Wizards of the Coast Layoffs Hit Dungeons & Dragons
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Over 1,100 Hasbro employees let go, including key members of the D&D game team
With just weeks left until the holidays, Hasbro CEO Chris Cocks recently announced that significant headcount reductions would be taking place across the company, including at Wizards of the Coast, publisher of both Dungeons & Dragons and Magic: The Gathering.
The move could have a significant impact on D&D going forward as the brand ramps up for a major year in 2024. Below we break out all the details about why the lay offs happened, who’s been affected so far and what happens next.
Why is Hasbro Laying Off So Many Employees?
The Hasbro’s lay offs – which are expected to impact 20% of their global workforce – come hot on the heels of financial struggles for the company over the last year, with soft revenue across their many toy lines and a major drop in revenue for their Consumer Products and Entertainment segment due to the Writers’ and Screen Actors’ Guild strikes.
In fact, Wizards of the Coast and Digital Games is the only category at Hasbro that has consistently performed well, according to their Q3 investor statement, with a 40% increase versus the previous year, thanks to several new digital products and licensing deal for the hit video game Baldur’s Gate III.
Despite this solid annual growth, Wizards of the Coast has still been hit with layoffs, with both the D&D and Magic: The Gathering teams being impacted as Habsro seeks to cut costs across the board.
Notably, this isn’t the first round of layoffs of the year, with Hasbro cutting over 1,000 jobs back in January 2023, representing almost 15% of their workforce at the time.
Who is Being Let Go from the D&D Team?
While the official list of D&D employees has not yet been announced, here are some of those impacted so far:
- Dixon Dubow: An Associate Influence Manager who was instrumental in managing some of the fallout from the OGL scandal and organizing the 2023 Creator Summit.
- Dan Dillon: A Game Designer who has been with the company since 2019 and worked on a number of products, including Tasha’s Cauldron of Everything, Fizban’s Treasury of the Dragons and Bigby Presents: Glory of the Giants.
- Bree Heiss: An Art Director who has been on the D&D team since 2013 and worked on a number of key projects during her tenure.
- Eytan Bernstein: A Senior Developmental Editor who has been with the company since 2022, but previously contributed to a number of core books for D&D 3.5 and 4th edition.
- Mike Mearls: A Director of Game Design for Magic: The Gathering at the time of the layoffs, Mearls is in fact one of the co-creators of D&D fifth edition and has been with the company since 2005.
- Amy Dallen: A Content Producer and video host who worked primarily on D&D Beyond and provided coverage on numerous products since starting with the company in 2022.
- Trystan Falcone: A Graphic designer who has been with the D&D team since 2019.
- Larry Frum: A Senior Communications Manager who handled PR outreach for D&D team since 2022.
- Chris Lindsay: A Product Manager who has been working with the D&D team for over 20 years, was instrumental in supporting the D&D Adventurer’s League, and most notably is the key creator of DMsGuild.
- Natalie Egan: A Product Manager who has been with Wizards of the Coast since 2020.
How Will the Layoffs Impact Upcoming D&D Products?
2024 will mark the 50th anniversary of Dungeons & Dragons, and a major milestone for the brand that will include an update to the fifth edition rules, along with a new Player’s Handbook, retooled Dungeon Master’s Guide and enhanced Monster Manual.
At this year’s PAX Unplugged, Wizards also announced a number of other new publications, including a historical non-fiction book entitled The Making of Original Dungeons & Dragons, a revamp of a classic 1982 Gary Gygax adventure with Descent into The Lost Caverns of Tsojcanth, a new adventure anthology entitled Quests from the Infinite Staircase, and a new campaign entitled Vecna: Eve of Ruin.
It’s not yet clear if these lay offs will impact any of the release dates of these or any other upcoming products.
Final Thoughts
Despite record sales over the past year, Wizards of the Coast’s reputation has taken a hit over the past year, thanks in larger part to their handling of the OGL scandal. This latest round of layoffs – while driven by their parent company Hasbro – likely isn’t going to help, especially with the cuts happening just a few weeks before the holidays.
We’ll be keeping a close eye on this new story and update this page as we learn more.
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Cameron Nichols is a Senior Editor who lives in Boston, Massachusetts, and has been playing D&D since the early 90s, when he was introduced by his older brother and cut his teeth on AD&D 2nd Edition. Since then he’s played virtually every RPG he could get his nerdy little mitts on (including a weird Goth phase in the early 2000s when he rocked Vampire: The Masquerade pretty hard). His favorite D&D campaign setting is the Forgotten Realms and his favorite character to play was a Half-Orc Barbarian named Grug (who was unfortunately devoured by a gelatinous cube).
