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Chris Pramas

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Chris Pramas at Gen Con on August 17, 2007
Chris Pramas at Gen Con on August 17, 2007
BornChris Pramas
OccupationGame designer
NationalityAmerican
GenreRole-playing games
Website
www.chrispramas.com

Chris Pramas is an American game designer and writer, as well as a founder of Green Ronin Publishing. He is best known as the designer of the Dragon Age RPG, Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay (second edition), and Freeport: The City of Adventure.

Career

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Early career

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Pramas began his career in the game industry as a freelancer in 1993, contributing to games such as Underground from Mayfair Games, the supplement Dangerous Prey (1995) from Pariah Press for The Whispering Vault, and The Dying of the Light (1995) Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay campaign from Hogshead Publishing.[1]: 369  He also contributed to the game Over the Edge.[2] Pramas acquired the rights to The Whispering Vault from Mike Nystul in early 1996 and with his brother Jason Pramas and their friend Neal Darcy, they founded the company Ronin Publishing; Jason Pramas left before long, and Ronin Publishing only successfully published The Book of Hunts (1997) before the rights to The Whispering Vault were transferred to another company.[1]: 369  Pramas moved to Seattle, Washington in August 1997, and made freelancing his full-time occupation.[1]: 369  Pramas worked on the sourcebook Blood of the Valiant (1998) for Feng Shui to be published by Daedalus Games; when that company instead went out of business, Pramas acquired a license to publish his adventure, which became the second and final book published by Ronin Publishing.[1]: 369 

Wizards of the Coast

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Pramas accepted an offer of employment from Wizards of the Coast as an RPG designer in March 1998.[1]: 369  Pramas designed the wuxia-inspired Dragon Fist, a variation of Advanced Dungeons & Dragons that was released in 1999 as one of the first PDF releases from the company.[1]: 370  Pramas made contributions on several products for AD&D and co-wrote the PDF-only Dark•Matter adventure The Final Church (2000).[1]: 370  Wizards created a miniatures division and made Pramas the creative designer on the Chainmail Miniatures Game (2001).[1]: 370  Pramas created the "Sundered Empire" setting for Chainmail, which he intended to be a standalone setting but Wizards management wanted him to place the Sundered Empire in Greyhawk, so he made it into the subcontinent Western Oerik.[1]: 289 

Pramas' work for Dungeons & Dragons includes: Slavers (2000, with Sean K. Reynolds), Guide to Hell (1999), Apocalypse Stone (2000, with Jason Carl), Vortex of Madness (2000), as well as some work on the third edition Player's Handbook (2000) and Dungeon Master's Guide (2000).

Green Ronin

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Pramas founded Green Ronin Publishing in 2000 with his wife Nicole Lindroos, and by 2001 they had brought Hal Mangold on as a third member of the team to do freelance graphic layout for Green Ronin.[1]: 370  Wizards of the Coast laid off Pramas in March 2002.[1]: 371  Toren Atkinson of the band The Darkest of the Hillside Thickets arranged with Pramas to have Green Ronin publish his RPG Spaceship Zero (2002) based on one the albums by the band.[1]: 371  Pramas asked Steve Kenson to design a new d20-based superhero role-playing game for Green Ronin, which resulted in Mutants & Masterminds (2002).[1]: 371  Green Ronin was incorporated as an LLC in 2004, with Pramas, Lindroos, and Mangold as the three partners.[1]: 373  Pramas designed the second edition of Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay (2005) for Games Workshop.[1]: 51  Pramas wrote the sourcebook The Pirate's Guide to Freeport (2007) for Green Ronin, with Patrick O'Duffy and Robert J. Schwalb.[1]: 375  While continuing to lead Green Ronin Publishing, Pramas is a content designer for the Pirates of the Burning Sea massively multi-player online game at Flying Lab Software.[2] Pramas designed the simplified class-and-level system for the role-playin game Dragon Age: Set I (2009).[1]: 377 

Pramas also worked as the lead writer for Warhammer 40,000: Dark Millennium Online at Vigil Games.[citation needed]

Pramas was a notable guest at Trinoc*coN in 2005,[citation needed] and a guest of honour at Ropecon 2008 in Dipoli, Espoo, Finland.[citation needed] He has also been a guest of Pacificon in 2015,[citation needed] and OrcaCon in 2016.[citation needed]

In 2012, he appeared on two episodes of the web series TableTop running his Dragon Age roleplaying game for host Wil Wheaton and the show's guests.[3] Since 2012 he has also been one of the curators of an annual "Art of RPGs" art show featuring the work of artists whose work have appeared in role-playing games.[4][5]

Bibliography

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Books and games Pramas has written or contributed to include the following:[6]

Books

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Games

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  • Torches & Pitchforks: The Card Game of Monster Movie Mayhem (Green Ronin)
  • Magic the Gathering: Urza's Legacy (Wizards of the Coast)

Role Playing Games

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Dragon magazine articles

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  • Pramas, Chris. "Ahmut's Legion." Dragon #286. Renton, WA: Wizards of the Coast, 2001.
  • -----. "The Armies of Thalos." Dragon #287. Renton, WA: Wizards of the Coast, 2001.
  • -----. "The Children of Nassica." Dragon #295. Renton, WA: Wizards of the Coast, 2002.
  • -----. "Drazen's Horde." Dragon #292. Renton, WA: Wizards of the Coast, 2002.
  • -----. "The Ebon Glaive." Dragon #296. Renton, WA: Wizards of the Coast, 2002.
  • -----. "The Empire of Ravilla." Dragon #285. Renton, WA: Wizards of the Coast, 2001.
  • -----. "Exiles from the Vault." Dragon #298. Renton, WA: Wizards of the Coast, 2002.
  • -----. "The Free States." Dragon #293. Renton, WA: Wizards of the Coast, 2002.
  • -----. "The Gnolls of Naresh." Dragon #289. Renton, WA: Wizards of the Coast, 2001.
  • -----. "People's State of Mordengard." Dragon #291. Renton, WA: Wizards of the Coast, 2002.
  • -----. "The Sundered Empire: Soldiers of the Last Order." Dragon #315. Bellevue, WA: Paizo Publishing, January 2004.
  • -----. "Underground Scenarios." Dragon #294. Renton, WA: Wizards of the Coast, 2002.

Media mentions

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Chris Pramas has appeared in the following newspaper and magazine articles, websites and podcasts.

Podcasts

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  • Caustic Soda: Episodes "Hitler" (2011), and "Regicide, Part 2" (2013)[7]
  • RPG Countdown:[8] Chris appeared on these episodes: 22 April 2009[9] (Warriors & Warlocks), 1 July 2009[10] (Sigmar’s Heirs), 15 July 2009[11] (GM Pack and Toolkit).
  • TableTop: "Dragon Age", Parts 1 & 2 (Season 1, Episodes 19[12] & 20[13] (2013)
  • Titansgrave[citation needed]
  • Vigilance Press Podcast[14]

References

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  1. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q Shannon Appelcline (2011). Designers & Dragons. Mongoose Publishing. ISBN 978-1-907702-58-7.
  2. ^ a b Pramas, Chris (2007). "The Warlock of Firetop Mountain". In Lowder, James (ed.). Hobby Games: The 100 Best. Green Ronin Publishing. pp. 362–364. ISBN 978-1-932442-96-0.
  3. ^ "Dragon Age Pt. 1: Chris Hardwick, Kevin Sussman, and co. Join Wil! | Geek and Sundry". geekandsundry.com. Archived from the original on 24 March 2015. Retrieved 5 February 2022.
  4. ^ Art of RPGs 2012 show announcement
  5. ^ "Art of RPGs" show Curator's Statement by Pramas
  6. ^ Pramas, Chris (14 December 2015). "Publications List". Official website. Retrieved 2 February 2016.
  7. ^ Pramas appearances on Caustic Soda
  8. ^ "RPG Countdown". Archived from the original on March 7, 2009. RPG Countdown on Facebook.
  9. ^ "RPG Countdown". 22 April 2009. Archived from the original on 23 May 2009. Retrieved 22 April 2009.
  10. ^ "RPG Countdown". 1 July 2009. Archived from the original on September 22, 2009.
  11. ^ "RPG Countdown". 15 July 2009. Archived from the original on 28 July 2009. Retrieved 15 July 2009.
  12. ^ "Dragon Age, Part 1", TableTop, Season 1, Episode 19
  13. ^ "Dragon Age, Part 2", TableTop, Season 1, Episode 20
  14. ^ Vigilance Press Podcast, July 2015
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