That was the birth of the project.ĭungeon Run (mock-up) demo game in action. He and I brainstormed and came up with ideas for new directions to take some of the concepts behind the print and play version. He put up Dungeon Run as a print and play project and I saw some great potential there. I knew that he was fairly prolific in designing games as a hobby and I was actively looking for the opportunity to publish one of his games. When I started Plaid Hat Games he helped out with playtesting, general advice, and other areas. He and I met one another through the Heroscape community. TRG: The next project that's been announced is a boardgame, Dungeon Run. I believe that success breeds success, so I'm going to keep paying my dues and keep looking for opportunities to get the word out about us. My plan is to keep producing great games and great customer service. The more success we get the more chances we can take on larger marketing campaigns directed at retailers. The longer Plaid Hat Games is around the more the stores will have heard of us and be willing to give our products a try. Players can help get Summoner Wars in their local game store by requesting it. I also only have so much time and money to devote to marketing and I choose to, right now, use that to market directly to players. I still maintain a day job which means I can't travel to things like GAMA and distributors conventions to reach out to game retailers. What are some plans to change that and give Summoner Wars a stronger presence at retail?ĬD: I wish I had all the answers here. TRG: Summoner Wars has gotten great reviews, and developed quite a strong following, yet doesn't have a real presence in game stores.
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My good friend John Clowdus of Small Box Games suggested the name Plaid Hat Games and most of the rest of my friends thought it was an excellent name. I had an illustration of me done in that hat which I used in a blog I kept for awhile and still use as my avatar on various sites. TRG: What's the story behind the name Plaid Hat Games?ĬD: I sometimes sport a plaid hat. Something I felt like I wanted to do and something I felt like Summoner Wars would be a great backbone start up product for. I felt like anything smaller than that meant Plan B, which was start a company of my own. I felt like those were the big dogs whose names and resources would do the most for the game.
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TRG: How did you come to the decision to start up your own company?ĬD: I told myself pretty early in my efforts on Summoner Wars that I was going to shop it to Hasbro, the biggest mass market company where I had the best connections, and Fantasy Flight Games one of the biggest and my favorite hobby game company. I also submitted it to Fantasy Flight Games, but I'm still waiting for their submissions department to return my email asking them if I can send them a prototype. I kind of knew that it wasn't going to be right for them, but I had to try. TRG: You tried to shop Summoner Wars around to other game companies, correct?ĬD: The main one I knew I wanted to shop it to was Hasbro. One of the designs that came out of that calling was Summoner Wars. TRG: When did you come up with the concept of Summoner Wars?ĬD:Back when Heroscape was still at Hasbro and Hasbro was sending me other various game design jobs I started to feel the call to design something that was all my own. That was my part of the project while it was at WotC (shared with Chris Dupuis and Jerry Hawthorne) and I took it seriously.
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I will say that I always did my best to make sure that the game mechanics for Heroscape continued to be innovative and exciting. So talking too openly about my experiences and my feelings toward how they handled the line seems ill advised. I worked with WotC on the line and am under contract as such. TRG: What were your thoughts when you found out WOTC was pulling the plug on Heroscape?ĬD: This is a tricky question. It was those experiences connecting with other gamers and especially checking out GenCon that caused me to discover the wider world of hobby gaming. TRG: Colby, could you give us your gamer origin, so to speak? How did you get into the hobby.ĬD: I've always been into games of all types, but Heroscape is the game that I fell so in love with that I got involved with online communities and went to a convention for. Plaid Hat Games owner and chief game designer Colby Dauch.