Hello, all. My name is Zach Parker, and I am the new staff writer here at Privateer Press.

I started at the company last September and have been secreted away, furiously typing in the deepest, darkest dungeon of our office ever since. With my name attached to several recent and upcoming releases, I thought it time to introduce myself to the community.

Stories have been at the heart of my existence for a long time. At my most basic, I am a person who loves to read and write. I suppose that’s pretty much what you’d expect from someone who makes a living writing. Included below is a list of random facts about me. (No surprise, most of them involve books.)

Back in June I had the pleasure of meeting many of you at Lock & Load 2015. I was a first-time attendee, and the level of enthusiasm from players blew me away. Whether chatting with people in the registration line or carrying on discussions in the hangouts, I thoroughly enjoyed the experience. Throughout the weekend, one question cropped up more than any other: What have you written for Privateer Press?

My first writing project for the company was actually done as work for hire. My connection with Privateer Press started when I met Aeryn Rudel, former publications manager and now Skull Island eXpeditions author, on an online forum where we were both posting fiction. Several other staff members were also active on that forum, including Privateer’s lead writer and lorekeeper, Doug Seacat, and the editorial manager, Darla Kennerud. A couple of freelance contracts followed—if you have read WARMACHINE: Vengeance, you have already seen my contributions among the model entries. A year later I moved to Washington to fill the position of staff writer.

WARMACHINE: Reckoning was the first project I worked on in-house, contributing both model entries and a small portion of the fiction. Working on staff differed from working on contract in a few key ways. The biggest difference was I no longer worked in a vacuum. As a freelancer, you are largely on your own. In house, you are part of a team. Whether it’s a blog post or an epic story arc spanning several books, everything at Privateer Press is worked on by multiple people.

Another difference was the extent of the revision process. When I was working on Vengeance, I would have characterized this process as intense and thorough, but revisions for Reckoning took that to a whole different level. On contract, I had been exposed to just a small part of what is required to take a model from concept to complete on the page. We strive to hold ourselves to high standards, and sometimes model entries or fiction has to go through several iterations before they sound the way we want them to. Entire manuscripts may even need to be scrapped and started over from scratch. I do not exaggerate when I say it’s brutal—and I love it.

With Reckoning behind me, I have had no shortage of other assignments. There are many projects I wish I could talk about, but those details will come in due time. For now, you can find my No Quarter debut in issue #61 with articles on both Aleksandra Zerkova and the Efaarit Scouts. I also wrote the fiction for the third season of the Path of Devastation league, which is available for free on the Privateer Press website along with the first two parts. My largest contribution yet will come with the release of HORDES: Devastation, for which I did a significant portion of the writing (with considerable guidance from Doug). There will be death, but also new life. Beyond that, I’ve been sworn to secrecy.