Paizo

Paizo Inc. is an American tabletop game publisher headquartered in Redmond, Washington and best known for Pathfinder and Starfinder. The company was founded in 2002 by Lisa Stevens, Vic Wertz, and Johnny Wilson. Its first major business was publishing Dragon and Dungeon, magazines it produced under license from Wizards of the Coast after that company discontinued their in-house publication. Paizo also published Polyhedron, a d20 System periodical that was bound with Dungeon. The magazine years helped establish a format that became central to Paizo’s identity: the Adventure Path. Rather than offering only isolated scenarios, an Adventure Path presents linked adventures intended to carry characters through an extended campaign. Shackled City, begun in Dungeon in 2003, was the first such campaign; Age of Worms and Savage Tide followed. When Wizards of the Coast chose not to renew Paizo’s magazine licenses, the final issues of Dragon and Dungeon appeared in September 2007. Paizo answered that loss by launching its own monthly Pathfinder Adventure Path, beginning with Rise of the Runelords in August 2007. These campaigns use Golarion, Paizo’s fantasy setting, whose regions include Varisia, Cheliax, and the Inner Sea. In 2008 Paizo released a Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Beta, and the finished Pathfinder Core Rulebook arrived in August 2009. Built from the Dungeons & Dragons 3.5 System Reference Document under the Open Game License, it offered an alternative for players who preferred that rules lineage after Dungeons & Dragons Fourth Edition adopted a different licensing approach. Pathfinder’s second edition was released in 2019, with revised rules and a three-action economy for turns. Paizo later issued the Pathfinder Remaster line: Player Core and GM Core appeared in November 2023, followed by Monster Core in March 2024. The remaster removed much terminology tied to the Open Game License while retaining Pathfinder Second Edition’s game structure. In January 2023, Paizo announced the Open RPG Creative License, or ORC License, developed with Azora Law and intended as a system-agnostic open gaming license. Starfinder, released in 2017, extends Paizo’s publishing into science-fantasy roleplaying. Its setting connects to Golarion but centers on a future galaxy where magic and advanced technology coexist; the disappearance of Golarion is a foundational mystery. Paizo supports its major games with organized play campaigns, Pathfinder Society and Starfinder Society, through which players can use characters across adventures. In 2021 Enad Global 7 acquired Paizo. That same year, Paizo voluntarily recognized the United Paizo Workers union.