Welcome to Studded Plate!

This blog will primarily cover two of my favorite things: role-playing games and LEGO toys--and frequently, both at the same time. In fact, the title of this blog, "Studded Plate," is taken from a trio of articles that I wrote a few years back for Matt Timmons' Big Blue Die website. In those columns, I discussed my own use of LEGO minifigures in place of traditional RPG miniatures, with suggestions for players looking to adopt the same idea. With Matt's permission, I'll be republishing those articles here soon. One of my goals in establishing this blog is to continue that series, and expand into related topics.

My love for LEGO bricks dates back to the first set I ever received, at age 5 (almost 40 years ago). I've been an avid collector ever since, with most of my collection consisting of the Castle, Star Wars, Harry Potter, Ninjas, Pirates, Lord of the Rings, Chima, and Creator themes, and above all, minifigures of all kinds. From 2012-2013, I worked at the South Shore LEGO Store in Braintree, MA, a position that I only very reluctantly left when my family relocated to Kentucky. I miss those days of getting paid for selling my favorite brand of toy, and receiving a significant employee discount when buying them for myself!

I've been playing and GMing RPGs for over 30 years. Most of that experience has focused on D&D and the d20 System, but I've also played and/or run long campaigns in GURPS, BESM, Earthdawn, Buffy/Angel, and other games. I've published a handful of articles in Pyramid and d20 Weekly, but most of my published writing credits belong to Green Ronin's Freeport: The City of Adventure product line. That work started with updating the Freeport Trilogy for the v.3.5 rules set, a project I landed based on my well-received fan errata for the setting. Since then I have proofread and edited other titles for the company, and written and co-written web supplements for Cults of Freeport and Buccaneers of Freeport.

In a way, I'll be coming full circle when I migrate my fan errata archive to GoogleSites over the next several months. The new site will include errata pages I've compiled for new acquisitions from the past year or two, as well as long-needed updates to earlier commentaries. I will be sure to post about that project's progress in this blog.

I will also be sharing news about my current RPG campaigns from time to time. I am currently running a Freeport game using Pathfinder (which now has a GoogleSites page, which I'll share in a future post). I am also developing a homebrew setting for my next Pathfinder campaign, which will begin sometime next year.

I hope you enjoy my blog, and I welcome feedback from my readers. If you have any suggestions for topics you would like to see me cover, please let me know!

--Tim