Tracy Hickman

SueTracy Raye Hickman is an author and sometime LDS missionary, and one of the major talents responsible for D&D as we know it. He is a great-grandchild of no less than that Danite, Wild Bill; who had turned around and totally blasted that Salt Lake caliph in his Brigham's Avenging Angel autobiography. Despite his gurly first name Tracy ain't exactly a little bitch himself.

Hickman did his missionising in Indonesia. His best work has infused Islamic, Indian, and - yes - Mormon themes to varying degrees of success. Mostly success.

Hickman's credits alongside his wife Laura include the I3-5 Desert of Desolation [pseudo-]series, Indian-influenced Rahasia which became one of the best-received of the B series, and Ravenloft; with others especially Margaret Weis, Dragonlance. He also wrote or co-wrote (often with Weis) many of the novelisations, as well as the Death Gate cycle and more... so much more.

That said, Hickman has his ups and downs. His early adventures, in the I3-5 line and in Dragonlance, tended to railroad the PCs. He also wasn't above using his modules to do da'wa on behalf of LDS dogma (those tablets in DL1 *cringe*); and he was consistently a colossal moralfag. To this end Hickman every now and again returns to comment on this hobby. He bashed Monte Cook for the Book of Vile Darkness, claiming that it was giving air to the Satanic Panic. The complaint didn't go anywhere because vile darkness is for bad guys.

Hickman really dislikes "crossover" campaigns that cover multiple settings, and is on record as despising what Ravenloft has become because of this. Perhaps this paradox is nowhere better displayed than one of the most famous D&D villains of all time, the iconic Death Knight Lord Soth, whom he created in Dragonlance, hated when he came to Ravenloft to the point of having the death knight cameo in his novels almost specifically to fuck up continuity on that front, and ultimately killed off so no one could have him... but, you know, in a way that was still oddly consistent with Soth's character arc, so it could've hurt worse.

In sum, kind of a big deal.