing - really exciting times! I cosplay and go to the major UK conventions so look out for me there. I’ll be cosplaying characters from my favourite films and TV shows. I have yet to create a gaming cosplay but SOON….I also am getting into LARP, I’ve always been arty and good with my hands so when I’m not working here I am either crafting something, writing music or out at some strange event or other.
What do you enjoy most about working for Modiphius?
I enjoy the fact that I am still pleasantly surprised every single day that I look around the office and see stacks of games, vintage gaming stuff, get to playtest and meet so many lovely people. It’s a very friendly and relaxed atmosphere that promotes wellbeing and discussion, gets the best out of people, the way things should be. I get to express myself truly as it ties in with the other things I do like the cosplay, and what I really love about this job more than any other is that my colleagues are hardcore geeks too and we can get into deep discussions about anything from starship engines, to feminism and responsibility in modern RPGs and films and TV!
Can you provide a little teaser about what you’re working on?
Ooooh, I can but I won’t. Haha!
What’s on your table right now and what do you look forward to playing?
SO MUCH - though a distinctly mutant - themed year methinks… I’m playing Doom trooper the card game from 1995 ( absolute riot), Firefly boardgame - stunning, the silly-fun dungeon building card game Boss Monster where you play the bosses! Mutant Chronicles: Year Zero, gross mutanty post apocalyptic fun, and really cannot wait to play the new Mutant Chronicles 3rd Ed! I feel very lucky to have front seats to this new sparkly corebook we have coming out real soon ;)
John Houlihan - Writer
Where do you live?
I live in the Jewel of Hertfordshire, also known as Watford. I'm a local lad, born and raised, but consider myself a citizen of the world... and beyond!
How did you first get involved with Modiphius?
It all started as the best things do over a pint with Chris Birch. We'd known each other through the video games business when he used to run Joystick Junkies and I used to be editor of the greatly lamented Computer and Video Games.com. We were talking about our shared love of sci-fi, fantasy and HP Lovecraft and he mentioned this little thing called Achtung! Cthulhu ...I said 'Maybe I could write something for it?' He said, 'You should.' The rest is history!
What was the first RPG you ever played?
Like most people I guess, it was Dungeons and Dragons, which I discovered at school and it absolutely blew me away. I'd always loved sci-fi and fantasy literature, but to find you could actually bring it to life in that way, constructing heroic and not-so-heroic tales in a shared imaginative world - amazing!
What have been your influences for the Chronicles of Seraph?
Writers are influenced by pretty everything they've ever read and my stack of fantasy and sci-fi book shelves are groaning with more worthy predecessors than I can possibly ever account for. But certainly Arthur Conan Doyle, Michael Moorcock, Fritz Leiber, Robert E Howard, HP Lovecraft, George MacDonald Fraser and even PG Woodhouse have all played their part in the formation of the mysterious Mister Seraph.
How did you first get involved in creating RPGs.. and fiction?
I wrote, designed and ran a lot of Call of Cthulhu and Warhammer scenarios when I was a student and spent endless hours playing them with my friends, a cheap way of spending time when you're a poverty-wracked student. But my first professional work was creating The Trellborg Monstrosities for Modiphius.
I wrote my first novel, Tom or the Peepers' and Voyeurs' Handbook, at the age of 23, just after I'd finished college and I really intended to write a whole lot more fiction. But a burgeoning career in journalism interrupted that best of intentions and it's only comparatively recently, that I've returned to fiction with a vengeance.
But now I've got a taste for it, there's no stopping me, check out my author page here for full details! I'll have a new Seraph novel, Before The Flood, set in a post-apocalyptic Britain invaded by the Deep Ones, appearing in the second half of this year and a standalone sci-fi novel, A Late Flowering Deity in the works too. Dark Tales from the Secret War, an Acthung! Cthulhu short story collection which I've edited for Modiphius which features some amazing established and emerging Cthulhu masters, should be out before too long as well!
What is your typical writing day like?
Since I still work full time, it has to be squeezed in between formal work, but I'll write during my lunch hour and when I get home, I spend about an hour to an hour and a half writing every night. On weekends I usually brew a big pot of coffee and write for two to three hours in the morning. If I have any spare time, you can usually find me chained to my computer, pumping out some more words.
What’s on your table (or console) right now and what do you look forward to playing?
Well, I've been playing quite a lot of Elite Dangerous which is a fantastic modern version of David Braben's classic space trading and fighting sim. Watch out for that Viper on your tail, it'll probably be me. I've also put quite a few hours into Destiny and I'm very much looking forward to playing The Witcher 3 if I can find the time.
Where will you be when Cthulhu rises?
Editing propaganda sheets for the resistance.
I live in the Jewel of Hertfordshire, also known as Watford. I'm a local lad, born and raised, but consider myself a citizen of the world... and beyond!
How did you first get involved with Modiphius?
It all started as the best things do over a pint with Chris Birch. We'd known each other through the video games business when he used to run Joystick Junkies and I used to be editor of the greatly lamented Computer and Video Games.com. We were talking about our shared love of sci-fi, fantasy and HP Lovecraft and he mentioned this little thing called Achtung! Cthulhu ...I said 'Maybe I could write something for it?' He said, 'You should.' The rest is history!
What was the first RPG you ever played?
Like most people I guess, it was Dungeons and Dragons, which I discovered at school and it absolutely blew me away. I'd always loved sci-fi and fantasy literature, but to find you could actually bring it to life in that way, constructing heroic and not-so-heroic tales in a shared imaginative world - amazing!
What have been your influences for the Chronicles of Seraph?
Writers are influenced by pretty everything they've ever read and my stack of fantasy and sci-fi book shelves are groaning with more worthy predecessors than I can possibly ever account for. But certainly Arthur Conan Doyle, Michael Moorcock, Fritz Leiber, Robert E Howard, HP Lovecraft, George MacDonald Fraser and even PG Woodhouse have all played their part in the formation of the mysterious Mister Seraph.
How did you first get involved in creating RPGs.. and fiction?
I wrote, designed and ran a lot of Call of Cthulhu and Warhammer scenarios when I was a student and spent endless hours playing them with my friends, a cheap way of spending time when you're a poverty-wracked student. But my first professional work was creating The Trellborg Monstrosities for Modiphius.
I wrote my first novel, Tom or the Peepers' and Voyeurs' Handbook, at the age of 23, just after I'd finished college and I really intended to write a whole lot more fiction. But a burgeoning career in journalism interrupted that best of intentions and it's only comparatively recently, that I've returned to fiction with a vengeance.
But now I've got a taste for it, there's no stopping me, check out my author page here for full details! I'll have a new Seraph novel, Before The Flood, set in a post-apocalyptic Britain invaded by the Deep Ones, appearing in the second half of this year and a standalone sci-fi novel, A Late Flowering Deity in the works too. Dark Tales from the Secret War, an Acthung! Cthulhu short story collection which I've edited for Modiphius which features some amazing established and emerging Cthulhu masters, should be out before too long as well!
What is your typical writing day like?
Since I still work full time, it has to be squeezed in between formal work, but I'll write during my lunch hour and when I get home, I spend about an hour to an hour and a half writing every night. On weekends I usually brew a big pot of coffee and write for two to three hours in the morning. If I have any spare time, you can usually find me chained to my computer, pumping out some more words.
What’s on your table (or console) right now and what do you look forward to playing?
Well, I've been playing quite a lot of Elite Dangerous which is a fantastic modern version of David Braben's classic space trading and fighting sim. Watch out for that Viper on your tail, it'll probably be me. I've also put quite a few hours into Destiny and I'm very much looking forward to playing The Witcher 3 if I can find the time.
Where will you be when Cthulhu rises?
Editing propaganda sheets for the resistance.