Dungeons & Dragons’ Chris Perkins Exits Wizards of the Coast

After 28 years, longtime Dungeons & Dragons designer Chris Perkins revealed he’s exited the company and retired from Wizards of the Coast.

Perkins said on Friday he was leaving with a “perfect fairytale ending…I can’t wait to enjoy D&D purely as a fan again, knowing the game is in good hands.” His retirement comes in the wake of the TTRPG’s 50th anniversary and the recent launch of its revised rulebooks, which he said were “doing gangbusters.” Prior to this, he stepped down as D&D’s product lead after the launch of the Dungeon Master’s Guide in October 2024. At the time, a Wizards representative told Polygon that Perkins “wasn’t going anywhere,” and that he was taking on a new role at the company.

Today I retire from Wizards after 28 years. With D&D’s 50th anniversary wrapping up and the revised rulebooks doing gangbusters, this is the perfect fairytale ending for me. I can’t wait to enjoy D&D purely as a fan again, knowing the game’s in good hands. See you in the Feywild! pic.twitter.com/YWV4hlEPg6

— Christopher Perkins (@ChrisPerkinsDnD) April 4, 2025

Chris Perkins entered the tabletop game industry in 1988 under the pen name “Christopher Zarathurstra,” which he used to write Dungeon Magazine #11’s “Wards of Witching Ways” adventure. He officially joined Wizards in 1997 as an editor for Dungeon, and later editor-in-chief of Wizards periodicals. Over the years, he’s become a more prominent figure for Dungeons & Dragons and contributed to its fourth and fifth editions and the famous Curse of Strahd module. Perkins also helped popularize the Actual Play genre through D&D games at popular enthusiast events like PAX, then running the Twitch show Dice, Camera, Action and guest starring on Critical Role.

After Perkins revealed his retirement, the Dungeons & Dragons team thanked him for “the decades of work he has poured into Wizards of the Coast, as D&D would not be what it is today without his numerous contributions. While we are incredibly sad to see him go, we welcome him at our game any day. While at D&D, Chris mentored the next generation of leaders who are stepping up as he moves on to enjoy his retirement.”

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