2026 Guests of Honour

Bill Benham started playing Dungeons & Dragons as a kid and knew he would make games one day. “One Day” was the summer of 2018 when he joined the Wizards of the Coast as a producer for D&D. Before joining Wizards, Bill served 20 years in the Army, earned a master’s in healthcare administration, and was a clinic manager in the public sector. Besides work, he fills his days finding new games, searching for new places to eat in Seattle, WA, and watching horror movies with his loyal French bulldog, Kizzy.

Chris is the designer of Lanterns: The Harvest Festival, My Little Pony: Festival of Lanterns & (the criminally underrated) Spell Smashers. He's also proud to be the adopted designer & developer of the My Little Pony: Deck-building Game. Yes, he's a brony. Yes, he's proud of it. Yes, Trixie is best pony. No, he cannot be swayed to believe otherwise. He's often open to playing all kinds of Euro games (even the slightly crunchier ones, *if* you have the patience to explain the rules. *hint hint*). You can probably find him celebrating (or lamenting) the Blue Jays' World Series victory (or defeat), or he's (constantly) lamenting the Maple Leafs. 

Greg Leatherman lives in Minneapolis, Mn and is a indie game designer and podcaster. He’s played over 35 TTRPGs on his actual play podcast, Very Random Encounters, and talks about table top game experiences on Game Mechanics podcast. He enjoys making games that fill his current pop culture obsessions. You can find his games, Glitter Hearts and Domeskai Tamers through Japanime games, The Mystery Business through Indie Press Revolutions, which is all linked on his website, Leatherman.games.

Gwendolyn Marshall is an independent author and game designer, working on products that challenge and supplement D&D, like her ENnie Winning best seller, Ancestry & Culture: An Alternative to Race in 5e, and dozens of other titles. She also develops indie games using OSR and PbtA systems and principles, to explore queer identity, chosen family, and classic adventuring themes. Apart from gaming, she is a professor of philosophy working on metaphysics and mind in 17th C. Europe, with a focus on women authors. She’s also a bi trans woman into games, SF/F, coffee, & punk, and a mom of two teen boys.

Joe Slack is a board game designer, publisher, instructor, and the author of the #1 international best-selling book, The Board Game Designer's Guide, along with 4 other books on game design. He has taught Game Design and Development at Wilfrid Laurier University and runs the Board Game Design Course, an online course for new game designers. Joe has 9 published games, including 4 successful Kickstarter campaigns.

Reed Mascola is a Toronto-based board game designer and cat dad. He has two of his designs published: CATNIP Auction House from Tin Robot Games and Vigilante (self-publish). This year, he is aiming to release Dracula is Dead from Lime Green Games, and Rûnebeasts: Deckbuilding Game (self-publish).