Meet the Starfinder Team

Since Starfinder Second Edition is preparing for launch, now’s a great time to meet the people behind the game!

Jenny Jarzabski
Creative Manager

Hi! I’m Jenny, Starfinder’s Creative Manager, which means I’m the captain of this starship. I’m one part creative director, leading the creative vision for Starfinder as a game and brand; one part manager, coordinating the efforts of the badass crew of designers and developers who call ourselves the StarFriends; and one part developer, concepting, creating, outlining, and writing content for Starfinder, plus upgrading work done by talented freelance contributors. 

I’ve written a ton of adventures for various tabletop games over the years, and I’ve contributed to many Paizo books, but we’re not here to tally my credits. I’m really proud of my latest long-form adventures, A Cosmic Birthday and Murder in Metal City, and I can’t wait for you to get a taste of my (our!) setting work in Galaxy Guide. You can reach me at jenny.jarzabski@paizo.com. 

But now it’s time to introduce you to the fantastic team helping me bring the galaxy of Desna’s Path to life.

Jessica Catalan
Senior Developer

Hello everyone! I’m Jessica Catalan (she/her), senior developer on the Starfinder Team and head of the Starfinder Society. This month we’re releasing the final Starfinder Society Scenario for first edition, and in a few short months, we’re launching a brand-new program for Starfinder Society second edition! I hope you join us as we bring first edition to a close and embark on this exciting new adventure into the future!

In addition to working at Paizo full time, I’m a frequent freelance author for the Pathfinder and Starfinder RPGs, with over 50 writing credits for Paizo, and many more for other companies and games.

I’m Metis and I live in wonderful Winnipeg, Canada. I spend my free time with my family: my husband, daughter, son, and pet rabbit. I love to play TTRPGs, TCGs, and board games, collect far too many sets of dice, and read. (Yes, of course I’ll read all those books on the shelf one day, and yes, I definitely need more…).

You can find me on most social media and Discords as d20diaries. If you’re interested in writing a Starfinder Society Scenario, reach out to me at jessica.catalan@paizo.com.

All the best, folks! Take care of each other out there.

Mike Kimmel
Senior Developer

Hello! I’m Mike Kimmel (he/him), Senior Developer for Starfinder Second Edition. You may recognize me from my prior work as an Organized Play Line Developer for Pathfinder Society, from my freelance contributions to Pathfinder and Starfinder, or as the founder of the Freelance Forge forum community. I’m a proud father, former educator, and author of many adventures. Since joining the Starfinder team in 2023, I’ve been hard at work on our core rulebooks, creating playtest adventures, items, classes, spells, new rules, lots of aliens, and all the other things a science-fantasy game might need. I’ve also taken the lead on some exciting adventure content that we’ve got planned for the new edition. I’m sure you’re already looking forward to the release of our premium box set module, Murder in Metal City, as well as our Free RPG Day adventure, Battle for Nova Rush—I know I am. If possible, I’m even more excited about the other adventures I’m working on, but I’m not allowed to say much on that front yet. We’ll have to keep it a secret… for now.

Dustin Knight
Designer

Greetings Starfinders! I’m Dustin Knight, Starfinder designer! I’ve always wanted to be a tabletop game designer, so being able to announce that I’m now officially one is literally a dream come true! That said, in the process of becoming one I’ve learned the only real requisite is designing a game, so I do fervently implore anyone reading this who wants to pursue the same career path to start writing now! Wait, let’s read the rest of the blog first! Then make some tea. Then go write.

My career really took off with Organized Play. You may have played my first game, Wayfinder Origins, a repeatable scenario that opens with a boat. Or Sundered Waves, a repeatable scenario that opens with a boat. I’m still writing the occasional adventure, like Wheel of Monsters, a repeatable scenario that opens with a boat. But my specialty and focus lie in player-facing mechanics like ancestries, backgrounds, and classes. I love the back and forth conversation between mechanics and lore in a class and level driven game that both inspires and develops multifaceted characters and adventures to create these immersive moments between friends where we play out these fantastic stories. Please feel free to tell me about your characters and the incredible moments, because those memories are worth more than anything I can graph out in excel.

Outside of work I’m often described as exactly the kind of nerd you’d expect with my job title. I spend my free time sorting tens of thousands of Magic cards into grossly organized binders. I play TCGs online using official apps and Discord. I watch at least five or six new anime a season, on top of trying to tackle my ever-growing watch list. And I love to cook, with my favorite dish still being okonomiyaki. My world travels and conventions have been on hiatus for the past five years, but I’m looking forward to hanging out virtually with everyone during PaizoCon and Gen Con. I’m in an ongoing Starfinder campaign and working to restart my personal Pathfinder campaign. And realizing with each sentence I’m inching closer and closer to talking about Paizo again!

You can catch me on any number of social media platforms as Dustin Knight or kitsunewarlock, including Discord and Bluesky. You can also email me at dustin.knight@paizo.com. Thank you all for continuing to play our game, and I wish you all love and peace.

And last but not least, allow me to introduce our newest StarFriend!

Aras Yazgan
Designer

Hello everyone! I’m Aras Yazgan, a Turkish-American game designer by vocation, computer engineer by training, artist by dedication, and forever GM by choice. Gosh, there’s an awful lot of you reading this, huh…? I think I might have page fright! I haven’t had the chance to publish much of anything thus far, but I’ve been working on little else other than TTRPG design for the last two years. My training arc is over and I’m ready to show off the results!

It’s difficult to express how excited I am to be working with the incredible Starfinder team. We’ve got some tantalizing projects in the pipeline that I can’t wait to get my mitts on…!

You can find my art on Cara @Sketching101. You can reach me at aras.yazgan@paizo.com!

From all of us, thanks again for playing Starfinder. We can’t wait to hear about all your adventures in spaaaaaaaaace!

–The Starfinder Team

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