Steve Perrin

Stephen Herbert Perrin (born January 22, 1946[1]), often simply known as Steve Perrin,[2] is a game designer and technical writer/editor.

For the footballer, see Steve Perrin (footballer).
Steve Perrin
BornStephen Herbert Perrin
(1946-01-22) January 22, 1946
OccupationGame designer, technical writer, editor
NationalityAmerican
GenreRole-playing games
Notable worksRuneQuest, Stormbringer, Call of Cthulhu

Perrin is best known for creating the role-playing game RuneQuest for Chaosium.

Early life and education

Perrin earned a Bachelor of Arts in English from San Francisco State University.

In 1966, Perrin had been a founding member of the Society for Creative Anachronism (SCA).[3]:83

Early career and Chaosium

One of his first contributions to the world of RPGs was "The Perrin Conventions" in 1976, a set of alternative rules for Dungeons & Dragons combat, which led to his work on RuneQuest.[3]:83[4] Perrin was interested in getting more involved with the RPG industry, and with Jeff Pimper he talked with Chaosium about publishing a D&D-based monster manual, which they called All the Worlds' Monsters (1977), which beat TSR's Monster Manual to market.[3]:83 Perrin - along with Steve Henderson and Warren James - began working on an idea for an original gaming system for Glorantha, and were soon joined by Ray Turney from the original failed design team; this system was published as RuneQuest (1978).[3]:83

Perrin officially joined Chaosium in 1981, although he just stayed a few years.[3]:84 He was one of several authors who contributed to Thieves' World (1981).[3]:85 Perrin's Worlds of Wonder (1982) was the third release under Chaosium's Basic Role-Playing system (BRP).[3]:86 Superworld, one of Worlds of Wonder's worlds, became its own game, although it was only moderately successful and Perrin later acknowledged that it was too similar to Hero Games' Champions.[3]:87 Perrin's Elfquest (1984), based on the black and white Elfquest comic book, was another BRP release.[3]:87 While at Chaosium he also created Stormbringer, and contributed to Call of Cthulhu.

Later career

Hero Games published its sixth RPG, Robot Warriors (1986), by Perrin.[3]:147 He also wrote the 1987 Champions role-playing game supplement The Voice of Doom.

He worked at Interplay Productions, Maxis, and Spectrum Holobyte, doing game design, playtesting, and writing manuals for such computer games as Star Trek: Starfleet Academy, SimCity 2000, and Flight of the Intruder to name but a few. He has also worked freelance for many of the major players in the games industry including TSR, FASA, Hero Games, West End Games, and Iron Crown Enterprises.

Steve Perrin's Quest Rules (SPQR) is the latest Steve Perrin role-playing game, which he sells independently through Chaos Limited. In 2004 he collaborated with Taldren on Black 9 Ops as a paper and pencil accompaniment to the company's Black9 PC and Xbox game, which fell afoul of developer-publisher friction and now looks to be unlikely to be published. Perrin decided to make Black 9 Ops available for free and provides pdfs to anyone who asks.

In 2010 Perrin began creating PDF adventures for the games Icons and Mutants & Masterminds. He has completed several scenarios for Vigilance Press and Fainting Goat Press.

In 2019, the current administration of Chaosium asked him to return to the company as "Creative Consultant," which he gladly accepted.

In 2020 he contributed to the Wild Cards novel American Hero.

References
  1. Miller, John Jackson (June 10, 2005). "Comics Industry Birthdays". Comics Buyer's Guide. Archived from the original on February 18, 2011.
  2. Steve Perrin biography resume on RPGGeek.com
  3. Shannon Appelcline (2011). Designers & Dragons. Mongoose Publishing. ISBN 978-1-907702-58-7.
  4. The History of Runequest: A Bright Beginning 2001 (revised 13 July 2005); accessed 22 June 2008
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