. The company was named after a guild of wizards in a
D&D campaign Adkison was playing. The company published RPGs such as the third edition of
Talislanta and its own product
The Primal Order (1992). but
Palladium Books sued WotC for using references to Palladium's game and system. The suit was settled in 1993. In 1991,
Richard Garfield approached WotC with the idea for a new board game called
RoboRally but Adkison rejected it because the game would have been too expensive to produce. Adkison asked Garfield if he could invent a game that was portable and quick-playing, and Garfield agreed. Adkison set up a new corporation called Garfield Games to develop Garfield's
collectible card game concept into
Magic: The Gathering. The new company sheltered the game from the legal battle with Palladium. Garfield Games then licensed the production and sale rights to WotC until the court case was settled, at which point Garfield Games was shut down. WotC debuted
Magic: The Gathering in July 1993 at
Origins Game Fair in
Dallas. and the
Origins Awards for Best Fantasy or Science Fiction Board Game of 1993 and Best Graphic Presentation of a Board Game of 1993. In 1994, WotC began an association with The Beanstalk Group, a brand-licensing agency and consultancy, to license the brand
Magic: The Gathering. After the success of
Magic: The Gathering, in 1994, WotC published
RoboRally, which won the 1994 Origins Awards for Best Fantasy or Science Fiction Board Game and Best Graphic Presentation of a Board Game. Also in 1994, WotC also expanded its RPG line by buying
SLA Industries from
Nightfall Games and
Ars Magica from
White Wolf. In August 1995, WotC released
Everway before closing its RPG product line four months later. In 1995, Wizards' annual sales passed US$65 million.
Acquisition of TSR and Pokémon Trading Card Game , founder of Wizards of the Coast, at
Gen Con Indy 2007 Wizards of the Coast announced the purchase of
TSR, the publisher of
Dungeons & Dragons, on April 10, 1997. The company acquired TSR and
Five Rings Publishing Group for $25 million. As part of the transition, TSR employees were given the opportunity to relocate from Wisconsin to the
West Coast. Between 1997 and 1999, the company discontinued several TSR campaign settings, including
Planescape,
Dark Sun, and
Spelljammer, to focus the business on the more profitable
Greyhawk and
Forgotten Realms lines. In mid 1997, WotC revisited the concept of a third edition of
Dungeons & Dragons, having first discussed it soon after the purchase of TSR. WotC released the third edition of
Dungeons & Dragons in 2000 with the
d20 System. The company released these properties under the
Open Game License, which allows other companies to make use of those systems. In 2002, WotC sponsored a design contest for which designers could submit proposals to produce a new campaign world to the company. WotC selected "
Eberron", which game designer
Keith Baker submitted, and its first campaign book was released in June 2004. In 2003, WotC released version 3.5 of
Dungeons & Dragons and the d20 system.
Pokémon TCG On August 2, 1997, Wizards of the Coast was granted on collectible card games. Some sports card series were discontinued in 1999 because so many printers were producing
Pokémon cards. WotC continued to publish the game until 2003. One of
Nintendo's affiliates
The Pokémon Company (formerly Pokémon USA) began producing a new edition for the game one day after the last of its agreements with Wizards expired on September 30, 2003. The following day, WotC filed suit against Nintendo, accusing it of "abandoning a contract with Wizards, the longtime producer and distributor of Pokémon trading-card games, and using Wizards-patented methods and technology to manufacture the games itself". The companies resolved the legal action in December 2003 without going to court.
Retail stores After the company's success in 1999 with
Pokémon, The company's gaming center in Seattle was closed in March 2001. The stores were closed in early 2004.
Avalon Hill, which Hasbro had purchased in mid-1998, was made a division of WotC in late 1999. In November 1999, WotC announced
Gen Con would leave Milwaukee after the 2002 convention. Also in November, Vince Caluori became President of WotC. On January 1, 2001, Peter Adkison resigned from WotC. Between 2001 and 2002, Hasbro sold
Origins Game Fair to
Game Manufacturers Association (GAMA),
2000–2010 In 2000, Wizards of the Coast introduced the
Open Game License (OGL), which allowed the production of a wide range of unofficial commercial
derivative works based on the
mechanics of
Dungeons and Dragons; it is credited with increasing the market share of d20 products and leading to a "boom in the RPG industry in the early 2000s". Chuck Huebner became president and CEO of Wizards of the Coast in June 2002. In 2003, the company employed 850 people. Throughout the early 2000s, WotC won multiple
Origins Awards, including: 2001
Best Role-Playing Game Supplement (
Forgotten Realms Campaign Setting) and the
Best Game Related Novel (
Clan War 7th Scroll: The Lion); 2002
Best Role-Playing Adventure (
City of the Spider Queen); 2005
Collectible Card Game or Expansion of the Year (
Ravnica: City of Guilds expansion for
Magic: The Gathering) and ''Gamer's Choice Best Historical Game of the Year
(Axis and Allies Collectible Miniatures Game
), and the 2006 Miniature or Miniatures Line of the Year
(Colossal Red Dragon''). It also won the 2002 Gold
Ennie Award for "Best Publisher" and the 2006 Silver Ennie Award for "Fan's Choice for Best Publisher". In 2002, Wizards of the Coast's periodicals department was spun off; WotC outsourced its magazines by licensing
Dungeon,
Dragon,
Polyhedron, and
Amazing Stories to
Paizo Publishing. The license expired in September 2007 and WotC began publishing the magazines online. In 2003, WotC released
Dungeons & Dragons miniatures; collectible, painted, plastic miniature games. In 2004, the company added a licensed
Star Wars line. In April 2004, Loren Greenwood succeeded Huebner as the subsidiary's president. Also in 2004, Avalon Hill became a subsidiary of WotC. The lawsuit said Rutter publicly posted confidential prototypes of upcoming
Magic: The Gathering card sets to the MTG Salvation forums, The lawsuit was settled out of court, according to
Mark Rosewater. On June 6, 2008, Wizards released the fourth edition of
Dungeons & Dragons, and began introducing fourth-edition online content in
Dragon and
Dungeon magazines. Throughout the 2000s, WotC released new editions of
Magic: The Gathering. In 2009, WotC announced a new edition called
Magic 2010, which coincided with the first major rules change to
Magic since the
Revised Edition was released in 1994. By 2008, the company employed over 300 people and went through a restructuring. On April 6, 2009, WotC suspended all sales of its products for the
Dungeons & Dragons games in PDF format from places such as
OneBookShelf, and its online storefronts RPGNow and
DriveThruRPG. The company launched a lawsuit against eight people to prevent future copyright infringement of its books, including fourth-edition
Dungeons & Dragons products that were sold through these places, and all older editions PDFs of the game.
2010–2020 In 2012,
Ethan Gilsdorf writing for
The New York Times reported sales of
Dungeons & Dragons products had slumped. That year, WotC announced a public playtest to develop a new edition of
Dungeons & Dragons called
D&D Next. The 5th edition of
Dungeons & Dragons was released on July 15, 2014, with the
Dungeons & Dragons Starter Set. In 2014, 126,870 units of the
Dungeons & Dragons Starter Set were sold, and in 2018, 306,670 units of the product were sold. Throughout the 2010s, WotC and its products continued to earn awards. This included multiple 2015
Origins Awards, such as:
Role-Playing Game Fan Favorite (
Dungeon & Dragons: Players Handbook),
Role-Playing Supplement Fan Favorite (
Dungeon & Dragons: Monster Manual), and
Collectible Card Game (
Magic the Gathering:
Khans of Tarkir). WotC won the 2015 Gold
Ennie Award for "Fan's Choice for Best Publisher" and won the 2017 Gold Ennie Awards for "Fan's Choice for Best Publisher". In 2014,
20th Century Fox acquired the screen rights to
Magic: The Gathering to produce a movie series with
Simon Kinberg attached to the project. Also in 2014, WotC filed a lawsuit against
Cryptozoic Entertainment and Hex Entertainment alleging their online card game
Hex: Shards of Fate was a clone of
Magic: The Gathering. The three companies agreed to a settlement the following year. In 2015, it was reported an estimated 20 million people played
Magic: The Gathering and that the game had tournaments, a professional league, and a weekly organized game program called
Friday Night Magic. Since the release of the 5th edition, WotC has published more than twenty
Dungeon & Dragons books, including new
rulebooks, campaign guides and adventure modules. According to
The Seattle Times, 2017 had "the most number of players in its history". Writing for
Bloomberg,
Mary Pilon reported sales of the 5th edition of
Dungeon & Dragons rose 41 percent in 2017 compared to the year before, and in 2018 rose another 52 percent. Pilon also said in 2017, nine million people watched others play
D&D on the video-sharing platform
Twitch. In 2016, Chris Cocks replaced Greg Leeds as president of WotC. Giaco Furino writing for
Vice reported high tensions over deadlines at the company. In 2019, WotC became a member of the
Entertainment Software Association. In April 2019, WotC announced the appointment of gaming-industry veteran
James Ohlen as the head of its new studio in
Austin, Texas; in January 2020 the new studio was revealed to be
Archetype Entertainment. In June 2019, internet-streaming service
Netflix announced WoTC would work with
Anthony and Joe Russo to create an animated series based on the mythology of
Magic: The Gathering. The Russo brothers were
executive producers on the series, with writers
Henry Gilroy and
Jose Molina as
showrunners, and
Bardel Entertainment worked on animation. In July 2019, Joe Deaux reported in
Bloomberg: "
Magic is part of the [Hasbro's] 'franchise brands', a segment that accounted for $2.45 billion in net revenue for the company last year". Brett Andress, an analyst at
KeyBanc Capital Markets, predicted
Magic: The Gathering Arena would boost earnings by at least 20 percent.
Dungeons & Dragons virtual play increased by 86 percent during 2020, due to the
COVID-19 pandemic. This provoked a backlash; multiple open letters that criticized the company for its treatment of
people of color, and documenting issues Black and Brown community members had taken with the company's actions were published.
The New York Times,
Polygon, and
Kotaku reported following this criticism, WotC banned seven
Magic: The Gathering cards that were deemed racially offensive from tournament-sanctioned play. The
D&D team announced it would be changing portions of its fifth-edition product line that fans had criticized for being insensitive, such as racist portrayals of a fictional people known as the
Vistani, and races
characterized as monstrous and evil. The company also announced plans to change character creation to broaden the range of character types and adding a sensitivity disclaimer to some legacy products that include cultures inspired by Asia,
Mesoamerica, and the Middle East.
The Washington Post reported the tabletop community has widely approved of these changes, although
Wired criticized some of the change attempts as often feeling "like lip service". During its 2021 Investor Event, Hasbro announced the company would be reorganized into three divisions: Consumer Products, Entertainment, and Wizards & Digital. Also in 2021, WotC opened a new video-game studio, whose first project was a high-budget game based on the
G.I. Joe franchise. In 2022, Chris Cocks became CEO of Hasbro and Cynthia Williams replaced him as president of Wizards & Digital. In June 2022, Hasbro defeated a board challenge from
activist investor Alta Fox Capital Management LLC., a
hedge fund company that owned a 2.5 percent stake in Hasbro and had wanted to spin out WotC into a separate company to create what it saw as "more value by making a second publicly traded company with a more profitable line of business". In July 2022, WotC announced it was establishing another new video-game studio called Skeleton Key, which would focus on
AAA games and would be headed by Christian Dailey, formerly of
BioWare. In April 2022, Hasbro acquired the digital toolset and game companion
D&D Beyond from
Fandom, and transferred control to WotC the following month. At the Hasbro Investor Event in October 2022, it was announced Dan Rawson, former chief operating officer (COO) of
Microsoft Dynamics 365 was appointed to the newly created position of Senior Vice President for the
Dungeons & Dragons brand to act as head of the franchise. According to
Dicebreaker, Rawson's role was "part of Wizards' plans to apply more resources to the digital side of D&D" following Hasbro's purchase of D&D Beyond. In 2022,
The Gamer and
Kotaku reported on the increased product-release schedule for
Magic: The Gathering;
The Gamer said the increased number of preview seasons for the game was leading to exhaustion within the community and had "drained the well of enthusiasm dry".
Vice commented there was "a growing divide in the
Magic: The Gathering community between the casual players and the collectors" because "some rich collectors have turned the cards into a kind of commodities market", In November 2022,
CNBC reported: "Bank of America downgraded the stock of Wizard of the Coast's owner, Hasbro"; analyst Jason Haas stated changes to the
Magic: The Gathering brand "amount to Hasbro 'killing its golden goose and that the "primary concern" is the overproduction of "
Magic cards which has propped up Hasbro's recent results but is destroying the long-term value of the brand". Between November and December 2022, there was speculation based on unconfirmed leaks saying WotC was planning to discontinue the OGL for
Dungeons & Dragons. Following a WotC response to the speculation, Codega said: "every single licensed publisher will be affected by the new agreement ... The main takeaway from the leaked OGL 1.1 draft document is that WotC is keeping power close at hand." Following this leak, numerous news-and-industry-focused outlets reported on negative reactions from fans and professional content creators.
TheStreet said WotC's main competitors quickly moved away from the OGL in the time it took WotC to settle on a response. Both
Kobold Press and
MCDM Productions announced upcoming new open tabletop RPG systems.
Paizo announced a new
Open RPG Creative License (ORC), a system-agnostic license, and other publishers joined the development of this new license.
TheStreet also said WotC had united its player base against it; both
TheStreet Io9 also reported WotC's internal messaging on the response to the leak was this was a fan overreaction. Both
Io9 and
ComicBook.com called the major concessions by WotC a "huge victory" for the
Dungeons & Dragons community. Also in January 2023, WotC canceled at least five unnamed video-game projects; an internal project code-named Jabberwocky, and two games that were in the early development stages. Jason Schreier writing for
Bloomberg News said fewer than 15 people at WotC would lose their jobs but "the reorganization will land hard for several independent studios such as Boston-based OtherSide Entertainment and Bellevue, Washington-based
Hidden Path Entertainment, both of which were working on games for Wizards of the Coast". In April 2023, WotC sent private detectives from the
Pinkerton agency to the house of a
Magic: The Gathering YouTuber, who said the agents demanded he destroy cards from an unreleased set he had been accidentally sent, and to remove videos from his channel, otherwise he and his wife would face a $200,000 fine and imprisonment. WotC's action was widely condemned and criticized, and the game's players subsequently initiated a boycott in response. In December 2023,
TechCrunch reported that paperwork Hasbro filed with the SEC contained information announcing layoffs of 1,100 employees (20 percent of their entire workforce across all divisions) effective immediately. A wide range of WotC employees were laid off; Chase Carter of
Dicebreaker commented: "past successes and future plans could not save Wizards of the Coast's workers from the hungry maw of corporate line-item reduction, and the full extent of this culling remains to be seen". In March 2024, Wizards of the Coast stopped
localizing Magic: The Gathering and
Dungeons & Dragons for
Portuguese. The company received a
vampetaço in retaliation. Cynthia Williams resigned at the end of April 2024 and was replaced that summer by
John Hight, who left his long-time role at
Blizzard Entertainment to take the job. The 3D
virtual tabletop (VTT)
Dungeons & Dragons simulator
Sigil launched as part of D&D Beyond in March 2025. Later that month, approximately 90% of the development team were laid off by WotC; in an internal communication, Hasbro Direct senior vice president Dan Rawson stated "our aspirations for
Sigil as a large, standalone game with a distinct monetization path will not be realized". Following the release of core rulebooks for the
2024 revision of
Dungeons & Dragons, Creative Director
Chris Perkins and Game Director
Jeremy Crawford announced their departures from the company in April 2025. Christian Hoffer, for
Screen Rant, highlighted that both "have been part of the
Dungeons & Dragons design team for decades and were two of the lead designers of"
Dungeons & Dragons 5th Edition. == Studios ==