Skaff Elias

Skaff Elias
Born1968-1969 (aged 57)
EducationUniversity of Pennsylvania
Alma materSouthern Lehigh High School
OccupationGame designer

Skaff Elias (born 1968-1969) is an American game designer.

Career

Skaff Elias started working on Magic: The Gathering at Wizards of the Coast when the company was still fairly new.[1]: 287  He was one of the designers for various Magic sets, including Arabian Nights (December 1993),[2] Antiquities (March 1994),[3] Legends (June 1994),[3] Fallen Empires (November 1994),[4] and Ice Age (June 1995),[4] Mark Rosewater also credits Skaff Elias with the invention of the Magic Pro Tour.[5]

Elias was responsible for the design work on the Chainmail miniatures game.[1]: 289  Elias and Richard Garfield designed an MMORPG based on Dungeons & Dragons, which was never published because Hasbro sold the D&D computer game rights to Infogrames.[1]: 290 

He co-authored the D&D manual Miniatures Handbook (2003).

Elias and Garfield also worked on Mind Twist, a free-to-play strategy game from Mind Control Software.[6]

In 2022, Nerdlab Games published Mindbug, a dueling card game designed by Elias, Garfield, Christian Kudahl, and Marvin Hegen.

Personal life

Elias went to Southern Lehigh High School and was a members of its Scholastic Scrimmage team.[7] He attended Princeton University for an undergraduate degree in physics and completed a graduate degree in math at the University of Pennsylvania[8]

References

  1. ^ a b c Shannon Appelcline (2011). Designers & Dragons. Mongoose Publishing. ISBN 978-1-907702-58-7.
  2. ^ Elias, Skaff (9 August 2002). "Better Late Than Never". Wizards of the Coast. Archived from the original on January 13, 2009. Retrieved 2009-10-16.
  3. ^ a b Elias, Skaff (8 March 2002). "Legendary Difficulties". Wizards of the Coast. Archived from the original on January 14, 2009. Retrieved 26 February 2011.
  4. ^ a b Rosewater, Mark (9 February 2009). "Whatever Happened to Barry's Land?". Wizards of the Coast. Archived from the original on February 13, 2009. Retrieved 26 February 2011.
  5. ^ Rosewater, Mark (26 July 2004). "On Tour, Part 1". Wizards of the Coast. Archived from the original on October 19, 2008. Retrieved 11 January 2008.
  6. ^ "NameBright - Domain Expired". mind-control.com.
  7. ^ Lehigh Valley Scholastic Scrimmage - Southern Lehigh High School vs. Northern Lehigh High School (Video). WLVT-TV. January 22, 1987. 1 minutes in. The captain, back with us again, is Skaff Elias, a senior...
  8. ^ Hamilton, Madison (2016-05-01). "Skaff Elias: Game Designer and Consultant". Medium. Retrieved 2026-03-20.