A pair of well-known faces within the Dungeons & Dragons streaming community are facing a number of accusations surrounding their treatment of collaborators on assorted projects. Over the past several days, over a dozen different former collaborators have spoken out against Satine Phoenix and Jamison Stone, a pair of frequently seen influencers who have appeared on numerous Dungeons & Dragons streaming shows and worked with the likes of Wizards of the Coast, Origins Game Fair, and Geek & Sundry. These accusations paint a pattern of poor treatment, bullying, and gaslighting, along with threats of blacklisting and manipulation.
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Phoenix was one of the first prominent online streamers to appear in the growing Dungeons & Dragons scene in the late 2010s. Her show The Sirens of the Realm appeared on Dungeons & Dragons’ official streaming channel, and Phoenix worked at Wizards of the Coast as the Community Manager for Dungeons & Dragons for at least a year. Phoenix has worked with numerous popular names in the Dungeons & Dragons community, including Matt Mercer and Luke Gygax, the son of Dungeons & Dragons co-founder Gary Gygax.
In recent years, Phoenix has made frequent appearances with Jamison Stone, a self-published author. The pair frequently make sponsored appearances together at conventions, shows, and signings, including a sponsorship in which the pair travel to GameStop stores to play Dungeons & Dragons with customers. Phoenix and Stone organized a crowdfunding campaign for Sirens: Battle of the Bards, a yet-to-be-published Dungeons & Dragons adventure/rulebook published by Apotheosis Studios, which was founded by Stone. Phoenix appears on the cover of the book and the pair added miniatures featuring their likenesses as add-ons. The Kickstarter for Sirens raised over $300,000. A separate Kickstarter for The Red Opera: Last Days of The Warlock raised over $160,000 on Kickstarter. While both books were headlined by Phoenix and Stone’s involvement, Apotheosis Studios brought in teams of freelancers to contribute to the book. Phoenix and Stone also had a public wedding ceremony at GaryCon earlier this year, with streamers like Jason C. Miller, Becca Scott, and Amy Vorphal participating in the wedding. Stone and Phoenix were also announced as the headlining special guests at Origins Game Fair, a prominent tabletop show organized by the Game Manufacturers Association.
In the past week, both Stone and Phoenix were accused of treating employees, co-workers, and freelancers poorly, often with threats of ruining their professional careers. The first accusation came from Chad Rowe, a tattoo artist who worked with Post Malone and collaborated with Stone on a tattoo back in 2020. Rowe shared screenshots of a dialogue he had with Stone and Phoenix over a contract regarding the use of artwork. Stone berates Rowe in the screenshots shared, at one point demanding that Rowe send him a written letter of apology for their interactions.
Soon afterward, several additional collaborators came forward about their own interactions with Stone and Phoenix while working on Sirens. In addition to similar accusations of bullying and poor treatment, several collaborators also noted that Stone placed them on a public “blacklist” after they were instructed to send invoices for work done on the book. The collaborators claim they were eventually paid but only based on a “post-edit” word count, which is not industry standard. The account of Jessica Marcrum, a notable tabletop designer, can be seen below:
Elisa Teague, a longtime tabletop designer who attended Phoenix and Stone’s public wedding ceremony at GaryCon, also indicated that she had not been paid for her work on Sirens.
Other collaborators came forward, citing similar treatment on The Red Opera. Pat Edwards, one of the writing leads on that project, described his experience below, noting that the band DiAmorte was basically pushed out of the project as Stone took more and more control, with Edwards’ share and pay threatened for questioning Stone’s decisions.
One of the most harrowing accounts came from Tristan Morris, who spoke about his experience with Phoenix and Stone at PAX West after his employer Okta paid for the pair to come out to the show and speak to gaming companies about cybersecurity. Morris spoke about how the pair treated him and co-worker Katie DeMatteis as assistants despite having arranged for the pair to attend PAX West and stream on their behalf.
Stone eventually posted a public apology to Rowe, the tattoo artist who first raised the issue on Twitter, and said that he had worked to change his behavior, which he blamed on “Complex Post-Traumatic Stress Syndrome” since their interactions in 2020. However, Jason Azevado, the founder of streaming channel RealmSmith TV, noted that his behavior was going on as recently as last month. Azevado posted that Stone and Phoenix were verbally abusive to workers at Satine’s Quest, a themed cruise organized by the duo. Azevado also claimed that Stone had tried to use RealmSmith’s sponsorship of the cruise to charge Norwegian Cruise Line an additional $20,000, only $5,000 of which was given to RealmSmith.
As a result of the numerous accusations and accounts, Stone announced that he stepped down from Apotheosis Studios earlier this week. Although Stone was removed from Origins’ guest list, Phoenix continued to make appearances at the show throughout the weekend. Afterward, Origins Game Fair sent out an email stating that “staff assessed that there was no immediate risk of physical harm” and moved forward with a modified appearance schedule for Phoenix.
While Stone was the focus of many of the accusations, Phoenix is also mentioned as exhibiting the same behavior. Additionally, other accounts are emerging regarding her actively blacklisting at least one tabletop professional, which played out at the Stream of Many Eyes, a D&D live/streaming event held back in 2018. In the thread below, Liisa Lee claimed Phoenix bullied her in the lead up to the Stream of Many Eyes, including at least one incident that happened on camera.
ComicBook.com has also learned that Phoenix is being sued by her former collaborator Ruty Rutenberg. Rutenberg and Phoenix ran the streaming network Maze Arcana, until it went dark in 2018. According to the lawsuit filing posted on the Los Angeles County Superior Court website, Rutenberg’s Routine Anomaly LLC accuses Phoenix of misappropriating $40,000 of Maze Arcana’s money, taking the money and transferring it to personal accounts while helping to run the channel. This money was never returned to Maze Arcana, leading to the lawsuit. That lawsuit is still pending and Phoenix has filed a countersuit, claiming breach of oral contract and breach of fiduciary duty.
Yesterday, Phoenix responded to the accusations, stating that she was sorry for “being the cause” of her accuser’s pain and for enabling Stone’s “terrible behavior.”
Since the accusations became public, Level Up Dice stated they were cancelling a planned collaboration with Apotheosis Studios. D&D In a Castle, a company offering vacation packages featuring D&D games played in European castles, also removed Phoenix from their website and stated that they will not work with Stone and Phoenix moving forward. Jasper’s Game Day, a charity organization that raises money through D&D streaming, announced that Phoenix had been removed from their advisory board and that the pair would not be invited to participate in future Jasper’s Game Day events. Additionally, podcaster and TTRPG personality Travis McElroy stated they would not associate with them in the future.
Wizards of the Coast declined to comment for this story. ComicBook.com has also reached out to Phoenix for comment about the accusations but did not receive a reply as of press time.
EDIT: This article has been updated to indicate that Phoenix has filed a countersuit against Rutenberg.
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