Explore jobs
Find specific jobs
Explore careers
Explore professions
Best companies
Explore companies
Wizards of the Coast history
Wizards of the Coast company history timeline
Wizards of the Coast was founded in 1990 by Peter Adkison, a systems analyst at Boeing.
According to Peter it'd sold 2500 copies within six months, not great for a core rulebook in 1990, but not bad for a newcomer's first product.
Wizards of the What?: Starting, 1991
In 1991, Wizards of the Coast was busy printing roleplaying games and supplements, and operated out of Peter Adkison’s basement.
The Primal Order was released early in 1992.
By the end of 1992 Wizards of the Coast was being sued by Palladium for use of their game system in The Primal Order.
Wizards of the Coast published Magic: The Gathering, and since its release in 1993, the game had grown by leaps and bounds, leaving Wizards flush with cash.
Magic: The Gathering’s history as a global phenomenon started in 1993 at the Origins Game Fair in Dallas, TX. It was an instant success—players bought up the full stock of what had been believed to be a year’s supply of cards, and a reprint had to be ordered immediately.
Shares of Garfield Games purchased in 1993 for $5 were worth well more than $1000, which is what they call in the investing world "a damned fine IRR."
They also purchased Ars Magica from White Wolf in January, 1994.
Due to the success of Magic, Garfield, whose influences included Lewis Carroll and J. R. R. Tolkien, was able to quit teaching and pursue his true passion of game design, coming on board with WotC full-time in June 1994.
Ironically they'd expressed some interest in Wizards of the Coast way back in 1994, at the Nurnberg Toy Fair, but they hadn't been interested in paying the couple of million dollars that Wizards would have cost them at the time.
In December 1995 Peter announced that Wizards was dropping their entire roleplaying line:
In 1995, Garfield created a card game called The Great Dalmuti, which was WotC's first game to be distributed through retail channels.
Then in 1995 Wizards released Jonathan Tweet's Everway, an entirely innovative RPG design.
In 1996, in the middle of this CCG-oriented time period, Wizards also purchased Andon Unlimited, which gave them control of the Origins convention.
By the end of 1996 they were over $30 million in debt.
Corporate Shuffle, a card game based on the United Features Syndicate Dilbert comic strip by Scott Adams, was released in May 1997.
On the other hand, Wizards of the Coast was granted a patent on August 2, 1997 for many basic CCG techniques.
Not content with just one acquisition, WotC also purchased Five Rings Publishing Group Inc. in 1997, best known for its Legends of the Five Rings trading card game, the Star Trek: The Next Generation collectible dice game, and the Dune: Eye of the Storm trading card game.
By 1997, TSR was bleeding to death.
WotC started 1998 with a bang, releasing four games (Twitch, Pivot, AlphaBlitz, and Go Wild!) in February.
Also in 1998, TSR released Alternity, a science fiction role-playing game which furnishes rules for all science fiction, from contemporary Earth settings to far-future space epics.
Ultimately Peter Adkison himself resigned from the company he created, as he announced in another letter to the Internet, this one posted on December 14, 2000:
The third edition of Dungeons & Dragons was released in 2000.
In 2001 they published a new edition of their Oriental Adventures setting book, but now it was based in the Legend of the Five Rings world of Rokugan.
Though Magic had shown up on computer screens before with a few casual video games, it truly entered the digital age in 2002 with the release of Magic Online.
In 2003 Wizards of the Coast released version 3.5 of their Dungeons & Dragons (and thus d20) system.
Rate Wizards of the Coast's efforts to communicate its history to employees.
Wizards of the Coast jobs
Do you work at Wizards of the Coast?
Does Wizards of the Coast communicate its history to new hires?
Wizards of the Coast competitors
| Company name | Founded date | Revenue | Employee size | Job openings |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Fantasy Flight Games | 1995 | $7.5M | 64 | - |
| Privateer Press | 2000 | $5.7M | 50 | - |
| Paizo | 2002 | $12.0M | 125 | - |
| Media Production | - | $7.3M | 61 | 1 |
| ProQuest | 1938 | $590.0M | 1,502 | 36 |
| IgnitionOne | 2004 | $150.0M | 375 | - |
| iostudio | 1997 | $36,000 | 5 | 11 |
| Swiftpage | 2001 | $19.0M | 350 | - |
| Gray Television | 1897 | $2.4B | 8,018 | 403 |
| FriendFinder Networks / Careers | 1996 | $314.4M | 200 | - |
Wizards of the Coast history FAQs
Zippia gives an in-depth look into the details of Wizards of the Coast, including salaries, political affiliations, employee data, and more, in order to inform job seekers about Wizards of the Coast. The employee data is based on information from people who have self-reported their past or current employments at Wizards of the Coast. The data on this page is also based on data sources collected from public and open data sources on the Internet and other locations, as well as proprietary data we licensed from other companies. Sources of data may include, but are not limited to, the BLS, company filings, estimates based on those filings, H1B filings, and other public and private datasets. While we have made attempts to ensure that the information displayed are correct, Zippia is not responsible for any errors or omissions or for the results obtained from the use of this information. None of the information on this page has been provided or approved by Wizards of the Coast. The data presented on this page does not represent the view of Wizards of the Coast and its employees or that of Zippia.
Wizards of the Coast may also be known as or be related to Wizards Of The Coast, Wizards of The Coast LLC, Wizards of the Coast and Wizards of the Coast LLC.