Michael A. Stackpole

{{short description|Science fiction author}} {{Infobox writer  | name = Michael A. Stackpole | image = Michael Stackpole by Gage Skidmore.jpg | caption = Stackpole at the 2017 Phoenix Comicon | birth_date = {{Birth date and age|1957|11|27|mf=yes}} | birth_place = Wausau, Wisconsin, U.S. | death_date = | death_place = | occupation = Writer, game designer | nationality = American | education = University of Vermont (BA) | period = 1977–present | genre = Role-playing games, video games, fantasy, science fiction novels | influences = }}

'''Michael Austin Stackpole''' (born November 27, 1957)<ref name="myspace">{{cite web | last = Stackpole | first = Michael | title = Michael Stackpole's Myspace Page | publisher = Myspace | url = http://www.myspace.com/talionrevenant | access-date = 5 December 2008 }}</ref> is an American science fiction and fantasy author best known for his ''Star Wars'' and ''BattleTech'' books. He was born in Wausau, Wisconsin, but raised in Vermont. He has a BA in history from the University of Vermont. From 1977 on, he worked as a designer of role-playing games for various gaming companies, and wrote dozens of magazine articles with limited distribution within the industry. He lives in Scottsdale, Arizona.

==Game design career== Michael Stackpole was hired full-time at Flying Buffalo after they accepted his submission for a solo ''Tunnels & Trolls'' adventure which was published in 1978 as ''City of Terrors''.<ref name="designers">{{Cite book|author=Shannon Appelcline|title=Designers & Dragons|publisher=Mongoose Publishing|year=2011| isbn= 978-1-907702-58-7}}</ref>{{rp|36}} He wrote columns on industry news and reviews for Flying Buffalo's magazine ''Sorcerer's Apprentice''.<ref name="designers"/>{{rp|36}} Stackpole worked for Coleco from 1980 to 1981 after Rick Loomis, Stackpole, and the president of Coleco met at a gaming and pinball convention.<ref name="designers"/>{{rp|36}} Stackpole designed the roleplaying game ''Mercenaries, Spies and Private Eyes'', which Flying Buffalo published in 1983.<ref name="designers"/>{{rp|38}} Stackpole left Flying Buffalo after the company's 1985 move to Scottsdale, Arizona.<ref name="designers"/>{{rp|39}} Stackpole, Ken St. Andre, and Liz Danforth designed the computer roleplaying game ''Wasteland'', published by Interplay in 1988.<ref name="designers"/>{{rp|39}} He later returned to work with his fellow creators of Wasteland as a writer on its sequel ''Wasteland 2'', released in 2014 by inXile Entertainment.<ref>{{cite web|title=Wasteland 2|work=Internet Movie Database|url=https://www.imdb.com/title/tt2321641/fullcredits}}</ref>

In response to the accusations of Patricia Pulling (among others) who felt that the "occult" elements of ''Dungeons & Dragons'' were driving people to suicide, Stackpole began to defend the game and the roleplaying game community.<ref name="designers"/>{{rp|22}} Stackpole published one of his first articles about the role-playing games misinformation from the media in ''Sorcerer's Apprentice'' #14 (Spring 1982) as an article titled "Devil Games? Nonsense!",<ref name="designers"/>{{rp|38}} and even debated the Western Regional Director of Pulling's BADD organization on a radio program broadcast on July 14, 1987.<ref name="designers"/>{{rp|22}} He compared BADD's statistics of suicides among role-playing gamers to the rate of general teen suicide and found the percentage of roleplayers committing suicide was actually lower than those who were not gamers, and published his argument in an article called "The Truth about Role-Playing Games" in the 1989 book ''Satanism in America''; he also published the document "The Pulling Report" in 1990, which further discredited Pulling's stand against roleplaying games.<ref name="designers"/>{{rp|22}}

In the 1980s, Stackpole began designing computer games for Coleco and then Interplay Productions. His work at Interplay included ''Bard's Tale III'', ''Wasteland'', ''Neuromancer'', ''Star Trek: 25th Anniversary'' and ''Star Trek: Judgment Rites''. He also created the role-playing game ''Mercenaries, Spies and Private Eyes'', which provided the game mechanics for ''Wasteland'', and wrote several solo adventures for the Tunnels & Trolls role-playing system, including "Dargon's Dungeon", "Overkill", "City of Terrors" and "Sewers of Oblivion".

Stackpole loaned his image to Decipher for the image of Corran Horn used in their ''Star Wars Customizable Card Game'' expansion "Reflections 2". Timothy Zahn did likewise for the character Talon Karrde. Stackpole teamed up with Decipher again, helping them write the background story to their ''WARS TCG'', including e-books and other writing tie-ins for the expanded universe.

In January, 2019 Stackpole resigned from the Board of Directors of GAMA (Game Manufacturer's Association), citing its inactivity and the poor handling of an incident involving GAMA President Stephen Brissaud.<ref>[https://techraptor.net/content/michael-stackpole-resigns-gama '''Tech Raptor''' - ''Michael A. Stackpole Resigns from GAMA, Slams Board of Directors'']</ref> He was one of the few remaining emeritus Directors (alongside Rick Loomis and Will Niebling).

==Writing career== [[File:Micheal A Stackpole at Dragon Con 2007.jpg|right|thumb|Michael A. Stackpole at Dragon Con 2007]] In 1986 Stackpole wrote his first novel, the fantasy story ''Talion: Revenant''. His editors believed that a 175,000 word book was too long for an unknown author and that the story wasn't particularly engaging. The story remained unpublished for the next 11 years until reworked by Stackpole's editor, Anne Lesley Groell. Stackpole clarifies these issues himself in the afterword of the published version of ''Talion.'' The manuscript was published in 1997 by Bantam Books.

Stackpole's first published novels were the Warrior trilogy for the ''BattleTech'' universe, published by FASA in 1988–1989.<ref name="designers"/>{{rp|122}} His "Blood of Kerensky" trilogy (1989–1991) were the last novels that FASA directly published; ''BattleTech: The Animated Series'' (1994) was set during the events of this trilogy.<ref name="designers"/>{{rp|124}} Stackpole also wrote a trilogy of novels published in 1992, which were based on the ''Dark Conspiracy'' roleplaying game by GDW.<ref name="designers"/>{{rp|60}}

Stackpole has found his greatest success in serial works that continue the characters and plot lines developed by other authors. In 1987 he began writing novels set in the BattleTech universe for FASA Corporation, some of which were used as the source for a television animated series. He was then selected to write several novels in the Star Wars universe for Bantam Books. He also wrote several comics based in the Star Wars universe for Dark Horse Comics. Initially these covered the period just before his ''X-Wing'' novels. Later, he also covered the marriage of Luke Skywalker and Mara Jade in the graphic novel ''Union'' and collaborated with Timothy Zahn on Mara Jade's early career. In the foreword to his book ''Outbound Flight'', Timothy Zahn thanks Stackpole and issues a challenge at ''Star Wars Trivial Pursuit''.

In addition, he has written several novels and short stories with original settings. One series is the ''DragonCrown War Cycle''. These books attempted to break fantasy conventions in order to stir reader interest, including the introduction of firearms in a fantasy setting. Reception of these books was fairly positive based on Amazon reviews, but reviews elsewhere were not as good.<ref>{{cite web|last1=Johnson|first1=Beth|title=The DragonCrown War Cycle: Fanboy fantasy at its very worst|url=http://www.fantasyliterature.com/reviews/the-dragoncrown-war-cycle/|website=FantasyLiterature.com}}</ref>

Stackpole contributed one of the four stories in Roger Zelazny's shared world anthology ''Forever After'', published by Baen Books in 1995. He was a contributor in the 1998 anthology ''Lord of the Fantastic'' commemorating Zelazny.

''The Age of Discovery'' trilogy is his latest complete series, with ''A New World'' released mid-2007. The trilogy is set in a fantasy world, with an attempt at an unconventional approach to magic and mastery.

''The Crown Colonies'' is a trilogy that re-imagines the events of the American Revolutionary War. The first book, ''At The Queen's Command'', was released in November 2010.

At New York Comic Con 2012, it was revealed that Blizzard Entertainment had approached Stackpole to write the next novel in their series based on the popular MMORPG, ''World of Warcraft''. The novel, titled ''Vol’jin: Shadows of the Horde'', centres around the chieftain of the Darkspear Trolls as his loyalty to the Horde is put to the ultimate test after an assassination attempt on his life. The novel was released in July 2013.

In 2023 he was elected Grandmaster of the International Association of Media Tie-In Writers, citing his contributions to "''Star Wars'', ''Battletech'', ''Dark Conspiracy'', and ''Warcraft'' universes."<ref name=S23>{{cite web|url=https://iamtw.org/the-scribe-awards/previous-scribe-award-winners/#2023|title=The Seventeenth Annual Scribe Awards (2023)|access-date=July 28, 2025}}</ref>

==''The Secrets''==

===Newsletter=== Stackpole also writes and publishes an online newsletter titled ''The Secrets'', which offers tips, tricks, and tidbits about fan fiction writing (focusing on, but not limited to, science fiction and fantasy). It is aimed towards the serious fan fiction writer and some casual writers, and includes information about getting books published..

Topics discussed in the newsletter range from how to beat writer's block to how to build a world, and even how to manage writing as a career.

''The Secrets'' newsletter requires a subscription, and issues are released every two weeks.

===Podcast=== ''The Secrets'' Newsletter has an "audio companion" in The Secrets Podcast. The first ten podcasts were based on material from the first ten issues of The Secrets newsletter. After the first series ended, the content of the podcast diverged from the newsletter. The podcasts average twenty-five minutes long and are voiced and produced by Stackpole.

The podcasts are free and require no subscription, but older episodes have been retired and are no longer available on the main archive.

Stackpole is also one of the main hosts on ''The Dragon Page Cover to Cover'', a book review and interview show dealing mainly with fantasy and sci fi publications, together with Michael R. Mennenga.

==Skepticism== Stackpole has been the executive director of the Phoenix Skeptics since 1988 and is listed as the contact for the group in the magazine ''Skeptical Inquirer''.

==Asteroid== An outer main-belt asteroid discovered March 23, 2001 by David B. Healy was named 165612 Stackpole.<ref>[http://ssd.jpl.nasa.gov/sbdb.cgi?sstr=165612 165612 Stackpole (2001 FP86)]. JPL Small-Body Database Browser. California Institute of Technology. Retrieved October 7, 2012.</ref>

==Novels==

===''DragonCrown War''=== Published by Bantam Books. *2000 ''The Dark Glory War'' *2001 ''Fortress Draconis'' *2002 ''When Dragons Rage'' *2003 ''The Grand Crusade''

===''Age of Discovery''=== Published by Bantam Books. *2005 ''A Secret Atlas'' *2006 ''Cartomancy'' *2007 ''The New World''

===''The Crown Colonies''=== Published by Night Shade Books. *2010 ''At The Queen's Command.'' *2011 ''Of Limited Loyalty.''<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.nightshadebooks.com/cart.php?m=product_detail&p=176 |title=Stackpole, Michael A. - Crown Colonies Book 2: Of Limited Loyalty |publisher=Night Shade Books |date=2006-08-28 |access-date=2012-07-31}}</ref>

===Homeland Security Services=== *2011 ''Perfectly Invisible'' (Stormwolf.com)

===World of Warcraft=== *2013 ''Vol'jin: Shadows of the Horde''

===BattleTech=== The BattleTech novels were originally published by FASA Corporation up until 1991. In that year, Penguin Group/Roc Books took over the line and also reprinted the earlier novels. The last print novel of the classic BattleTech setting was published in 2002; in the same year, the first novel for the Dark Age setting (set some 100 years after the classic setting) was published, written by Stackpole. His novels were typically "spine novels" that moved the setting ahead, narrating large-scale or otherwise important events with far-reaching consequences in the fictional timeline.

;Warrior Trilogy *1988 ''Warrior: En Garde'' (FASA, ROC reprint) *1988 ''Warrior: Riposte'' (FASA, ROC reprint) *1989 ''Warrior: Coupé'' (FASA, ROC reprint)

;Blood of Kerensky Trilogy *1989 ''Lethal Heritage'' (FASA, ROC reprint) *1990 ''Blood Legacy'' (FASA, ROC reprint) *1991 ''Lost Destiny'' (FASA, ROC reprint)

;Other BattleTech Spine Novels *1992 ''Natural Selection (novel)'' (ROC) *1993 ''Assumption of Risk'' (ROC) *1994 ''Bred For War'' (ROC) *1996 ''Malicious Intent'' (ROC) *1997 ''Grave Covenant'' (ROC) - Twilight of the Clans series #2 *1998 ''Prince of Havoc'' (ROC) - Twilight of the Clans series #7

;Mechwarrior - Dark Age setting *2002 ''Ghost War'' (ROC/WizKids) *2007 ''Masters of War'' (ROC/WizKids)

===Star Wars=== *1996 ''X-Wing: Rogue Squadron'' (Bantam Books) *1996 ''X-Wing: Wedge's Gamble'' (Bantam Books) *1996 ''X-Wing: The Krytos Trap'' (Bantam Books) *1997 ''X-Wing: The Bacta War'' (Bantam Books) *1998 ''I, Jedi'' (Bantam Books) *1999 ''X-Wing: Isard's Revenge'' (Bantam Books) *2000 ''The New Jedi Order - Dark Tide I: Onslaught'' (Del Rey Books) *2000 ''The New Jedi Order - Dark Tide II: Ruin'' (Del Rey Books)

===''Dark Conspiracy''=== Published by GDW. *1991 ''A Gathering Evil'' *1991 ''Evil Ascending'' *1992 ''Evil Triumphant''

===Others=== *1994 ''Once a Hero'' (Bantam Books) *1994 ''Dementia'' (Roc/Target) *1997 ''Talion: Revenant'' (Bantam Books) *1997 ''A Hero Born'' (HarperPrism) *1998 ''An Enemy Reborn'' (HarperPrism) *1998 ''Wolf and Raven'' (Roc/FASA) *1998 ''Eyes of Silver'' (Bantam Books) *2010 ''In Hero Years I'm Dead'' (Stormwolf.com) *2011 ''Conan the Barbarian'' (Berkley Books) *2014 ''The Crusader Road'' (Paizo Publishing)

==Other publications== *1982 Grimtooth's Traps Too (co-author) *1982 Citybook I: Butcher, Baker, Candlestick Maker (co-author) *1984 Citybook II: Port o' Call (co-author, co-editor) *1987 Citybook III: Deadly Nightside (co-author, editor) *1988 Lords of Darkness (co-author) *1989 [https://web.archive.org/web/20070630223913/http://www.featherlessbiped.com/6696/RPGSATAN/rpgsatan.htm ''Game Hysteria and the Truth''] *1990 [http://www.rpgstudies.net/stackpole/pulling_report.html ''The Pulling Report''] *1990 Citybook IV: On the Road (co-author, contributing editor) *1990 Sprawl Sites (co-author) *1991 (with co author Loren K. Wiseman) [https://archive.today/20070107004549/https://www.rpg.net/realm/critique/gama.html ''Questions and Answers about Role Playing Games''] Game Manufacturers Association (GAMA) *1991 Citybook V: Sideshow (co-author) *1994 GAMA News, ''Model Retailer'', March, 98–99 *1995 ACE Books, Superheroes (Edited by Lynne Varley) ''Peer Review'' *1995 Magic the Gathering: Tapestries (Edited by Kathy Ice), ''What's In A Name?'' *1996 Magic the Gathering: Distant Planes (Edited by Kathy Ice), ''Insufficient Evidence'' *2010 Steampunk'd (Edited by Jean Rabe and Martin H. Greenberg), ''Chance Corrigan and the Tick Tock King of the Nile'' *2012 Complete Kobold Guide to Game Design (co-author) *2012 The Kobold Guide to Worldbuilding (co-author) *2013 ''A Hero by Any Other Name'' (Short story anthology edited by Jean Rabe)

==References== {{Reflist}}

==External links== {{wikiquote}} *[http://www.stormwolf.com Personal Website] *[http://members.tripod.com/~limsk/pulling.htm The Pulling Report]: the result of Stackpole's research (see above) * [http://www.sffworld.com/interview/93p0.html Interview] at [http://www.sffworld.com SFFWorld.com] *[https://web.archive.org/web/20041206224844/http://warstcg.fanhq.com/Articles/Article.aspx?ID=438 Wars CCG Short Story collection online] *[http://pc.gamespy.com/articles/539/539635p1.html Interview with Mike Stackpole by GameSpy] *[https://web.archive.org/web/20050928151734/http://www.pen-paper.net/rpgdb.php?op=showcreator&creatorid=2192 Pen & Paper listing for Mike Stackpole] *[https://archive.today/20060518220847/http://www.sliceofscifi.com/archives/slice_of_sci-fi_023.html Interview with Michael Stackpole] on Slice of SciFi *[https://shouldwrite.blogspot.com/2005/09/show-4.html Interview with Michael A. Stackpole] on I Should Be Writing (audio) *{{ISFDB name|id=Michael_A._Stackpole|name=Michael A. Stackpole}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Stackpole, Michael}} Category:1957 births Category:20th-century American novelists Category:21st-century American novelists Category:American fantasy writers Category:American male novelists Category:American science fiction writers Category:American skeptics Category:American video game designers Category:Conan the Barbarian novelists Category:Interplay Entertainment people Category:Living people Category:People from Wausau, Wisconsin Category:Role-playing game designers Category:American video game writers Category:University of Vermont alumni Category:Writers from Vermont Category:Writers from Wisconsin Category:20th-century American male writers Category:21st-century American male writers