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Shane]Bruce, I admire your work with Mystara, especially the Savage Coast, where you created an entire sub-setting to go along with the Known World. I like how it had its own themes (e.g. the Red Curse and swashbuckling) but was neatly woven into the wider Mystara continuity. I also like how you stuck to the Known World model with tiny countries based on a kaleidoscope of real world cultures. Did you ever entertain thoughts about making another sub-setting on Mystara?

Not within the scope of the Princess Ark. By the time the PA series ended, the Mystara line had gone over to a different design group focused on the AD&D game. The passion just wasn't there. It pretty much ended any long term planning for this product line. By then TSR's finances also were at their worst which didn't help. If the PA series had continued, either Northwestern Davania would have become the next area of focus, or inland areas north of the Savage Coast.

Bruce, I admire your work with Mystara, especially the Savage Coast, where you created an entire sub-setting to go along with the Known World. I like how it had its own themes (e.g. the Red Curse and swashbuckling) but was neatly woven into the wider Mystara continuity. I also like how you stuck to the Known World model with tiny countries based on a kaleidoscope of real world cultures. Did you ever entertain thoughts about making another sub-setting on Mystara?[/quote]
Not within the scope of the Princess Ark. By the time the PA series ended, the Mystara line had gone over to a different design group focused on the AD&D game. The passion just wasn't there. It pretty much ended any long term planning for this product line. By then TSR's finances also were at their worst which didn't help. If the PA series had continued, either Northwestern Davania would have become the next area of focus, or inland areas north of the Savage Coast.

Bruce

Amberville]If the PA series had continued, either Northwestern Davania would have become the next area of focus, or inland areas north of the Savage Coast.

Bruce, thanks for your response. Have you sketched out your ideas (even rough ideas) for these areas in your mind or on paper? If so, is there anything you can share, or would it be best to save them for any (hopefully) future VotPA adve wrote:

Mystara also is hollow! The inside of the planet hides new continents and mysteries that perhaps only a handful of people in the Known World have ever heard of.

This fantastic setting is fully described in the Hollow World Reference Guide.

I was wondering...is the Hollow World Reference Guide still extant?

Shane

Shane]Bruce, over on this thread - http://boards1.wizards.com/showthread.php?t=682234 - Geoff posed a question about the vaporware module X11: Blackheart, which was reportedly replaced by X11: Saga of the Shadow Lord. Can you shed any light on this?

Boy, this does go way back... Around that time period, there was a tendency at TSR to come up with product titles very early in the production process for the purpose of filling slots on TSR's yearly release catalog. In some cases, no author/in-house-advocate was attached to a project (hence the resulting vaporware when production hit the proverbial speedbump several months later).

Why did they do that?

100% of TSR sales relied on pre-sales to outside distributors up to about 15 months prior to release dates. If a product did not hit the shelves when promised to distributors, that product was 100% dead (hence the term "deadline"). This meant a total loss to TSR. As a result, products where planned way in advance, even to the point of dreaming up titles and module numbers sometimes without a clue as to what these products would be.

This changed a few years later for several reasons. The above was a big one. :D

Other reasons had to do with a much more aggressive/empowered management on the part of product managers (including myself when I took over Mystara's direction), and their conscious effort to make sure future products were actually integrated in a design strategy for their game worlds. For a few years Mystara/D&D was an orphan product line with no in-house advocate, which made it an ideal terrain for vaporware or purely "title-driven" designs. There was a number of these back then. Another factor was my involvement as director of production planning for all of TSR game products which prevented the emergence of vaporware and other undefined/unassigned/unbudgeted projects.

Bruce, over on this thread - http://boards1.wizards.com/showthread.php?t=682234 - Geoff posed a question about the vaporware module X11: Blackheart, which was reportedly replaced by X11: Saga of the Shadow Lord. Can you shed any light on this?[/quote]
Boy, this does go way back... Around that time period, there was a tendency at TSR to come up with product titles very early in the production process for the purpose of filling slots on TSR's yearly release catalog. In some cases, no author/in-house-advocate was attached to a project (hence the resulting vaporware when production hit the proverbial speedbump several months later).

Why did they do that?

100% of TSR sales relied on pre-sales to outside distributors up to about 15 months prior to release dates. If a product did not hit the shelves when promised to distributors, that product was 100% dead (hence the term "deadline"). This meant a total loss to TSR. As a result, products where planned way in advance, even to the point of dreaming up titles and module numbers sometimes without a clue as to what these products would be.

This changed a few years later for several reasons. The above was a big one. :D

Other reasons had to do with a much more aggressive/empowered management on the part of product managers (including myself when I took over Mystara's direction), and their conscious effort to make sure future products were actually integrated in a design strategy for their game worlds. For a few years Mystara/D&D was an orphan product line with no in-house advocate, which made it an ideal terrain for vaporware or purely "title-driven" designs. There was a number of these back then. Another factor was my involvement as director of production planning for all of TSR game products which prevented the emergence of vaporware and other undefined/unassigned/unbudgeted projects.

Bruce