Scott Palter

Daniel Scott Palter (died February 17, 2020) was a game designer who worked primarily on wargames and role-playing games. He joined the New York State Bar before working at his family's company, Bucci Imports, an importer of Italian shoes and accessories.

In 1986, Palter was able to acquire the license from Columbia Pictures to produce an RPG based on the popular film Ghostbusters. WEG's game designers created a new rules system for Ghostbusters: A Frightfully Cheerful Roleplaying Game that used only six-sided dice rather than the polyhedral dice favored by other role-playing game companies. WEG would use this D6 System for many of their licensed products.

In January 1987, again using funds from Bucci Imports, WEG was able to purchase the games license for Star Wars, and immediately published Star Wars: The Roleplaying Game. That same week, Palter confirmed plans to file for a Chapter 11 reorganization of the company's finances. As a result, LucasFilm pulled their Star Wars license, selling it to rival Wizards of the Coast. Former WEG designers Costikyan and Goldberg took Palter to court over ownership of Paranoia, and in 2000, the courts ruled that the license should revert to Costikyan and Goldberg. Yeti purchased West End's remaining intellectual property and trademarks, as well as licensing contracts for Indiana Jones, Star Wars and Xena, and brought in Palter in to manage them. Palter announced that D6 Legends would be publishing a third edition of Paranoia and a Bug Sector supplement, but these were never released. Palter was able to acquire the role-playing game license to DC Comics and D6 Legends was able to publish the DC Universe Roleplaying Game (1999). Humanoids announced a "West End Games House Systems" license, and their first licensee was Palter; he soon put out a mecha game called Psibertroopers (2002).

Novelist In 2017, although suffering from recurring bouts of serious illness, Palter used Final Sword Productions to publish his alternate history novel, The Reich Without Hitler: The Falcons of Malta, set in a world where in June 1940, Hitler dies accidentally while returning to Berlin after signing the Armistice with France at Compiègne. The following year, Palter published a science fiction novel, Dead Night of Space: The Hybrid Crew (2018). His final novel, Reich without Hitler: Deaths on the Nile (2019), was a sequel to his first book. Palter was writing the third novel in his Reich without Hitler series when he fell ill and died on February 17, 2020.