Why did Wes and James really leave?


Paizo General Discussion

Sovereign Court

With all the recent news coming out it makes me wonder.

Did these incidents have anything to do with both James Sutter and Wes Schidner leaving the company?


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Pathfinder Adventure Path, Lost Omens, Rulebook, Starfinder Roleplaying Game Subscriber

Rampant speculation is rampant.

Highly doubtful. Paizo won’t comment, because it’s either a disciplinary matter or a private citizen who is no longer an employee’s personal business. Sutter and Wes might choose to drop by. I suspect their answers are “no”, based on comments elsewhere, but that’s up to them to clarify.

Shadow Lodge

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We will never know.

Silver Crusade

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Pathfinder Adventure Path Subscriber

Given the laudations and farewells, I'd hazard a guess that both left under mutually amicable terms with Paizo.

Paizo Employee Chief Creative Officer, Publisher

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Both left under mutually amicable terms with Paizo. Wes and James had both been in their jobs for over a decade, and were looking for new challenges. We wish them the best, and expect to work with them again in the future.

Lantern Lodge RPG Superstar 2014 Top 4

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Seconding Erik's statement. I don't know James as well as I know Wes, but Wes left for an amazing opportunity that I'm sure he'll be talking about more publicly when he's able to.

RPG Superstar 2015 Top 8

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James Sutter (with whom I am unaffiliated) posted this on EnWorld when they were speculating:

James L. Sutter wrote:
Honestly, folks, I was just ready for a change. Thirteen years is a long time for anyone to work in the same place these days. For me, I felt like, between Starfinder and Pathfinder, I'd done most of what I wanted to do in the RPG industry, and I wanted to put more of those 40+ hours a week toward writing novels and comics. I know I shocked a lot of my coworkers with the timing (Starfinder's one of the biggest hits the company's ever had, and I'm leaving right as the proverbial money truck is backing up to the loading dock), but when I decide to do something, I hate dallying, and I wouldn't want to stay Creative Director if my heart wasn't 100% in it. Starfinder is still my baby, and I want what's best for it. So it seemed best to go out on a high note, and this Gen Con was nothing if not a high note! I'm confident that Rob McCreary and the rest of the team will do great things with the game, and I hope to still get to write for it in the future!

Lantern Lodge Customer Service Manager

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Folks, I'm going to go ahead and lock this up. I don't feel that it is appropriate to speculate about people's employment decisions on the paizo.com forums.

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