François Marcela-Froideval

Who is François Marcela-Froideval?

François Marcela-Froideval is a French role-playing game, videogame and comic scenarist.

Froideval had a major influence on the introduction of role-playing games in France, mainly as editor in chief of the now-defunct Casus Belli role-playing magazine. During this time, he was one of the three authors who established the French term for a "munchkin", Gros Bill, from the nickname of an overly powergaming player once in Froideval's group.

He left for the United States in 1982 to join TSR, Inc., where he worked for four years. His writing contributions include several Advanced Dungeons & Dragons rules and monster manuals in collaboration with Gary Gygax, like Oriental Adventures. Back in France, he focused on translating and publishing TSR games until 1989.

He wrote the scenario of several French videogames, working for Infogrames and Cryo Interactive.

In 1989, he wrote the scenario of the first Black Moon Chronicles comic album with drawer Olivier Ledroit. He kept on writing the scenario until the end of the series in 2008.

Froideval dedicated the Black Moon Chronicles series to Gary Gygax in the last album End of Times through these words: