Jolly Randall Blackburn is best known as the creator of the

comic strip A comic strip is a sequence of drawings, often cartoons, arranged in interrelated panels to display brief humor or form a narrative, often serialized, with text in balloons and captions. Traditionally, throughout the 20th and into the 21st ...

Knights of the Dinner Table ''Knights of the Dinner Table'' (''KoDT'') is a comic book/strip created by Jolly R. Blackburn and published by Kenzer & Company. It primarily focuses on a group of role playing gamers and their actions at the gaming table, which often result in ...

''.

Biography

Jolly Blackburn went to Ball State University. Jolly Blackburn majored in anthropology, history, and classical cultures in college. Blackburn later joined the Army, and launched both the gaming magazine ''

Shadis ''Shadis'' is an independent gaming magazine that was published in 1990–1998 by Alderac Entertainment Group (AEG). It initially focused on role-playing games. Publication history Shadis was conceived and started by Jolly Blackburn as an indepen ...

'' and his company

Alderac Entertainment Group Alderac Entertainment Group, or AEG, is a publisher of role-playing game, board game, and collectible card game products. AEG was formed by Jolly Blackburn in 1993 and is based in the city of Ontario, California. Prior to getting into their cur ...

(named after his ''

AD&D In insurance, accidental death and dismemberment (AD&D) is a policy that pays benefits to the beneficiary if the cause of death is an accident. This is a limited form of life insurance which is generally less expensive, or in some cases is an add ...

'' campaign world) while still in the Army. The original ''Shadis'' was a black-and-white digest featured gaming articles largely written by Blackburn, and each issue featured several pieces of fiction collectively called the "Alderac Anthonology" which detailed Blackburn's world of Alderac (one of Alderac's moons was Shadis, from which the magazine borrowed its name). He conceived of having a comic strip that became ''

'' (''KoDT'') in 1990 as part of ''Shadis'': "I had been a great fan of J.D. Webster's ''

Finieous Fingers Finieous Fingers (often misspelled ''Fineous'' even in Dragon magazine's own FAQ) was among the earliest comics that appeared in '' Dragon'' magazine. Finieous Fingers, the title character and self-proclaimed "World's Greatest Thief", was a good ...

'' from the early ''

Dragon A dragon is a reptilian legendary creature that appears in the folklore of many cultures worldwide. Beliefs about dragons vary considerably through regions, but dragons in western cultures since the High Middle Ages have often been depicted as ...

Magazine'', and I wanted something similar. Unfortunately, I couldn't find anyone willing to do a strip. Finally I sat down and drew out a very crude cartoon showing a gamemaster and a player sitting around a table arguing over a rules call." Blackburn based the ''KoDT'' characters on friends and fellow players, and B.A. Felton on himself. Blackburn conceived the cartoon as just filler material, but when he replaced it with more professional strips in one issue of ''Shadis'' there was an outcry from fans. Blackburn was a sergeant in the army during Operation: Desert Storm. During the conflict Blackburn helped activate reservists for remedial training prior to deployment. The magazine, ''Shadis'', was not published for a year and a half, but Blackburn got back into the publishing business when he returned in 1992. Alderac published three issues of a ''KoDT'' comic book in 1994-1995: "I soon became aware that the demand for ''KoDT'' was much higher than I had ever realized. That got me thinking about doing it on a monthly schedule." Blackburn left Alderac in 1995 because he felt that he and his partners John Zinser and David Seay were looking for success in the CCG industry while he wanted to keep the company fun and small and focus on ''KoDT''. He formed a new company called KODT Enteractive Facktory to publish ''KoDT'' monthly. While working at ''Shadis'', Blackburn had made friends with employees of

Kenzer & Company Kenzer & Company (KenzerCo) is a Waukegan, Illinois based publisher of comic books, role-playing games, board games, card games, and miniature games. They are known for the '' Kingdoms of Kalamar'' campaign setting and for their own '' HackMa ...

: "We discovered that we had so much in common, I decided to come aboard and throw my intellectual properties in the kitty." Blackburn joined Kenzer in December 1996, and Kenzer published his comic book monthly beginning with a reprint of issue #4. The ''KoDT'' comic strip moved to ''Dragon'' in issue #226, becoming very popular. "Over the years I've often wondered just what it is that causes all the fuss... I'm the first to look at the typical strip and say, 'It's not ''all'' that!'" In 2001, Kenzer published the ''

HackMaster HackMaster is a fantasy role-playing game produced by Kenzer & Company. It began as a fictional game, a parody of ''Dungeons & Dragons'' played by the characters of the ''Knights of the Dinner Table'' comic strip by Jolly R. Blackburn. The ...

'' role-playing game, which was based on the fictional game played by the characters in the ''Knights of the Dinner Table'' comic strip.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Blackburn, Jolly American cartoonists Living people Year of birth missing (living people)