Eric "Shade" Jansing (1971-2012)

[BOZ]

Thank you verfy much for posting. I wish I had known him in the same sort of way, but we never got the chance to meet in person. It made me smile to read your rememberences of him. It's good to hear from someone who knew him personally.

 

[Echohawk]

Hi. You may or may not know me. I lurk here...a lot. I rarely post anymore.

Clefton, thank you very much for taking the time to post here. It means a lot to hear from someone so close to Eric. Like BOZ, your stories of time spent with him made me smile. Please make sure that his family knows that he has friends all over the world whose lives he touched and who also miss him greatly.

 

[freyar]

Clefton, thank you very much for taking the time to post here. It means a lot to hear from someone so close to Eric. Like BOZ, your stories of time spent with him made me smile. Please make sure that his family knows that he has friends all over the world whose lives he touched and who also miss him greatly.

I'll just repeat Echohawk's sentiments. Grief is somehow easier in a community, and means a lot to hear from someone close to Eric. I hope it is some small comfort to you, Eric's friends, and his family that there are others of us who are also mourning this loss.

 

[Clefton Twain]

His family has definitely been surprised to see the response here on ENWorld. ENWorld has always been a fantastic community. I tried several times to get Eric to come to Gencon and staff the ENWorld booth with me but, sadly, he never went. I am sure he would've had a blast.

It's funny because, for the longest time, I didn't even know he was involved in the creature conversion. See, he and I furiously coded 3e and 3.5 resources into HTML for our games. We got to the point where we never had to crack a book. His main focus was coding the monsters and mine was spells and magic items. So I never had to look at the monsters in the actual books or magazines.

It wasn't until quite a bit later that I discovered he was heavily active in this forum, had written articles for Dragon and, I think, S&S's Creature Collection II (again, I *think*). He was pretty modest that way.

--CT

 

[Echohawk]

It wasn't until quite a bit later that I discovered he was heavily active in this forum, had written articles for Dragon and, I think, S&S's Creature Collection II (again, I *think*). He was pretty modest that way.

According to his RPG Designer page here, he has quite a few credits for published RPG material:

Books:
- Relics & Rituals II: Lost Lore
- Creature Collection III: Savage Bestiary
- Strange Lands: Lost Tribes of the Scarred Lands
- Monster Geographica: Forest
- Monster Geographica: Marsh & Aquatic
- Monster Geographica: Hill & Mountain

Articles:
- Dragon 337 - Monsters of the Mind
- Dragon 347 - Princes of Elemental Evil: The Archomentals
- Dragon 347 - Paraelemental Paragons
- Dragon 353 - Class Acts: Arcane - Spells Without SR
- Dragon 354 - Class Acts: Arcane - Power Word, Spell
- Dragon 355 - Creature Catalog VI
- Dragon 356 - Ferrous Dragons: The Return of Heavy Metal Dragons
- Dragon 358 - Checkmate! Chess Made Deadly
- Dungeon 149 - Campaign Workbook: Wandering Monster - Black Willow

 

[Debby]

I am shocked to hear this sad news. While I rarely post here, I've been reading the monster entries for years. I learned so much from reading the entries and the process that was discussed. My condolences to his family and friends.

Debby

 

[BOZ]

Yep, and I worked with him on a good half of those things that Echohawk lists.

I tried several times to get Eric to come to Gencon and staff the ENWorld booth with me but, sadly, he never went. I am sure he would've had a blast.

I know I asked him a few times, because I go every year, and I wanted to meet him. Too bad he never could make it - I agree, we would have had a great time. If you're going this year let me know, maybe we can get together.

 

[Nookie]

Now that i think about it My earliest memory of shade was back when i rocked my old Clifford handle (before it got Phished) the homebrew forums were still going strong and the march movie monster meyhem was a big deal to me at the time. I remember requesting a Adamantine dragon conversion and I kept getting bounced back between the Epic monsters threads and the dragon threads for a little bit. Anyway sorry to ramble just thought i would share my first memory of shade.

I cant say that me and shade were friends, more like passing casual forum acquaintances. Still, we would sometimes contribute to the same conversion threads and i never thought much whenever I would see his Shadow Dragon avatar and i always took it for granted. Now when i see all the little creatures lurking around its muddying my day a little knowing i wont see any shadow dragons lurking about.

As BOZ said Shade had a good life. I don't know him in hardly any capacity other than the forums but i don't know anyone who wants people to be sad about their passing so i wont be. I just Hope Shade is having a blast rolling some d20's with Gary and David.

My best wishes to his family.

There is a link for Best wishes here on facebook.

 

[RavinRay]

Oh My God.

I just read freyar's PM here in the hotel restaurant where I had given a talk for a seminar. It's because of my increased office travels that I haven't been as active at the CC lately, and wish I had the chance to participate one last time while Shade was still here. My flight back home is less than two hours away, and I'll use the flight to think of Eric and the fun monster conversion threads he started that I joined. As I'm up there above the clouds, I'll imagine his spirit is soaring the skies too.

RIP Eric aka Shade. You will be sorely missed.

 

[Clefton Twain]

I am unfortunately not able to go this year. It's been a couple of years since I've been so I am probably due for a visit next year. We'll see how it goes. I would very much enjoy hanging out with BOZ and anyone else available. ENWorlders are always a fantastic time.

A couple of things you may not know about Eric:

a) The "Friends and Family" Facebook page is about the only way you could ever get him onto Facebook.

b) His name, "Shade", was first used (with me around, anyway) when we played Baldur's Gate together. Shade had a nasty habit of being eaten by bears. I don't know what it was, but it was always him, and always a bear.

c) From his childhood, he had a very old boardgame--"Krull" (yes, from the movie). We laughed about it incessantly for years until, one night, in the midst of gaming, we unearthed the game and played it. We still have yet to figure out the real rules.

--CT