Seth Skorkowsky Talks RPG Philosophy

Seth Skorkowsky was born beneath the pine trees of East Texas and grew up with a love of camping and outdoors. His teen years were spent ingesting heavy doses of Dungeons & Dragons and Clive Barker novels.

At thirteen, while visiting his favorite comic/game shop, he saw the cover for the AD&D “Lankhmar: City of Adventure” campaign book. Seth had no idea who Fritz Leiber or his heroes, Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser, even were, but the imagery captured him. Leiber’s stories became the single greatest influence on the atmosphere of his fantasy writing.

Sometime after college, while attempting to write the next great epic horror/fantasy, he penned a short story on the side called ‘The Mist of Lichthafen‘. It was his nod to Fritz. He sold the story to TTA Press who wanted it for their upcoming Black Static magazine. “The Mist of Lichthafen” was praised among readers. It received a longlist nomination for the 2009 British Fantasy Award. Seth would later narrate the story for TTA Press’ ‘Transmissions From Beyond’ podcast.

Later, during a moment of writer’s block in his novel, he wrote an origin story for a thief character called The Black Raven. ‘Birth of the Black Raven’ was always intended to be a stand-alone story with a very open ending. A year later, after his first trip to Venice, he wrote ‘Race for the Night Ruby‘, and decided to cast the same character, but now as a master thief. Once that was done, he really had no choice but to fill in the gaps between the two stories and then continue on with more adventures. As of writing this, Black Raven has had over 21 stories.

In 2011, after attending a brutal 3-day writing workshop, Seth finally came to grips that his first novel was simply dreadful. Instead of feeling dismayed, it gave him the courage to let it go and actually start work on an Urban Fantasy story that he’d been mulling for several years.

DÄMOREN sold to Ragnarok Publications in 2013. It published in 2014 and was a Audie Award finalist for Best Paranormal Audiobook.

A week later, lightning struck twice more when he signed to publish not just one, but two collections of Black Raven adventures. MOUNTAIN OF DAGGERS and SEA OF QUILLS.

Seth has now published four Valducan novels and a seperate novel Ashes of Onyx. He has many more Black Raven adventures planned. One day he hopes to pen that epic fantasy, as well as a gritty pulp crime novel.

In 2016, he started making YouTube videos about table-top role-playing games one day. His channel won the Gold ENnie Award for Best Online Content in 2019.

In 2020, his first published RPG scenario ‘A Mother’s Love’ was released in the Call of Cthulhu collection New Tales of the Miskatonic Valley. The collection went on to win the 2020 Gold ENnie Award for Best Electronic Book.

When not writing, Seth loves going on walks to clear his head and daydream. He enjoys traveling. His favorite city is Florence. Table-top role-playing is still an enormous part of his life. He loves, going to Renaissance faires, making YouTube videos, and watching bad movies with friends.

To learn more:

https://skorkowsky.com

‪@SSkorkowsky‬

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