During Redguard's production, Kuhlmann and Kirkbride wrote the Pocket Guide to the Empire, 1st Edition to be shipped as a physical pamphlet with Redguard, and in doing so largely redesigned the basis of The Elder Scrolls lore. According to Kuhlmann, Kirkbride, Howard, and himself had devised the story and the game's puzzles over a few weeks. Kuhlmann and Kirkbride made a pitch to Todd Howard for a 'pirates-on-Mars' game on which Kuhlmann had already written 'scores of notes', eventually becoming Redguard with the trio as writers, while a separate team developed Battlespire.
He bonded with artist and writer Michael Kirkbride, who was hired on the same day that he was, over a shared interest in weird fiction. Kuhlmann joined Bethesda Softworks in 1996 near the end of Daggerfall's development as 'the most junior designer possible', and his work on the game included exclusive quests for the CompUSA Special Edition of the game.
