The guest speakers are listed in order of attendance of the MerpCon events.

Professor Chris Seeman

Chris Seeman was running games set in JRR Tolkien's world long before Iron Crown Enterprises (ICE) began producing the Middle-earth Role-playing (MERP) series.

In 1992 he established Other Hands: The International Journal of Middle-earth Gaming, which he published on a quarterly basis until 2001. He has edited and contributed to several of ICE's MERP modules, as well as some of the more recent Lord of the Rings RPG products by Decipher. He has also been co-editor and author for The Guild Companion eZine and many content submissions there. He manages The Tolkien Music List www.tolkien-music.com. Chris holds a Ph.D. in Near Eastern Religions from the University of California at Berkeley.

He was/is also co-editor and co-author of a number of ICE modules in the 1990's and and in the 2000's for Decipher's LOTR RPG, including:

MERP

• Kin-strife (1995)
• Southern Gondor: The Land (1996)
• Southern Gondor: The People (1996)
• The Northern Waste (1997)
• Hands of the Healer (1997)

• Fell Beasts and Wondrous Magic (2003)
• Moria (2003)

Michael M. Martinez

Michael Martinez is the author of:

• Visualizing Middle-earth
• Parma Endorion: Essays on Middle-earth, 3rd Edition.
• Understanding Middle-earth, published by Vivisphere in 2003.

"Recognized around the world as one of the leading authorities on the works of J.R.R. Tolkien, Michael Martinez has shared his knowledge and insights on Middle-earth with other fans in the online world for many years. His books and essays have been translated into Polish, Spanish, Italian, Hungarian, Greek, Hebrew, Portuguese, and Finnish. But though he is best known for his research into Tolkien's chief literary creation, this versatile author has garnered respect and acknowledgement in more than one field.

Most of Michael's early professional career was devoted to the family of Business Basic programming languages which were developed for mini-computers in the late 1960s and early 1970s, and then ported to UNIX and PC operating systems in the 1980s. A former employee of Basis International, one of the leading vendors of Business Basic, Michael has written numerous technical papers and articles on programming techniques and methodologies. He has worked as a consultant, IT manager, programmer, and teacher for many companies.

You can view a list of his works and contributing works at http://www.michael-martinez.com/articles-and-essays.html "

Doctor Thomas Morwinsky

Dr. Morwinsky is author of a number of Middle-earth role playing gaming adventures and magazine contributions to Other Hands magazine. He is also the designer of several wonderful large-scale, highly detailed maps set in Tolkien's imaginary universe, including the most detailed large-scale map of J.R.R. Tolkien's Númenor ever made.

In the “real world” Dr. Morwinsky is an entomologist for the German Government. He will be flying in all the way from Germany just for the chance to speak at this event on Saturday, July 28th at 6:00 pm Pacific Time.

Dr. Morwinsky was born in 1967. He graduated with a PhD in entomology in 2002. He has been working for the German government's armed forces as the government's entomologist since 2003. He has been married since 2004. He first began role-playing in Middle-earth in 1987. He was a GM (Game Master) for MERP/RM (Middle-earth Role Playing / Role Master) in Middle-earth from 1988 to around 1999. He contributed more than half a dozen works to the the Middle-earth role playing gaming magazine Other Hands, from 1999 to 2001. His contributions to OH included:

“Númenor” map

Dr. Thomas Morwinsky will be flying in all the way from Germany just to speak at the MerpCon III event. He is flying in Friday, arriving late Friday night (July 27th). He will be at the convention all day Saturday (July 28th), speaking at 6:00 pm to 7:00 pm. Then catching his return flight to Germany early Sunday (July 29th) morning.

Joe Mandala

Joe Mandala will be a guest speaker at MerpCon III.
Joe has been involved in Middle-earth gaming since the early 1990s when ICE revised MERP for its full second edition.  Shortly thereafter, he was selected to pen the mighty tome Races and Cultures of Middle-earth for RMSS, but sadly it was never to be published as ICE lost the license to Middle-earth before project completion.  Pieces of that (incomplete) work can be found here and there on the internet, having found homes where they could.  Joe began gaming in Middle-earth sometime in the mid-1980s, and has been doing so ever since (with a break now and then).

Joe makes his living currently working with law enforcement agencies on criminal intelligence systems in a project management role.  His largest current project involves an inter-jurisdictional statewide Intel system for the state of Kansas that will also interface with national and federal agencies.

Joe was born in 1972.  He studied Classical Antiquity at the University of Kansas and has served in the US Army (albeit briefly).  He was married in 1996, and has four children with his wife Jill.  He lives in northeast Kansas on a small 10-acre farm, and would love nothing better than to be a gentleman farmer, or possibly a Hobbit.

Joe's contributions to the Middle-earth gaming community are humble, and include:

•   Early articles written for Grey Worlds, ICQ (Iron Crown Quarterly), and other  small-circulation magazines

•    Secondary editing and vetting for 2nd-edition MERP source material
•    The Mysterious Manuscript for R&C:M-e
•    A vast body of editing work for The Guild Companion
•    Editing and article vetting for Other Hands
•    Content vetting for source material on Decipher's LotR RPG
•    Maps of Middle-earth: Cities and Strongholds for Decipher's LotR RPG

In addition, Joe has made an attempt to write several literary essays on
Tolkien's work, some of which have accidentally stumbled into print and
happily gone unnoticed enough to avoid critique.

Cason Snow

Cason Snow is a librarian for Northern Illinois University in DeKalb,
Illinois. 

He has been cataloging for their Rare Books and Special Collections for almost six years, and of course, especially enjoys their sci fi/fantasy collection.

A life long gamer and devote of Tolkien, he has been incredibly fortunate to be able to combine these interests into his professional career.

His main field of research is in tabletop roleplaying and how it can be integrated into the public and academic library.

Cason is speaking at MerpCon III in the final Sunday night session. He plans to discuss how everyone can use the tie-in of Tolkien and role playing gaming to encourage libraries and other facilities to allow role playing games to be available to the public in their collections.

Hawke Robinson

 

Hawke has been role playing since 1979 and a regular Game Master since 1984. He has role played with dozens of game systems in countless campaign worlds, but his favorite setting is in Middle-earth using various game systems since 1984. He has been an RPGA (Role Playing Gamers Association) member since 1984 and he created and ran two annual RPGA conventions in 1985 and 1986 in Utah when only 15 & 16 years old. He created a BBS (Bulletin Board Service) supporting role playing gaming, and Tolkien fans in 1994.

Hawke took over what is now the merp@merp.com email list from Mario M. Butter (silent-tower.org) in the late 1990's. He founded Merp.com ( http://www.merp.com ) in the 1990's before handing it over to be run by the international volunteer community. He has created a series of rulebooks known as Eä d20 ( http://www.ead20.com ), adapting D&D 3.5 (Dungeons & Dragons) rules for play in Middle-earth. He has founded the Numenor Project ( http://www.numenorproject.com ). He is the founder and organizer of MerpCon ( http://www.merpcon.org ). He is founder and co-editor of the new quarterly publication MerpCon ( http://www.merpcon.org ). He is founder and co-editor of the new quarterly publication Other Minds Magazine ( http://www.othermindszine.org ) dedicated to role playing gaming in J.R.R. Tolkien's Middle-earth. He has published a number of essays on J.R.R. Tolkien specifically, and on Role Playing Gaming in general.

In the "real world" Hawke is a retired computer scientist ( http://www.hawkenterprising.com and http://www.dev2devportal.com ), information security specialist & analyst, Radio DJ ( http://www.thesyntheticzenshow.com ) and talk show host ( http://www.techtalkhawke.com ), who is married and raising their three sons. He is also a huge open source advocate and activist. Meanwhile he is volunteering & studying as a Recreation and Music Therapist working with special needs children. He has been learning ASL (American Sign Language) since 2006, and has founded the Spokane ASL study groups website ( http://www.spokaneasl.com ). He is organizing the first Deaf Role Playing Gaming Group in the Inland Northwest (Washington/Idaho) Spokane area, and he is working on a 10+ year research project on "The Therapeutic Aspects of Role Playing Gaming"
( http://www.rpgresearch.com ).

Hawke also has several projects about to be published including:

• "Escape From Numenor" adventure module ( http://www.numenorproject.com )
  
• "Ea d20 Races and Cultures" Open D20 rulebook for Dungeons & Dragons role playing gaming ( http://www.ead20.com )
  
• "Under Umbar" adventure module. ( http://www.numenorproject.com )
• "First Contact" adventure campaign

Additionally he is working on trying to develop the "truest but playable" Tolkien RPG system known as Ea RPGS ( http://www.earpg.com ).




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