Wyrmwood, a High-End Tabletop Gaming Manufacturer, Under Fire for Handling of Abuse Scandal
WormwoodThe maker of tabletop gaming accessories long loved by Dungeons & Dragons players and others has come under fire for its handling of a string of sexual assault allegations that surfaced this week.
After the tweet gained momentum He accused the company of protecting an employee accused of sexual assault.
I am a former employee of Shinshin
I would like to keep my story on record. I’m the person the tweet was talking about. Doug, do you remember when you fired me?(I’m just glancing at the video because I wrote everything down for clarity and brevity.)#WyrmsArentFriends pic.twitter.com/FiVDKyg6iM
— Andy Morocco (@Andy_Morocco) February 19, 2023
Former employee in the video Andy Moroccoclaims he was fired in retaliation for reporting the sexual assault of a colleague on company property.
“I was taken to the back of the store by CEO Douglas Costello. I thought he wanted more information directly from the source, but instead, in his words, and fired me in retaliation for “creating drama in the store,” Morocco claims in the video.
He later added, “The Wilmwoods aren’t your friends and they don’t care about people.”
Wyrmwood against allegations 4 page document released Describing the incident in their own words, the accused sex offender was also fired, claiming he had no knowledge of the assault taking place at work. has been released. undisclosed since thenwhere Wilmwood management and human resources further took their side in the presence of lawyers and refuted their allegations, including false claims that they had not been informed of where the incident occurred. I repeated.
Organization begins to cut ties with Wilmwood
Shortly after Wilmwood’s reaction, fans and partners alike began cutting ties with the company. take this A non-profit organization that has been affiliated with Wyrmwood for many years.
in their statement, Take This, cited what they believed to be Wyrmwood’s misbehavior as the ultimate reason for ending the partnership, writing: Wyrmwood has since released a written statement and accompanying video, which is troubling and outside Take This’s ethical standards. ”
Meanwhile, former Wilmwood supporters have taken to social media to express disappointment with the way Wilmwood has responded to the allegations, saying many of them will no longer buy Wilmwood products.
After reading the written statement last night, some of the feedback felt harsh. Now, seconds into this video, I am completely horrified by Wilmwood’s actions.
— Lysa Penrose (fae/faer) (@lysapenrose) February 22, 2023
The next day, Wyrmwood kept the video response private, issued a new statement apologizing Their first reaction was, “We are taking down the video we posted. We reacted instinctively out of anger and disbelief to the false allegations being spread online and decided that what we do all the time is I did — I posted a video addressing it to protect myself, but a number of partners and customers contacted me and described the video as jarring and harmful, and we agreed with them. ,I apologize.”
Over the years, Wyrmwood has been a reliable high-end choice for tabletop gamers, and their projects Biggest kickstarter success everOnly time will tell if partners and customers will accept the apology, but at this point the whole controversy seems to have had little impact on Kickstarter. Gaming table raised over $1.7 million.
Travis Northup is a writer for IGN. You can follow him on Twitter @TieGuyTravis and read his book game coverage here.
