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Internet Message Format | 1995-09-28 | 10KB

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Newsgroups: rec.games.frp.archives
Subject: INTERVIEW: CARL SARGENT Interview
Followup-To: rec.games.frp.misc
Date: 26 Sep 1995 09:28:23 -0400
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> Dek ([e-mail]) wrote:
>> Earlier this year, an interview with Carl Sargent was posted to either
>> this newsgroup or r.g.f.archives (I don't remember which).

([e-mail]) then replied:
>
> I now have read this more than once. Obviously I missed this post,
> which I really would like to read. Did anybody by chance save it and
> still has it at hand? I'd like a copy of it. Thanks.

As would others like Iquander. Well, Dek was right. I was the interviewer
and poster, both here and on the ADND-L mailing list. Here it is again,
and the archives group seemed like a good idea - so I'm sending it there,
too. Thanks, Dek.

Oh, and Iquander...you know how I feel about AOL's posting guidelines, but
none of that stuff applies in this case. Feel free to post it there,
though I gather that your fellow members of the Council aren't exactly
fans. Their loss.

--------

Hello, all. I have recently had the good fortune to communicate with Carl
Sargent, who designed a number of quality AD&D products and is now with
FASA. His specialty was the World of Greyhawk, however, and IMHO his works
just before they cancelled the world were some of the best things TSR has
released.

Inspired by some old TSR employee profiles in my Dragon back-issues, I
asked him for some personal information as well as permission to post it
to the Internet. His responses are included below, and I think y'all will
find them intersting. I would especially commend to you his tips for any
game designer wannabes - he's one of the best, and knows whereof he
speaks.

Enjoy!


******[ DESIGNER PROFILE: CARL SARGENT]******

(Interview and compilation by Joe Katzman, 1995)


BORN: 12/11/52 in Caerleon, Wales, UK.

EDUCATION: Ph.D. in Psychology

MAJOR DESIGN CREDITS:
- (TSR) City of Greyhawk boxed set*, Complete Thieves Handbook*, From the
Ashes boxed set [Greyhawk revision], The Marklands, Iuz the Evil, Monster
Mythology, Night Below [Oct. 1995], Faerie Queen and Country*.
- (GW) Warhammer City*, Power Behind the Throne, Empire in Flames, Death's
Dark Shadow, Castle Drachenfels.
- (FASA) London Sourcebook, Tir Na Nog, Paranormal Animals of Europe,
Prime Runners, Harlequin's Back*, Viviane/Skypoint [Gen Con 1995].

* = a collaborative work

NOVELS: (Shadowrun) Blood on the Streets, Nosferatu, Black Madonna
[1996].  (Earthdawn) Shroud of Madness [later 1995]. All with Mark
Gascoigne.

HOBBIES: Very academic, I have to say: historical and mythological
reading/research for the most part. I am one of those hideous serious
people who regards "fun" as a wholly alien concept, but I am a fan of the
Patriots so I do have a mitigating sense of humour.

BEST BOOK YOU'VE READ LATELY: (Fiction) The Information, by Martin Amis.
(Non-Fiction) Vicars of Christ: The Dark Side of the Papacy by Peter de
Rosa.


HOW DID YOU GET STARTED IN GAMING?

I started playing D&D in 1978 through friends and just wondering "what are
these people doing playing this game that has no board, hacking zombies?
What are experience points?" and the usual hundred question that occur to
an onlooker.


HOW DID YOU GET INVOLVED IN THE GAMING INDUSTRY?

I researched and taught Psych. at the University of Cambridge, and TSR UK
were based in that town. They asked me down for a drink after I'd sent an
article to the late lamented 'Imagine' magazine and everything went on
from there. The TSR UK crew decamped to Games Workshop, so I started
working for them and kept links to TSR UK. All done from personal contact,
but the UK is much smaller geographically than the US, so this may be
somewhat easier here.


FUTURE PROJECTS: [Now with FASA, see above.]

I've just completed "Night Below," which is a huge boxed dungeon set due
for September or October 1995. My brief for this was to give it the
flavour of the old GDQ modules, and to make it generic but suitable for
placement in the Realms or Greyhawk (so it may not be dead - hence the
need to keep letters coming in to TSR!) This turned out to be good, and at
800+ words per page you will get good value for your money.


THIS MUST BE A VERY COMMON QUESTION FOR YOU, BUT WHERE DO YOU GET YOUR IDEAS?

As to ideas, I read very widely, almost all non-fiction and usually
historical material. I have a Psych. Ph.D. which helps with understanding
theories of human motivation and personality. Where I can say I don't get
anything is from movies or contemporary fiction, though factual TV
programs are useful. For instance, the Gwydiesin character from "Ivid the
Undying" is based on the Welsh bard Taliesin and a Japanese
environmentalist I saw a documentary about. Hopefully the relevant
chapter, on the Grandwood, will get into Dragon because it's fairly
self-contained.

I've always thought that non-fiction sources for RPG characters and
plotlines are superior to fictional ones, for many reasons. Truth is
stranger than fiction; plot devices in fiction often don't work in RPG
settings; fiction is often too "clean" in construction; and researching
non-fiction sources can offer up a dozen tangents for every theme you
wanted to get into in the first place.

For example, I've just been reading a sociological monograph, "Poverty and
Deviance in Early Modern Europe," which gives some very simple information
on the lives of the poor. Mapping causal chains for the circumstances of
their lives, a neat little flow diagram simply shows causations such as
wet weather produces fungal growth produces disease of people and crops
[Ed. Note: also hanatavirus - ask the Navajo]. Now, you can say (in a
fantasy campaign) "people are starving, there's been a famine," but how
much more impactful and "fantasy realistic" to say "after a long wet
summer that only rotting fungi and insects liked, many people have disease
and the crops have failed, rotted by blight - the King and his nobles have
real problems." I don't think you can pick up that kind of logic of
explanation from fiction (unless it's awfully good).


DO YOU PLAY AD&D REGULARLY, AND IF SO IS YOUR CAMPAIGN SET IN GREYHAWK?

I do have a Greyhawk campaign, of some 11 years standing. My first two
characters still survive; one of them is the template for Artur Jakartai
of Furyondy on Oerth.

I am indeed a freelancer [Ed. note: was a freelancer], and in a sense I
was brought in to do Greyhawk. I had done a lot of work before I was given
Greyhawk, having let it be known for some time that I was eager to write
for this game world.


ADVICE FOR WOULD BE DESIGNERS:

Find out what the company wants, get writer's guidelines and check them
out. Get familiar with the background of the game world you hope to write
for. Check how the company works: TSR doesn't accept proposals while FASA
does, for example. If a company is interested in proposals, keep them
short, and don't send complete manuscripts on spec - companies don't have
time to read them. Advance inquiry can also avoid the possible problem of
you going ahead with something the company is already doing itself.

Start small and get writer's credits with magazines in the first instance,
this is important. Dungeon/Dragon remain the best bets. There's no career
path here and no qualifications of relevance other than experience - game
designers come from all kinds of backgrounds. Zeb Cook was a teacher, Tim
Brown was a rock musician, I was a psychologist, for example.

Experienced designers are currently being lost to the industry (Cook,
Murphy, Rolston, Findley) and quality replacements are hard to find. If
you can get your act together, there is a market out there for these
skills.

Finally, one summary sentence on what makes a good product: get your
explanatory and connecting logic right, and check that your adventure
premises are plausible and coherent.


CONTACT ADDRESS?

Carl Sargent,
c/o FASA Corporation
1100 W Cermak B 305
Chicago, Il.  60608
U.S.A.

(No e-mail address as yet.)


CAVEAT RE: FANS SENDING HIM MATERIAL

As a rule..., I don't read anything sent to me. That's just because I need
to be able to say to the people I work for that what I write for them is
original. With the best will in the world, if I read lots of unpublished
material it's always possible that some interesting idea or image will pop
back into my head from it some years afterward and end up in something I
write for publication. It's an occupational hazard which I have to protect
against as best I can. Sorry if this seems a bit formal and aloof, but
it's really something I need to do.


FINAL COMMENTS:

It's good to know that you use what I wrote as a springboard for your own
ideas. That's what it was originally written for, after all.



Well, that's all for now. Until next, then. (Hey Wolfgang, care to go in
on something similar?)


Thalion Envinyatar
------------------------------------------------
"Once in a while you get shown the light
in the strangest place if you look just right."
              - G.D. lyricist J.P. Barlow
------------------------------------------------