d4: Tabletop Creative Conference is a two-day virtual event celebrating the design, development, discussion and discovery of tabletop games.
Fertessa Allyse
Fertessa Allyse is an Atlanta native now doing her game designing in Seattle. She is the recipient of the 2020 New Heroes Scholarship. She has three games signed: Book of Villainy (Goldseal Games), Wicked & Wise (Weird Giraffe Games) and co-designed Mansplaining with Mondo Davis (Breaking Games). She currently works as a Game Producer with Funko Games, and is excited to literally eat, sleep, and breathe games for a living.
Paula Deming
Paula Deming is an actor and the creator of the board game comedy series Things Get Dicey, contributor to the youtube channel Watch It Played, a regular cast member of the board game comedy panel show podcast This Game Is Broken and streams board games at twitch.tv/GenConTV and twitch.tv/PaulaDeming.
Tanya DePass
Tanya DePass is the founder and Director of I Need Diverse Games, a not-for-profit organization based in Chicago, which is dedicated to better diversification of all aspects of gaming. I Need Diverse Games serves the community by supporting marginalized developers, attendance at the Game Developer Conference by participating in the GDC Scholarship program, helps assist attendance at other industry events, and is seeking partnership with organizations and initiatives. Tanya is a lifelong Chicagoan who loves everything about gaming, #INeedDiverseGames spawn point, and wants to make the industry better and more inclusive for everyone. She’s part of the Rivals of Waterdeep live play stream on twitch.tv/rivalsofwaterdeep, a partnered Twitch variety broadcaster; and often speaks on issues of diversity, feminism, race, intersectionality & other topics at conventions.
She’s also contributed to publications at Green Ronin, Paizo and Monte Cook Games and is the co-developer for the Fifth Season RPG based on N.K. Jemisin’s three time Hugo award winning Broken Earth trilogy. She’s the creator and Creative Director of Into the Mother Lands, a Twitch supported RPG and Actual Play stream, airing weekly on her channel, twitch.tv/cypheroftyr. Additionally, she is a Senior Annenberg labs Civic Media Fellow at USC. She’s also the creator and Creative Director of Into the Mother Lands, a new sci fi afro-futurist RPG developed with a team of all POC and Black creators; live streamed on her twitch channel, /cypheroftyr.
She was also named part of The Game Awards Future Class 2020, a diverse group of builders, thinkers and dreamers whose voices elevate and diversify our artform. It recognizes individuals around the world who represent the bright, bold and inclusive future for video games. She was also named as one of Gamers of the Year 2020 by Kotaku along with three of her contemporaries. She was also invited to the Xbox MVP program in February 2021.
Tanya is the programming & diversity coordinator for OrcaCon and GaymerX. She also serves on the Board of Directors for OrcaCon and Take This. She often speaks on issues of diversity, feminism, race, intersectionality & other topics at conventions. Her writing about games and games critique appears in Uncanny Magazine, Polygon, Wiscon Chronicles, Vice Gaming, Paste Games, Mic, and other publications. She’s the editor of Game Devs and Others: Tales from the Margins (2018, CRC Press) and contributed to The Advanced Game Narrative Toolbox. (2019, CRC Press)
Gabe Hicks
Gabe Hicks is a game designer for digital and tabletop. Currently, he works as Game Designer and Creative Producer at Roll20. He created the CMM (an alternative character creation tool for 5e focused on class narrative), has worked with Paizo, Critical Role, MageHandPress, and Grim & Perilous Studios. Leading a group called Mythic Grove, he focuses on highlighting smaller creators to give them a platform and opportunity through streaming, design, writing, or other creative mediums with the projects that Mythic Grove creates. "Let's put more magic into the world, together."
Becca Scott
Becca Scott is an actor and the creator of the tabletop and TTRPG youtube channel Good Time Society, host of How to Play for Geek & Sundry, plays Tatyana on the official D&D liveplay The Black Dice Society, is a contributor for Magic: The Gathering, and streams video games at twitch.tv/geekandsundry and twitch.tv/thebeccascott.
B. Dave Walters
B. Dave Walters is a Storyteller & proud Scoundrel American. He is best known as the writer and co-creator of Electropunk, Dungeons & Dragons: A Darkened Wish for IDW comics, and creator and DM of the Darkened Wish streaming show for Wizards of the Coast, and DM of the Black Dice Society. He plays Baron Victor Temple on Vampire the Masquerade: LA by Night, Freely on Heroes of the Planes, and Marcid the Typhoon on Pirates of Leviathan.
This project was made possible with support from California Humanities, a non-profit partner of the National Endowment for the Humanities. Visit www.calhum.org.