Rob Heinsoo

Last updated

Rob Heinsoo
Rob Heinsoo.jpg
Born1964 (age 59–60)
OccupationGame designer
NationalityAmerican
Genre Role-playing games

Rob Heinsoo (born 1964[ citation needed ]) is an American tabletop game designer. He has been designing and contributing to professional role-playing games, card games, and board games since 1994. [1] Heinsoo was the lead designer on the 4th Edition of Dungeons & Dragons (2008), and is co-designer of the 13th Age roleplaying game along with Jonathan Tweet. He has also designed and contributed to role playing, miniatures and card games, and a computer game.

Contents

Career

Heinsoo began playing Dungeons & Dragons in 1974 at age 10, using the original edition. [2] His interest in games informed his interest in science fiction and fantasy, and vice versa. [2] Heinsoo was hired by Jose Garcia for Daedalus Games to work on the RPG Nexus ; [3] : 256  some of his work for Daedalus Games' Feng Shui RPG was later published by Atlas Games.[ citation needed ] Chaosium hired Heinsoo in 1996 to oversee their licenses for Glorantha, [3] : 359  but he was laid off the following year. [3] : 361 

Heinsoo joined Wizards of the Coast (WotC) as part of the "D&D Worlds" team, where he focused on the third-edition version of Forgotten Realms . [3] : 289  With WotC, Heinsoo was involved with a number of Dungeons & Dragons game products. Other Forgotten Realms works include the sourcebook Monsters of Faerûn . He also helped write the third edition Forgotten Realms Campaign Setting , which reached the top 50 of the non-fiction bestsellers in Canada in 2002 [4] and won an Origins Award for best roleplaying supplement of 2001. [5] He is the designer of Three-Dragon Ante , a card game.

While at Wizards of the Coast, he also led and contributed to various miniatures gaming projects. Heinsoo playtested the Chainmail game and so he became a member of the Chainmail team, and contributed to the Chainmail column in Dragon magazine writing about tactics and rules. [3] : 289–290  Subsequent to the release of the Dungeons & Dragons Miniatures Game, he took over as lead designer on that project. [6] He was also one of three designers of Dreamblade , for which he was nominated for an Origins Award in 2007. [7]

Early in 2005, Bill Slavicsek organized a team to begin some early designs for a fourth edition of D&D, which was headed up by Heinsoo and also included Andy Collins and James Wyatt, with Heinsoo leading the teams working on the design and development in 2005 and 2006. [3] : 297  The Player's Handbook for this edition was nominated for an Origins Award for Best Roleplaying Game in 2009. [8] His teammates referred to his role on the 4th Edition team as the "mad genius". [9] His book Monster Manual 2, co-written with Chris Sims, was a Wall Street Journal bestseller in 2009. [10] Heinsoo was laid off by Wizards in 2009. [3] : 301 

After Wizards, Heinsoo designed the 13th Age RPG. [11] He designed 13th Age with Jonathan Tweet, the lead designer of 3rd Edition D&D. [11] Heinsoo and Tweet are close friends who have played tabletop games together for years. [11]

Rob Heinsoo also contributes to Alarums and Excursions .

Tabletop roleplaying games

3rd Edition D&D

4th Edition D&D

13th Age

Card games and board games

Miniatures games

Computer games

Related Research Articles

<i>Dungeons & Dragons</i> Fantasy role-playing game

Dungeons & Dragons is a fantasy tabletop role-playing game (TTRPG) originally created and designed by Gary Gygax and Dave Arneson. The game was first published in 1974 by Tactical Studies Rules (TSR). It has been published by Wizards of the Coast, later a subsidiary of Hasbro, since 1997. The game was derived from miniature wargames, with a variation of the 1971 game Chainmail serving as the initial rule system. D&D's publication is commonly recognized as the beginning of modern role-playing games and the role-playing game industry, which also deeply influenced video games, especially the role-playing video game genre.

Forgotten Realms is a campaign setting for the Dungeons & Dragons (D&D) fantasy role-playing game. Commonly referred to by players and game designers as "The Realms", it was created by game designer Ed Greenwood around 1967 as a setting for his childhood stories. Several years later, it was published for the D&D game as a series of magazine articles, and the first Realms game products were released in 1987. Role-playing game products have been produced for the setting ever since, in addition to novels, role-playing video game adaptations, comic books, and the film Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Jonathan Tweet</span> American game designer

Jonathan Tweet is an American game designer who has been involved in the development of the role-playing games Ars Magica, Everway, Over the Edge, Talislanta, the third edition of Dungeons & Dragons and 13th Age, and the collectible miniatures game Dreamblade. In 2015 Tweet released Grandmother Fish, a full-color, full-sized book about evolution aimed at preschoolers. In 2018 Tweet released Clades and Clades Prehistoric, two card games for children and adults which demonstrate the concept of a clade.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Tiefling</span> Fictional humanoid race in Dungeons & Dragons

The tiefling is a fictional humanoid race in the Dungeons & Dragons (D&D) fantasy roleplaying game. Originally introduced in the Planescape campaign setting in the second edition of Advanced Dungeons & Dragons as a player character race for the setting, they became one of the primary races available for player characters in the fourth edition of the game.

Jeff Grubb is an author of novels, short stories, and comics, as well as a computer and role-playing game designer in the fantasy genre. Grubb worked on the Dragonlance campaign setting under Tracy Hickman, and the Forgotten Realms setting with Ed Greenwood. His written works include The Finder's Stone Trilogy, the Spelljammer and Jakandor campaign settings, and contributions to Dragonlance and the computer game Guild Wars Nightfall (2006).

Richard Baker is an American author and game designer who has worked on many Dungeons & Dragons campaign settings.

Several different editions of the Dungeons & Dragons (D&D) fantasy role-playing game have been produced since 1974. The current publisher of D&D, Wizards of the Coast, produces new materials only for the most current edition of the game. However, many D&D fans continue to play older versions of the game and some third-party companies continue to publish materials compatible with these older editions.

Ralph Williams, almost always referred to as Skip Williams, is an American game designer. He is married to Penny Williams, who is also involved with the games industry. He was the co-creator of Dungeons & Dragons 3rd Edition and the longtime author of the "Sage Advice" column for Dragon Magazine.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Robin Laws</span> Canadian writer and game designer (born 1964)

Robin D. Laws is a Canadian writer and game designer who lives in Toronto, Canada. He is the author of a number of novels and role-playing games as well as an anthologist.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">James Wyatt (game designer)</span> American game designer (born c. 1968)

James Wyatt is a game designer and a former United Methodist minister. He works for Wizards of the Coast, where he has designed supplements and adventures for the Dungeons & Dragons (D&D) roleplaying game. He is the author of sci-fi and fantasy novels, including Forgotten Realms books, and the 4th edition Dungeon Master's Guide.

Dwarf (<i>Dungeons & Dragons</i>) Fictional playable humanoid race

A dwarf, in the Dungeons & Dragons (D&D) fantasy roleplaying game, is a humanoid race, one of the primary races available for player characters. The idea for the D&D dwarf comes from the dwarves of European mythologies and J. R. R. Tolkien's novel The Lord of the Rings (1954–1955), and has been used in D&D and its predecessor Chainmail since the early 1970s. Variations from the standard dwarf archetype of a short and stout demihuman are commonly called subraces, of which there are more than a dozen across many different rule sets and campaign settings.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Bill Slavicsek</span> Role-playing game designer

Bill Slavicsek is an American game designer and writer who served as the Director of Roleplaying Design and Development at Wizards of the Coast. He previously worked for West End Games and TSR, Inc., and designed products for Dungeons & Dragons, Star Wars, Alternity, Torg, Paranoia and Ghostbusters.

<i>Miniatures Handbook</i>

The Miniatures Handbook is an official supplement for the 3.5 edition of the Dungeons & Dragons roleplaying game.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Mike Mearls</span> American game designer

Michael Mearls is an American writer and designer of fantasy role-playing games (RPGs) and related fiction.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Chris Pramas</span> American game designer

Chris Pramas is an American game designer and writer, as well as a founder of Green Ronin Publishing. He is best known as the designer of the Dragon Age RPG, Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay, and Freeport: The City of Adventure.

<i>Wizards Presents: Races and Classes</i> Tabletop role-playing game supplement

Wizards Presents: Races and Classes is an accessory released as a preview for the 4th edition of the Dungeons & Dragons fantasy role-playing game, published in December 2007.

<i>13th Age</i> Tabletop fantasy role-playing game

13th Age is a d20 fantasy role-playing game designed by Rob Heinsoo and Jonathan Tweet, and published by Pelgrane Press. 13th Age has been well supported with over 25 supplements published since its 2013 release, the most recent in 2022.

<i>Wizards Presents: Worlds and Monsters</i> Tabletop role-playing game supplement

Wizards Presents: Worlds and Monsters is an accessory released as a preview for the 4th edition of the Dungeons & Dragons fantasy role-playing game, published in January 2008. It is the second book in the series following Wizards Presents: Races and Classes.

Dungeons & Dragons: Adventures in the Forgotten Realms is an expansion set for Magic: The Gathering (Magic) released in July 2021. The world of the Forgotten Realms was created by game designer Ed Greenwood around 1967 as a paracosm for his childhood stories and premiered as a campaign setting for the Dungeons & Dragons (D&D) fantasy role-playing game in the Forgotten Realms Campaign Setting (1987). This expansion set is the third collaboration between Magic and D&D; both teams are part of Wizards of the Coast.

References

  1. ↑ ""Rob Heinsoo" game credits". Pen & Paper. Archived from the original on April 18, 2003.
  2. 1 2 "Interview". Guys Lit Wire. June 23, 2008.
  3. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 Shannon Appelcline (2011). Designers & Dragons. Mongoose Publishing. ISBN   978-1-907702-58-7.
  4. ↑ (September 2002). "Bestsellers Lists", Books in Canada31 (6): 11.
  5. ↑ "2001 Academy of Adventure Gaming Arts & Design". Archived from the original on March 3, 2008.
  6. ↑ "Spotlight interview". Archived from the original on December 20, 2010.
  7. ↑ "Google Groups". groups.google.com.
  8. ↑ "Nominees for 35th Origins Awards announced". April 29, 2009.
  9. ↑ "Rob's definitely the mad genius of the group, particularly when it comes to mechanical design." Kobold Quarterly, Summer 2008, page 32.
  10. ↑ (May 29, 2009). "Wall Street Journal Best-Sellers", Connecticut Post .
  11. 1 2 3 "13th Age: The New Tabletop Game From The Lead Designers Of 3rd And 4th Edition Dungeons And Dragons". Forbes . Retrieved June 9, 2013.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.