Mistwell
Crusty Old Meatwad (he/him)
I would imagine their treatment of Paizo played into that? Suddenly cutting off Paizo from their highly successful stewardship of Dragon and Dungeon can't have been reassuring for anyone else contemplating a business model that relied on "Trust Wizards to let you produce stuff under license."
I don't like this characterization of "suddenly" cutting them off. Let's be clear - it was the end of their contract term, and they were not renewed. But WOTC gave them an extension on that contract so they could wrap up their current AP. It was not a sudden cut-off, and they treated Paizo well at the time, and Paizo said so at the time. Paizo didn't express distrust of Wizards at the time, and I don't think we should try and re-write history to pretend it was a sudden cut-off that made Paizo distrust WOTC and think ill of them.
This sort of thing just makes the edition wars worse. I wish people would take the leads of the actual individuals at WOTC and Paizo. They make it clear they don't dislike each other and there is nothing but respect and admiration for each other - why do fans have to pretend it's something it's not, and try and turn events into bigger things than they are?