"Too bad, make it work": Unionizing staff describe crunch culture and creative oppression within Wizards of the Coast
UWOTC-CWA members are confident in their ability to organize their workforce, even without voluntary recognition.
‘Disappointed, but not surprised’ is how workers reacted to Wizards of the Coast (WotC) refusal to voluntarily recognize two new unions. Creative staff within the Dungeons & Dragons and Studio X (Magic: The Gathering and Duel Masters) teams gave the tabletop publisher until October 13 to embrace an extension of United Wizards of the Coast - CWA’s representation. Now, they prepare for the month-long waiting period before an election will decide their fate
Rascal spoke to Vanessa Hoskins, a producer for D&D, and Stella Sherwin, a game designer on Duel Masters, both of whom have been involved with the effort for “a long time,” likely at least two years. The pair expressed a resolute confidence in the workers’ potential, seeing as both teams hold a supermajority of card-carrying staff (which number approximately 100 for D&D and easily twice that for Studio X). But they also outlined a stressful, crunch-prone work culture and several existential threats — historic layoffs, encroaching generative AI, and an oppressive inventor clause — that hamstrings the passion and dedication behind two of tabletop’s biggest games.
The day that the union sent their letters of intent to management was characterized by “a lot of positive energy,” according to Sherwin. UWOTC waited until the teams felt prepared “both in terms of having a supermajority of support amongst our potential union members, as well as feeling fully prepared to have a pro union campaign that we could that we could work on, knowing that it was possible that management would not recognize our union, and it would go to an official legal vote,” Hoskins explained.
Yesterday, Wizards informed us that it doesn’t intend to voluntarily recognize the D&D or Studio X units of our union ahead of a vote. We remain committed to creating a workplace focused on wellness, transparency, and collaboration by winning our coming election.
— United Wizards of the Coast - CWA (@uwotc-official.bsky.social) October 14, 2026 at 4:01 PM
That worry was well-founded. The publisher not only refused to recognize UWOTC when it was first established within the Magic Arena team, but also forced a long (and sometimes arduous) NLRB vote in order to ratify the worker’s organization. During that time, businesses can deploy union avoidant playbooks (or outright union busting) via propaganda, closed-door meetings, and general fearmongering about added costs or lost benefits.
But that hasn’t stopped the team’s positivity. “The excitement felt electric,” Hoskins said. “Everyone was anticipating this huge outcry of public support, which we received and are grateful for. With the Studio X and the D&D folks going together, we felt that we had a lot of public and cultural cachet. And we still feel optimistic despite management declining to voluntarily recognize us.” Sherwin drew strength from the inter-team support alongside guidance from Communication Workers of America, while still holding out hope for a change of heart at the corporate level. “We're ready to win that election if that's what it comes to. And at any point between now and then, the company can still change its mind and choose to voluntarily recognize us.”
Hoskins explained that management’s immediate response to the public letters was a nondescript acknowledgement of their intent, nothing more than a read receipt. “While they attempted to sound neutral in saying things like, ‘We respect your right to organize your labor,’ they did tell people ‘you could go talk to your manager if you want.’ And they've held several Q&A sessions for people that just want more information, which sounds an awful lot like an opportunity to have a closed door meeting with potential union supporters and convince them not to.”
The new union organizers believe they’ve learned what to expect by watching WotC and Hasbro’s reactions the first time around. “We have anticipated several different types of union avoidance tactics that management might employ, and we think that we have prepared our workers to identify when those tactics are happening, versus genuine conversation about what is going to happen and and how things are going to proceed,” Hoskins explained. “We're ready for whatever disinformation or argument they are ready to make..” At the end of the day, both Hoskins and Sherwin agree that the workers within D&D and Studio X “are already pretty well informed.”
Sherwin remained grateful to the Magic Arena team for leading the charge to unionize WotC’s creative workforce. “We're hugely appreciative of all the support we've seen from our coworkers over there in helping us understand and navigate the same challenges that they've already overcome. I'm really glad that we get to work together. That's what it's all about: solidarity.” Hoskins agreed: “Seeing them be successful in their union vote and having accomplished as much as they have, I think [it] was really inspiring to myself and many of our workers that we too could be successful.”
Support D&D and MtG workers UNIONIZING!! 💪 Sign the petition by Oct 13 to add your voice to the demands so Wizards can see that the community supports their employees being compensated fairly and protecting against AI: actionnetwork.org/forms/uwotcp...
— Ginny Di (@ginnydi.com) October 8, 2026 at 11:56 PM
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Too many promises, too little control
Working at a subsidiary of Hasbro means balancing a dedication to delivering the best possible game for players against the constant worry that, according to Sherwin, “we're just gonna wake up and be out of work one day.” Hasbro’s well documented history of cutting jobs around the end of the year, just before the holidays, put layoff protections high on both bargaining unit’s list of priorities.
“When I look at layoff protections, I think of it as the positive in that I love my job,” Hoskins said. “I love making D&D, and I don't want to stop doing my job because someone wants a ratio on a balance sheet to look better when they make their annual stock report. I want to keep making a game that I feel passionate about and that I love. I don't want to have to keep looking over my shoulder and wondering if I'm still going to have this job next month because of the whims of the C-Suite. I want to retire working on D&D.”
Hoskins said she cannot reconcile WotC’s continuously record-breaking profits against excuses from managers that the company lacks the resources to improve working conditions. “There's still not enough money to pay for various things, whether that be more headcount for a team, better healthcare options, parental support… Almost all of the things on our list lead back to requests that we've made of management and heard them say, No, there's nothing we can do about it. We're sorry. Often those decisions are tied to there being no money, while we continue to make record breaking revenue year over year.”
Chase Carter
Hoskins also admitted that, despite strict internal rules against the use of generative AI, workers remain concerned about corporate policy. When they raise these worries to team leads and managers, “a lot of the time the answer we hear is, ‘we're not gonna do that, but we don't really have that much control over it.’ If we can get in a union contract that we're not going to use generative AI for things that creative humans should be doing, that will give all of the leverage we need to ensure that the policies we have in place today continue for the next decade.”
Studio X staff are focused on bridging the pay discrepancy between Duel Masters designers compared to those working on MTG, especially when those people have the same job titles. “Other union contracts have provisions for pay transparency and equity across the same job titles. I would like to see us do the same here at Wizards,” Sherwin said. “That pay discrepancy isn't a winning strategy to attract and retain top talent for Duel Masters, Magic, or any of our games.”
The inclusion of “inventor clauses” in WotC work contracts caused a brief stir amongst players and fans when UWOTC published the latest union letters. Effectively, Hasbro can claim ownership of creative works made by employees during their off hours. And while it doesn’t seem that the company has directly enforced this clause, Hoskins explained that its mere existence “has put a stranglehold on our creatives who don't feel like their free time is their own.” This isn’t something that is unique to Hasbro; Disney has famously included similar clauses in their contracts for decades. But existing as a ‘semi-standard’ across creative industries doesn’t make it right.
Hoskins was very passionate about this issue, explaining its overbearing effect. “Any side projects that [employees] want to do, to continue keeping their creativity alive, to explore other mediums, all have to go through an internal process that requires approval all the way up to vice president levels. The end result is that our creatives can do very little outside their job as long as it has anything to do with any sort of business that Hasbro engages in, which means no toys, no games, no roleplaying games.” She continued, saying that “even writing is very limited. If the theme is too close to something we do — for example, if I wanted to write a short story in a fantasy genre, well that's really close to D&D. Now, you have to prove that it's fantasy that isn't anything like D&D in order to get it approved. And if you don't get it approved, then Hasbro owns whatever you made by default.”
Lin Codega
This feels like an impossible standard. D&D is, itself, an amalgam of genres, influences, and inspirations, and has soaked up fantasy culture like a sponge across its fifty years of existence. Technically, a vampire gothic could be considered close to D&D if someone thought the main villain cleaved too close to Strahd von Zarovich. “It is extremely challenging for our current creatives who are only allowed to be creative in one specific way that benefits the company,” Hoskins said.
A pervasive crunch culture has affected both of the teams, especially as mounting workloads stretch the teams’ capacities. “I love that players are enjoying our games and want more, but the company is handing us work to do without growing our teams to take that work on,” Sherwin said. “That means long hours, constant stress, and a worse game experience at the end of the day. Many of my coworkers are overloaded, and, despite us raising concerns to management, we haven't seen much relief. Some of us are doing the work of three people. I think WotC and our audience both stand to gain when everybody is working to the best of their ability, and not being constantly rushed.”
As a producer, one of Hoskin’s core obligations is understanding the discrepancy between work timelines and resources available to achieve them. But she too often hits a brick wall when requesting more of the latter. “I have gone to management, who is demanding a certain number of projects be completed in a certain amount of time, and I say, ‘We don't have the people for this.’ In most cases, the answer has been just figure it out. Now, I work with the game designers specifically, and because every one of them is salaried, management doesn't consider it onerous for them to work unpaid overtime in order to accomplish our goals. In a lot of cases, they're expecting us to do unpaid overtime in order to make the products for them.”
Over a long enough period of time, Hoskins said this approach not only breeds individual creative burnout but an overall degradation in quality across all of the studio’s games.
A+ stuff. A United Wizards Of The Coast means better conditions and better games for everyone!
— Tolarian Community College (@tolariancommunitycollege.com) October 6, 2026 at 6:06 PM
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“Poor decisions on how much stress to put our workers through leads to good creatives leaving the company to work somewhere that isn't going to overwork them,” Hoskins said. “It has had an overall negative effect on the games we create, and it makes it really challenging to gain and maintain good talent when crunch is the rule of the day.”
Such conditions have slightly improved over the last two-and-a-half years, but the workers aren’t convinced they won’t return — hence seeking the kinds of protections from a collective bargaining unit. Even one case of long term crunch is too much for Hoskins. “One of our game designers had to lead two different projects that overlapped and was unable to take PTO before it expired at the end of the year because all of that work needed to get it to the printer to release on time,” she said. “No one should have to do that. Right now, we can complain about it. We can ask that things be moved. But when the answer is too bad, make it work, what other recourse is there other than forming this union?
Both Hoskins and Sherwin were very clear that neither union is calling for a strike or boycott at this time. “It is a nuclear option,” Hoskins said. “We want to make our games… for our fans and for ourselves. And no one can do that if we're striking. It is a last resort and not something that's on anyone's mind at this point.”
Instead, Sherwin says that the best thing people can do to show support is “to sign and share our petition asking for leadership to voluntarily recognize our union. They've declined for now, but they can still recognize us at any point up to our election.” Keeping the pressure on Wizards is the best way to show management that the union has public support. For a company like Wizards of the Coast, which really wants to keep its fanbase happy, nothing could perhaps be more important.
Hoskins added that people should “share your support on social media. Tag in the union so we can repost the best stuff. We want management to know that our fans are behind us and help them make the right decision.”
