David Kenzer

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David Kenzer
Occupation Game designer

David S. Kenzer is a game designer whose company, Kenzer & Company, is best known for the comic book series Knights of the Dinner Table , as well as for various role-playing games such as HackMaster .

Contents

Company start-up

In the early 1990s, David Kenzer, a law student, was playing Advanced Dungeons & Dragons regularly with five friends, including Brian Jelkey and Steve Johansson. [1] In the spring of 1993, the group decided to start up a company in order to publish AD&D adventures. Kenzer filled out the paperwork to incorporate the company, and put "Kenzer and Company" as a placeholder for the company name. When the five friends objected to the name, Kenzer told them it was only a placeholder, and they were free to come up with a better name for the company. A discussion produced no consensus, and Kenzer laid down a deadline of a week to come up with a better name before he filed the papers. No better name was submitted, so the new company became known as Kenzer & Company. [1]

First products

Studying Intellectual Property law at the time, Kenzer was sure that the company could produce non-licensed material for AD&D without TSR's approval. Their first project, published in 1994 , was the AD&D-compatible adventure The Kingdom of Kalamar . [2] : 309  The adventure was marked "suitable for use with Advanced Dungeons & Dragons " printed on the back cover, and included the disclaimer text "Advanced Dungeons & Dragons is a registered trademark of TSR Hobbies, Inc. Use of this trademark is NOT sanctioned by the holder." [2] : 309 

After producing another adventure, Kenzer decided to branch out, producing a licensed collectible card game (CCG) based on Monty Python and the Holy Grail in 1996, which proved to be a bestseller. [1]

Knights of the Dinner Table

Kenzer began a casual relationship with Alderac Entertainment Group, which had just started to publish the RPG magazine Shadis , with Jolly Blackburn as editor. [2] : 309  Kenzer and his staff wanted Blackburn to join Kenzer & Company after he left AEG in 1995, and Kenzer and others visited him in November 1996 during a local convention, during which Blackburn became convinced that Kenzer had the business sense and integrity he wanted in a partner. [2] : 309 

Kenzer & Company began publishing the Knights of the Dinner Table comic books by Blackburn, and beginning with issue #5 (February 1997) it became the work of the "KoDT Development Team" made up of Blackburn, Kenzer, Jelke and Johansson. [2] : 310 

Hackmaster

Kenzer acquired the license to Advanced Dungeons & Dragons from Wizards of the Coast that allowed the company to release HackMaster (2001) as a satire of AD&D. [2] : 311  Kenzer was not willing to sign the Game System License that Wizards offered when they released 4th edition D&D in 2008, and he instead published a 501-page PDF for Kingdoms of Kalamar (2008) and did not reach out to Wizards for authorization. [2] : 312 

Awards

Kenzer's Aces & Eights: Shattered Frontier , co-authored with Jolly R. Blackburn, Brian Jelke, Steve Johansson, Jennifer Kenzer and Mark Plemmons, won a 2007 Origins Award in the category Roleplaying Game of the Year 2007, [3] and a Silver ENnie Award for "Best Game of 2007."

References

  1. 1 2 3 "Kenzer and Company Interview". Gaming Ballistic. 10 May 2017. Retrieved 19 January 2026.
  2. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 Shannon Appelcline (2011). Designers & Dragons. Mongoose Publishing. ISBN   978-1-907702-58-7.
  3. ↑ "2007 Origins Awards".
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