In what way? If you are having trouble understanding my argument, can you narrow down what part of it so I can try to clarify?
Here is how I understand your argument:
Ford is going to make their cars so they can only use BP brand gasoline. I object that they are anti-consumer because that means BP will raise prices above other sources due to a unique higher demand. Ford releases a statement that says this was all a misunderstanding. They intended all along to ask us which gas brand we wanted and thanks for the feedback, we regret the fear and panic that we caused our customers but this was all caused by a few loud voices over-reacting. They further say they will reconsider which gas stations they will be exclusive to. I say I'm angry that Ford is anti-consumer because they lied about their intent and they seem to be planning the same thing with slightly different details. You ask what other gas station I am trying to protect. I say I'm angry that Ford is anti-consumer. You say but WHICH third party gas are you protecting? I say you are making a bad faith argument and you say "Hey, the gas tank is not an agreement between Ford and the consumer'.
Well existing Ford cars would still run normally and no one would buy the new ones because no one would want to be limited to just one brand of gas station. Plus it would not be trivial to install sensors in new cars that could somehow tell the difference.
If the product ceases to be useful, people will move on to other products. That is normal in the world.
Also the better analogy between cars and gasoline would be an attempt on the part of WotC to require the game to be played only on some sort of closed system that only they control. That is arguably similarly impractical or impossible to Ford making cars that would only run on one specific brand of gas. Being impractical to impossible to implement, it seems an irrational fear.
No 3rd party products are needed to play the game. Or if any are, please cite them.
His example was fine. I can tell you know it was, too. Instead of engaging with it, you're trying to poke holes in it. That's what people do when someone has a point they're trying to desperately ignore.
Also, re: 3rd party products "not being needed"... If your game uses any of the IP from a 3rd party product, you needed that 3rd party product for your game. So, ALL 3rd party products are required. To cite the ones required would be to cite every single one that has ever been used. Because they are required for each game whose individual table has decided to include them.
The same is true for any actual wotc released book too. You can play d&d without ever buying a single book from anyone.
What is required is whatever you, in practice, ended up buying and using. If that's xanathars, so be it. If thats a 3rd party monster hunting supplement, so be it.
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I'm probably laughing.
It is apparently so hard to program Aberrant Mind and Clockwork Soul spell-swapping into dndbeyond they had to remake the game without it rather than implement it.
In what way? If you are having trouble understanding my argument, can you narrow down what part of it so I can try to clarify?
Here is how I understand your argument:
Ford is going to make their cars so they can only use BP brand gasoline. I object that they are anti-consumer because that means BP will raise prices above other sources due to a unique higher demand. Ford releases a statement that says this was all a misunderstanding. They intended all along to ask us which gas brand we wanted and thanks for the feedback, we regret the fear and panic that we caused our customers but this was all caused by a few loud voices over-reacting. They further say they will reconsider which gas stations they will be exclusive to. I say I'm angry that Ford is anti-consumer because they lied about their intent and they seem to be planning the same thing with slightly different details. You ask what other gas station I am trying to protect. I say I'm angry that Ford is anti-consumer. You say but WHICH third party gas are you protecting? I say you are making a bad faith argument and you say "Hey, the gas tank is not an agreement between Ford and the consumer'.
Well existing Ford cars would still run normally and no one would buy the new ones because no one would want to be limited to just one brand of gas station. Plus it would not be trivial to install sensors in new cars that could somehow tell the difference.
If the product ceases to be useful, people will move on to other products. That is normal in the world.
Also the better analogy between cars and gasoline would be an attempt on the part of WotC to require the game to be played only on some sort of closed system that only they control. That is arguably similarly impractical or impossible to Ford making cars that would only run on one specific brand of gas. Being impractical to impossible to implement, it seems an irrational fear.
No 3rd party products are needed to play the game. Or if any are, please cite them.
So your take away was to argue about the analogy? Now I KNOW you are making bad faith arguments.
His example was fine. I can tell you know it was, too. Instead of engaging with it, you're trying to poke holes in it. That's what people do when someone has a point they're trying to desperately ignore.
Also, re: 3rd party products "not being needed"... If your game uses any of the IP from a 3rd party product, you needed that 3rd party product for your game. So, ALL 3rd party products are required. To cite the ones required would be to cite every single one that has ever been used. Because they are required for each game whose individual table has decided to include them.
The same is true for any actual wotc released book too. You can play d&d without ever buying a single book from anyone.
What is required is whatever you, in practice, ended up buying and using. If that's xanathars, so be it. If thats a 3rd party monster hunting supplement, so be it.
It is engaging with an argument to present counter-arguments. When the argument consists of analogy, citing material, relevant manners in which the two situations are not comparable is valid counter-argument.
First of all, 'need' is a very strong word that you are just throwing in there. Furthermore, it does not apply. If you were to play a Sherlock Holmes based campaign, your campaign would presumably need to reference things from the Sherlock Holmes IP. That IP has nothing whatsoever to do with D&D other than your use of it. Nothing about WotC's copyright diminishes the Sherlock Holmes IP or has control over it in any way.
If you used a rule or item or monster or etc from a book.. you needed that book. Yes. Need.
It is such an obvious truth I'm a little uncertain why you're even asking.
D&D at its core doesn't need any books, neither wotc or 3pp. So if you want to add content from books, any books, you'll need those books. (Or a suitable fill in, pdf or etc) It's super commen sense.
Even if WotC somehow were able to forbid one from playing their game using any other IP other than their own, despite that making the game literally unplayable since it would mean everyone would have to use stock characters only in ways explicitly approved by WotC, how, exactly, would they police it?
I'm not in the buisness of inventing new ways for them to be overbearing and exploitative. You'll excuse me not answering.
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I'm probably laughing.
It is apparently so hard to program Aberrant Mind and Clockwork Soul spell-swapping into dndbeyond they had to remake the game without it rather than implement it.
His example was fine. I can tell you know it was, too. Instead of engaging with it, you're trying to poke holes in it. That's what people do when someone has a point they're trying to desperately ignore.
Also, re: 3rd party products "not being needed"... If your game uses any of the IP from a 3rd party product, you needed that 3rd party product for your game. So, ALL 3rd party products are required. To cite the ones required would be to cite every single one that has ever been used. Because they are required for each game whose individual table has decided to include them.
The same is true for any actual wotc released book too. You can play d&d without ever buying a single book from anyone.
What is required is whatever you, in practice, ended up buying and using. If that's xanathars, so be it. If thats a 3rd party monster hunting supplement, so be it.
It is engaging with an argument to present counter-arguments. When the argument consists of analogy, citing material, relevant manners in which the two situations are not comparable is valid counter-argument.
First of all, 'need' is a very strong word that you are just throwing in there. Furthermore, it does not apply. If you were to play a Sherlock Holmes based campaign, your campaign would presumably need to reference things from the Sherlock Holmes IP. That IP has nothing whatsoever to do with D&D other than your use of it. Nothing about WotC's copyright diminishes the Sherlock Holmes IP or has control over it in any way.
Even if WotC somehow were able to forbid one from playing their game using any other IP other than their own, despite that making the game literally unplayable since it would mean everyone would have to use stock characters only in ways explicitly approved by WotC, how, exactly, would they police it?
Read it again in the context of your objections about not understanding why I called your previous comments arguments in bad faith, which are, I have recently found, against the forum rules. if you respond to me again on this thread with another bad faith argument, I will report it.
Or, you can simply stop trying to ask what third party company a post is intended to protect when the poster says they believe WotC is anti-consumer.
But to be anti-consumer from the perspective of any given consumer, they have to be affecting products that particular consumer feels a need for. I don't feel any need for the 3rd party products. I do not feel the need for all WotC D&D products.
"Gaslighting and deceit" that do not materially affect me one way or another are not very effective gaslighting or deceit.
So I was asking which 3rd party products are really that consumer vital.
Unless the argument is that IP rights should not exist at all, on the theory that, thereby, consumers have the most access to everything, however, then there is less reason to produce as it is a lot harder for anyone to turn a profit from their creations.
(emphasis mine)
You do not need to be personally affected by your need or use of a company's products to deem them anti-consumer, especially with community-driven products like games. If I want to join a TTRPG community, one of the main things to look out for, IMO, is that the community is healthy, supported by companies, and that there are 3rd parties able to produce content for it, which serves to keep a healthy community while 'main' companies push out their release cycles. WOTC threatening 3rd party content puts into risk the health of the overall community. With less 3rd party content, there is a non-trivial amount of people that will lose interest in D&D, myself included.
This would be a very different matter if a healthy 3rd party community didn't exist in the first place. Not offering the option in the first place can be seen as just protecting your IP, but deciding to decimate the market and raking in more profits than most companies make on these products after you have let them take the risk and boost the popularity of your IP and community is peak anti-consumerism.
This would be a very different matter if a healthy 3rd party community didn't exist in the first place. Not offering the option in the first place can be seen as just protecting your IP, but deciding to decimate the market and raking in more profits than most companies make on these products after you have let them take the risk and boost the popularity of your IP and community is peak anti-consumerism.
This (just would have labeled it something like peak-monopoly deceit as the main thrust is against 3rd parties first, while the main anti-consumer traits will come later with all the brave new world stuff around micro transactions, season passes, loot boxes, ... ).
Hey guess what some of us can't ******* play pen&paper.
This whole "D&D will never die so long as I have a hardcopy book and a Dream!" thing is fantastic if your table lives in your area and you all gather around a physical table. My table lives in Minnesota, Massachusetts, Texas, Florida, and a couple of other places I haven't even figured out yet. If all you rampaging rioting yaybos kill off the edition and the digital toolset the edition is built on, my table is **** outta luck.
Some of us need the digital toolset to play the god damned game. Stop trying to burn it down and say "no worries, we'll just play good old-fashioned pen and paper like God and Gary Gygax intended!" That's amazing if it's an option for you but it is most definitively not an option for everybody.
Hey guess what some of us can't ******* play pen&paper.
This whole "D&D will never die so long as I have a hardcopy book and a Dream!" thing is fantastic if your table lives in your area and you all gather around a physical table. My table lives in Minnesota, Massachusetts, Texas, Florida, and a couple of other places I haven't even figured out yet. If all you rampaging rioting yaybos kill off the edition and the digital toolset the edition is built on, my table is **** outta luck.
Some of us need the digital toolset to play the god damned game. Stop trying to burn it down and say "no worries, we'll just play good old-fashioned pen and paper like God and Gary Gygax intended!" That's amazing if it's an option for you but it is most definitively not an option for everybody.
You know there are existing virtual tables that WotC could work with right now to integrate a DnD API in the way they have said you can do in the 1.2 OGL where it just shows numbers and autorolls, but they have chosen not to in the interest of stifling competition with their own not yet existing VTT.
If you want to blame anyone for not having an improved VTT experience right now and in the future you should be blaming WotC. Falling back on pen and paper is just a point that DnD is more than just a potential VTT as it appears WotC is shifting away from that part of the userbase.
A word to the wise on the OGL situation: if you have decided you will NEVER BUY FROM HASBROZARDS AGAIN and are busily whipping everyone you can into a zealous fervor of spite and fury seeking to do as much damage to Wizards as you can? You are not helping.
Honestly false. Hasbro only cares about it's investors, if we whip up our friends and family into the Spirit of DnDBegone, and boycott all things Hasbro D&D and MTG The investors will notice, and then Hasbro will have to make things right before April. When the quarter is up, and they have to post earnings and other things for the investors to review.
Hey guess what some of us can't ****ing play pen&paper.
This whole "D&D will never die so long as I have a hardcopy book and a Dream!" thing is fantastic if your table lives in your area and you all gather around a physical table. My table lives in Minnesota, Massachusetts, Texas, Florida, and a couple of other places I haven't even figured out yet. If all you rampaging rioting yaybos kill off the edition and the digital toolset the edition is built on, my table is **** outta luck.
Some of us need the digital toolset to play the god damned game. Stop trying to burn it down and say "no worries, we'll just play good old-fashioned pen and paper like God and Gary Gygax intended!" That's amazing if it's an option for you but it is most definitively not an option for everybody.
Well that's just simply not correct. You can certainly play without Beyond. Even if we were to assume WotC would thoroughly crack down on all other digital tools and digital repositories, you could still just use conference calls.
A scanner or camera can upload or broadcast your character sheet, if you need that. Or you can just type up private documents, or use the form-fillable PDFs already provided by Wizards. A camera or screen share can allow map and prop interaction. There are digital ways to roll dice, or you can just use real dice. You can reference rules documents through any combination of these tools, as well as just having one person search their books while on call, like you would at the table.
It could be more clunky, but you've never needed Beyond to play D&D online. Now, are you saying that this inconvenience would turn people away from playing D&D? Or from starting playing? Maybe. That's pretty speculative, though. Any history you might cite as evidence -- people not playing online before Beyond came onto the scene -- is complicated by lots of context. But they did, even if it wasn't hugely popular. And even if they didn't, that doesn't prove that they won't. Right?
One D&D and D&D Beyond are not going anywhere.. You seem to be scared of this hypothetical situation where everything WotC has made disappears, while attempting to diminish the reaction to a very real and ongoing problem that other people see. A problem that already has affected people's livelihood, upending long plans and leaves the future in the wind for them. A situation which would have been worse if people didn't get mad.
If we don't stay mad and they do handicap 3PP and other VTTs so theirs can reign supreme, they will drain every red cent they can out of you AND your players. They made it very clear with their OFFICIAL, SIGNABLE, NOT DRAFT, COVERED BY NDA, OGL 1.1, all they care about is money. Even if that meant they lose the majority of their longtime players and all of 3PPs which have helped carry their brand. That was a very real thing that happened and is still not resolved. In fact they are still using muddy language and hiding behind fake moral cause.
To me this is much more important than worrying about some butterfly effect hypothetical future. Stop telling people how to feel about something you clearly don't care about and doesn't effect you. All you care about is that YOU are going to lose "D&D" in whatever form you apparently have imagined it to be.
[Edit] Removed my own hypothetical speculation about how they might monetize their feature rich VTT they are trying to monopolize. Can't wait for the Battle Pass, I'm dropping at Tilted Temple, my animated magic missile go burrrr
Just to talk about this draft. First they are handicapping the crap out of future VTT's and the words they are using leaves it very unclear as to what is even allowed in those VTT's.
Second I am just going to copy paste what I said elsewhere right here.
What needs to be noted is this OGL 1.2 is still able to be revoked according to their wording. While they put the word "irrevocable" in the text they simultaneously REDEFINED it to mean (meaning that content licensed under this license can never be withdrawn from the license), the license itself is 100% still revocable. They could decide next year to de-authorize this one with no notice.
And they also can completely change what is in the SRD at ANY time, and you can't use an OLDER SRD
This license covers any content in the SRD 5.1 (or any subsequent version of the SRD we release under this license)
It says OR any later SRD instead of AND any future SRD so they could just remove 90% of what is in the SRD so you can't make a new subclass for Sorcerer anymore or something.
+ it provides anti-protection for the third party publishers. Essentially it says we can steal your work and you have to PROVE that we stole it instead of coming up with it ourselves... BUT, if you accidentally make something similar to another third party person you have no rights.
There is also a clause that doesn't seem enforceable about preventing people for suing them for wrongful termination because they decide what is harmful in any vague way possible, AND if any portion of the contract is unenforceable they can terminate the entire license WITHOUT notice. 1.0a just allowed them to alter an unenforceable clause to be enforceable.
This agreement is garbage, and they are really trying some sneaky stuff with this one.
The ability to change SRD at any time + the ability to change the license again any time they want + the huge and vague handicaps on other VTT's is showing their colors again. they are still trying to just destroy third party publishers, and more importantly they are trying to destroy any VTT that isn't their new one coming out or isn't linked to DnD beyond subscriptions. Because you may not be allowed to use anything outside the SRD on those VTT's anymore other than what players put in manually.
This is just as bad as the first draft leak, it is just a lot sneakier about it.
Just to talk about this draft. First they are handicapping the crap out of future VTT's and the words they are using leaves it very unclear as to what is even allowed in those VTT's.
Second I am just going to copy paste what I said elsewhere right here.
What needs to be noted is this OGL 1.2 is still able to be revoked according to their wording. While they put the word "irrevocable" in the text they simultaneously REDEFINED it to mean (meaning that content licensed under this license can never be withdrawn from the license), the license itself is 100% still revocable. They could decide next year to de-authorize this one with no notice.
And they also can completely change what is in the SRD at ANY time, and you can't use an OLDER SRD
This license covers any content in the SRD 5.1 (or any subsequent version of the SRD we release under this license)
It says OR any later SRD instead of AND any future SRD so they could just remove 90% of what is in the SRD so you can't make a new subclass for Sorcerer anymore or something.
+ it provides anti-protection for the third party publishers. Essentially it says we can steal your work and you have to PROVE that we stole it instead of coming up with it ourselves... BUT, if you accidentally make something similar to another third party person you have no rights.
There is also a clause that doesn't seem enforceable about preventing people for suing them for wrongful termination because they decide what is harmful in any vague way possible, AND if any portion of the contract is unenforceable they can terminate the entire license WITHOUT notice. 1.0a just allowed them to alter an unenforceable clause to be enforceable.
This agreement is garbage, and they are really trying some sneaky stuff with this one.
The ability to change SRD at any time + the ability to change the license again any time they want + the huge and vague handicaps on other VTT's is showing their colors again. they are still trying to just destroy third party publishers, and more importantly they are trying to destroy any VTT that isn't their new one coming out or isn't linked to DnD beyond subscriptions. Because you may not be allowed to use anything outside the SRD on those VTT's anymore other than what players put in manually.
This is just as bad as the first draft leak, it is just a lot sneakier about it.
There isn't going to be any truly irrevocable contract. There simply isn't. Even the constitutions of countries have amending formulas.
If they couldn't change what is in the SRD, they couldn't ever have errata or introduce new anything.
"Essentially it says we can steal your work and you have to PROVE that we stole it instead of coming up with it ourselves" that is the default situation in copyright cases. If they take someone to court over their copyright, they do have to show their copyright was actually breached. That goes for someone else too. For the clause about someone else having (allegedly) no rights, they would have to show that clause applies. The wording will be cleaned up but it is so nevertheless
You aren't understanding the problem with the OR. It means they can REMOVE previous SRD's. By making it or, it means the future SRD's overwrite the previous SRD's which means they can remove magic missile, fireball literally anything they want. They can remove it whole sale. If it said AND then they could add stuff in the future, adding stuff isn't the problem.The problem is, unlike 1.0a, this provides absolutely 0 protection or guarantees to third party publishers at all.
And that is the other trick, as I said, if it is "not enforceable" there is a clause that allows them to toss the whole license agreement whole sale. So the clause that states that people can't sue them for wrongful termination turns out to be unenforceable the entire contract FOR EVERYONE is void instead of that one part being re-written.
There are ways to make a contract amendable, it is even set in 1.0a under what circumstances the contract could be changed. The idea that they CANT make a contract that is irrevocable is non-sense. It is what 1.0a was intended to be back in 2000. It was a PERPETUAL license which, at the time, meant irrevocable.
As long as they can revoke the license every single 3PP should be weary of writing on it or building their lively hood on it. It is the entire reason Kobold Press is making their own game system and why so many 3PP are banding together to make their own systems and their own Open license and probably still aren't touching this license with a 10 foot pole. This thing is loaded with loopholes and traps. It has nothing to do with a language clean up. This is them trying to take advantage of and destroy 3PP because they view them as competition rather than allies building their business and their communications have made that abundantly clear with the whole "this wasn't meant to fund competition". They are creating their competition by being hostile.
The problem is still that WotC/Hasbro have decided to return D&D to what sadly is normal for media/IP stuff. They want total control. D&D was pretty much failing with TSR running the normal aggressive stands normal to most IP stuff, and became the dominant, close to monopoly power thing on the back of 3rd parties being pulled in by the OGL as a reaction to it -- a very unusual approach in all things IP. Now D&D is in a place where they don't need the 3rd parties anymore (would still need the DMs for TTRPG, but they are at the same time prioratizing computer games and other media anyways) and want to apply the standard practices. OGL stands in the way. It (the real thing/ idea) has to be defended at all costs. Any updates need to be iron clad open. 1.0a needs to stay and be it only as an option for bad days (such as those we are in...) and anything new needs to be open even stronger, not weaker. WotC/Hasbro has to be forced to make their money by making the better products and have their trademarks signal to players that this is where the better products are, not by killing competition by law department. It is a tall order to ask for, but D&D would probably not exist as a relevant brand anymore without the OGL based contributions and so we are very much in the right ethically -- and have to fight for and win that position.
Again, I argue that D&D was failing under TSR because of new edition follies, not because of handling of 3rd party anything. 2e was controversial. 3e was a mess. 3.5e was better but seen as an insult to players because it was essentially 3.0 with needed errata, then 4e (which was published after the OGL) was a nigh complete disaster.
All this 'The OGL saved us all' rhetoric is revisionist history to me.
As someone who was a Table Top Game Store manager, at what was once the Last Table Top Game store in my Region (1999-2002) I was there, I saw what was happening.
D&D was failing for a large list of reasons.
(Quick sample of the top ones, not all)
1: Video Games were easier.
2: Video Games Had Fantasy RPG that were better than most Games.
3: Poor Advertising from TSR, and a bad reputation for legal shenanigans.
4: Every Company was make games with very different rule sets, and there was no unity in the Community besides Friday Night Magic.
5: At our Store Games Workshop, 7 Seas, and Deadlands were the top sellers after Magic, and Pokémon. D&D wasn't even in the top10 most popular games. However, we had 5 or 6 DMs running games connected with our store. (Warhammer Fantasy Minis, were more popular for D&D than the semi-official ones, as they were more customizable, and better quality)
6: When the OGL launched with 3rd edition, that was the turn around for D&D, slowly it went from a dead game to being fairly popular. I would say the moment it turned around to being almost as popular as Magic, Yu-Gi-Oh!, and WH40k (2nd Ed), was the day D20 modern dropped. Things started to really peak, people were starting to accept the D20 system and the (No thAC0 method of D&D) Seriously people were playing D&D on 1st, 2nd, and 2.5 ed books for a good 5 years with no new purchases until D20 Modern. Not to say there wasn't people playing, they just had no motivation to buy new books.
The big reason D&D died in 1999, Reliance on Book Sales. Your customers were 1 person in 5, who used a Xerox Machine at Kinkos to run off Character sheets and copies of PHBs. They had all the books, but only the DM needed to buy them. Sure they had a Subscription to Dragon magazine and Dungeon Magazine. And they all purchased the 2.5 PHB because it was easy to read. But that was it. It's honestly the same issue D&D has now, but the saving grace is With all the 3rd party material, and Supplements People are buying more books, and not just the DMs. Partially due to Remote gaming. People want to read the rules for them selves, a Xerox copy in the 90s was sufficient, now it's a PDF, or DnDB and the modified WIki style Rules Books.
When this all started I was in Agreement, D&D is Under Monetized, always has been. The solution however is not to force the Community to Choose between WotC or 3rd Party Developers. The Solution is to use the D&D name, and Branding, and work with those 3rd party Creators to expand the customer base, encourage everyone to make more purchases, and license out the IP for Hasbro properties to third party developers to make new D&D books.
When's the last Darksun Book come out? When's the last Gamma World? WotC has over a dozen settings they could license out to Paizo and others to make content for. They could include My Little Pony and GI Joe. Two Hasbro Properties that would make great D&D campaign settings.
They have a VTT coming soon, instead of trying to shut out the competition, just integrate theirs to work with everyone, allow for 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th editions to go full SRD. Make GMs Guild integrated with DnDB, and the VTT. Include all editions and Pathfinder and other top games to sell on DnDB/GMs Guild, Hells, I would make deals with tch.io to allow integration as well.
Since ORC is underway, pay for it, work with everyone.
D&D could come out greater than ever if they worked with the community. But right now they want to fight the community, they want to lie and steal, and try and dominate the industry through underhanded practices, and not a good business model. They need to look at Steam and GOG. They need to also realize the TTRPG community is more like a family than random millions. I use to know Mike Mearls back in the day. I've interacted with just about everyone from all these companies at Gencon back in the 90s and early 2ks. Everyone at these Third Party Companies Either started at D&D, under contract to D&D, or was hired to the industry from someone who did. If I was to say the name of my store owner, I'm sure all the D&D Veterans at Piazo and a Few at WotC will mumble the same set of comments. (Not pleasant ones, but not mean) ie "BRB Brad" (Note :MTG Made a Joke play Card based on him, 7th Seas had made a card that looked like him.)
And one of the problems is those people who seem to think the IP should be literally free for all to use. 3rd party producers should realize that such people will just as happily mooch off them as they will off WotC.
Everybody is free in deciding what is in open game content and what with OGL. The problem is if someone wants to take it back once it did its job to be open instead of producing better stuff based on it and rely on being the default anyways by brand representation through trademark and size.
Hey guess what some of us can't ****ing play pen&paper.
This whole "D&D will never die so long as I have a hardcopy book and a Dream!" thing is fantastic if your table lives in your area and you all gather around a physical table. My table lives in Minnesota, Massachusetts, Texas, Florida, and a couple of other places I haven't even figured out yet. If all you rampaging rioting yaybos kill off the edition and the digital toolset the edition is built on, my table is **** outta luck.
Some of us need the digital toolset to play the god damned game. Stop trying to burn it down and say "no worries, we'll just play good old-fashioned pen and paper like God and Gary Gygax intended!" That's amazing if it's an option for you but it is most definitively not an option for everybody.
To some extent I feel your pain, I don't have that problem, but I can imagine that for those that are purely digital the idea of DnDBeyond shutting down, not digital tools coming and 6e just going back to print game would significantly impact their ability to play.
To that, I can only say that I think... and in a way I hope, that Wizards of the Coasts takes a hard enough hit here and really feels it in their wallet and comes to understand that they never have and never will be in control of D&D, the community decides over D&D.. no one else. This collective doesn't agree on a single bloody thing and as such, the game must exist in all forms at the same time and this is why the OGL is such a critical and pivotal point. It allows our community to exist in all its forms simultaneously, unimpeded.
Sure sometimes its offensive, sometimes the content is just crap and other times its just outright stupid, but, for every book you find offensive, someone else finds funny and creative and this is the point. We as a community don't need to agree on much, the only thing we must absolutely agree on is that creative freedom must always be completely free and a corporation can never be allowed to decide for us what we can create or consume.
If we can't agree on that, the game IS going to die, I assure you. There is no scenario in which Wizards of the Coasts passes this OGL and the game survives in any recognizable form, this community will burn down the whole thing. We can only hope that Wizards of the Coast is wise enough to realize that.
What does brand recognition mean when anyone can use your products for free and slap their brand name on them?
That is not how the OGL 1.0a works. Literary works that are not part of the SRD are still protected as always in copyright law. The OGL 1.0/1.0a just allows to actively declare a bucket of things that might otherwise be protected to be used as defined by the license. What you are saying would be if everything WotC publishes would be published either as open game content or under a typical creative commons license. OGL with SRD is very different from what you seem to believe it to be.
If you use the OGL, you are permitted to use any of the contents of the SRD freely, and only the contents of the SRD. It acts as a gateway to 5e, allows third parties to create content compatible with 5e, which in turn encourages people to then purchase additional 5e content from Wizards.
The other thing to keep in mind is that it was partly created because you can't trademark mechanics, so they had nothing to lose by allowing people to use their terms rather than just rebranding the same mechanics under "unique" terminology. It made 5e the defacto default D20 system, allowed third parties to create compatible add-ons, and prevented the need for unnecessary legal costs.
I'd encourage you to read into what is actually being discussed before engaging with the topic.
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His example was fine. I can tell you know it was, too. Instead of engaging with it, you're trying to poke holes in it. That's what people do when someone has a point they're trying to desperately ignore.
Also, re: 3rd party products "not being needed"... If your game uses any of the IP from a 3rd party product, you needed that 3rd party product for your game. So, ALL 3rd party products are required. To cite the ones required would be to cite every single one that has ever been used. Because they are required for each game whose individual table has decided to include them.
The same is true for any actual wotc released book too. You can play d&d without ever buying a single book from anyone.
What is required is whatever you, in practice, ended up buying and using. If that's xanathars, so be it. If thats a 3rd party monster hunting supplement, so be it.
I'm probably laughing.
It is apparently so hard to program Aberrant Mind and Clockwork Soul spell-swapping into dndbeyond they had to remake the game without it rather than implement it.
So your take away was to argue about the analogy? Now I KNOW you are making bad faith arguments.
If you used a rule or item or monster or etc from a book.. you needed that book. Yes. Need.
It is such an obvious truth I'm a little uncertain why you're even asking.
D&D at its core doesn't need any books, neither wotc or 3pp. So if you want to add content from books, any books, you'll need those books. (Or a suitable fill in, pdf or etc) It's super commen sense.
I'm not in the buisness of inventing new ways for them to be overbearing and exploitative. You'll excuse me not answering.
I'm probably laughing.
It is apparently so hard to program Aberrant Mind and Clockwork Soul spell-swapping into dndbeyond they had to remake the game without it rather than implement it.
Read it again in the context of your objections about not understanding why I called your previous comments arguments in bad faith, which are, I have recently found, against the forum rules. if you respond to me again on this thread with another bad faith argument, I will report it.
Or, you can simply stop trying to ask what third party company a post is intended to protect when the poster says they believe WotC is anti-consumer.
(emphasis mine)
You do not need to be personally affected by your need or use of a company's products to deem them anti-consumer, especially with community-driven products like games. If I want to join a TTRPG community, one of the main things to look out for, IMO, is that the community is healthy, supported by companies, and that there are 3rd parties able to produce content for it, which serves to keep a healthy community while 'main' companies push out their release cycles. WOTC threatening 3rd party content puts into risk the health of the overall community. With less 3rd party content, there is a non-trivial amount of people that will lose interest in D&D, myself included.
This would be a very different matter if a healthy 3rd party community didn't exist in the first place. Not offering the option in the first place can be seen as just protecting your IP, but deciding to decimate the market and raking in more profits than most companies make on these products after you have let them take the risk and boost the popularity of your IP and community is peak anti-consumerism.
This (just would have labeled it something like peak-monopoly deceit as the main thrust is against 3rd parties first, while the main anti-consumer traits will come later with all the brave new world stuff around micro transactions, season passes, loot boxes, ... ).
Hey guess what some of us can't ******* play pen&paper.
This whole "D&D will never die so long as I have a hardcopy book and a Dream!" thing is fantastic if your table lives in your area and you all gather around a physical table. My table lives in Minnesota, Massachusetts, Texas, Florida, and a couple of other places I haven't even figured out yet. If all you rampaging rioting yaybos kill off the edition and the digital toolset the edition is built on, my table is **** outta luck.
Some of us need the digital toolset to play the god damned game. Stop trying to burn it down and say "no worries, we'll just play good old-fashioned pen and paper like God and Gary Gygax intended!" That's amazing if it's an option for you but it is most definitively not an option for everybody.
Please do not contact or message me.
You know there are existing virtual tables that WotC could work with right now to integrate a DnD API in the way they have said you can do in the 1.2 OGL where it just shows numbers and autorolls, but they have chosen not to in the interest of stifling competition with their own not yet existing VTT.
If you want to blame anyone for not having an improved VTT experience right now and in the future you should be blaming WotC. Falling back on pen and paper is just a point that DnD is more than just a potential VTT as it appears WotC is shifting away from that part of the userbase.
Honestly false. Hasbro only cares about it's investors, if we whip up our friends and family into the Spirit of DnDBegone, and boycott all things Hasbro D&D and MTG The investors will notice, and then Hasbro will have to make things right before April. When the quarter is up, and they have to post earnings and other things for the investors to review.
Well that's just simply not correct. You can certainly play without Beyond. Even if we were to assume WotC would thoroughly crack down on all other digital tools and digital repositories, you could still just use conference calls.
A scanner or camera can upload or broadcast your character sheet, if you need that. Or you can just type up private documents, or use the form-fillable PDFs already provided by Wizards. A camera or screen share can allow map and prop interaction. There are digital ways to roll dice, or you can just use real dice. You can reference rules documents through any combination of these tools, as well as just having one person search their books while on call, like you would at the table.
It could be more clunky, but you've never needed Beyond to play D&D online. Now, are you saying that this inconvenience would turn people away from playing D&D? Or from starting playing? Maybe. That's pretty speculative, though. Any history you might cite as evidence -- people not playing online before Beyond came onto the scene -- is complicated by lots of context. But they did, even if it wasn't hugely popular. And even if they didn't, that doesn't prove that they won't. Right?
One D&D and D&D Beyond are not going anywhere.. You seem to be scared of this hypothetical situation where everything WotC has made disappears, while attempting to diminish the reaction to a very real and ongoing problem that other people see. A problem that already has affected people's livelihood, upending long plans and leaves the future in the wind for them. A situation which would have been worse if people didn't get mad.
If we don't stay mad and they do handicap 3PP and other VTTs so theirs can reign supreme, they will drain every red cent they can out of you AND your players. They made it very clear with their OFFICIAL, SIGNABLE, NOT DRAFT, COVERED BY NDA, OGL 1.1, all they care about is money. Even if that meant they lose the majority of their longtime players and all of 3PPs which have helped carry their brand. That was a very real thing that happened and is still not resolved. In fact they are still using muddy language and hiding behind fake moral cause.
To me this is much more important than worrying about some butterfly effect hypothetical future. Stop telling people how to feel about something you clearly don't care about and doesn't effect you. All you care about is that YOU are going to lose "D&D" in whatever form you apparently have imagined it to be.
[Edit] Removed my own hypothetical speculation about how they might monetize their feature rich VTT they are trying to monopolize. Can't wait for the Battle Pass, I'm dropping at Tilted Temple, my animated magic missile go burrrr
Just to talk about this draft. First they are handicapping the crap out of future VTT's and the words they are using leaves it very unclear as to what is even allowed in those VTT's.
Second I am just going to copy paste what I said elsewhere right here.
What needs to be noted is this OGL 1.2 is still able to be revoked according to their wording. While they put the word "irrevocable" in the text they simultaneously REDEFINED it to mean (meaning that content licensed under this license can never be withdrawn from the license), the license itself is 100% still revocable. They could decide next year to de-authorize this one with no notice.
And they also can completely change what is in the SRD at ANY time, and you can't use an OLDER SRD
This license covers any content in the SRD 5.1 (or any subsequent version of the SRD we release under this license)
It says OR any later SRD instead of AND any future SRD so they could just remove 90% of what is in the SRD so you can't make a new subclass for Sorcerer anymore or something.
+ it provides anti-protection for the third party publishers. Essentially it says we can steal your work and you have to PROVE that we stole it instead of coming up with it ourselves... BUT, if you accidentally make something similar to another third party person you have no rights.
There is also a clause that doesn't seem enforceable about preventing people for suing them for wrongful termination because they decide what is harmful in any vague way possible, AND if any portion of the contract is unenforceable they can terminate the entire license WITHOUT notice. 1.0a just allowed them to alter an unenforceable clause to be enforceable.
This agreement is garbage, and they are really trying some sneaky stuff with this one.
The ability to change SRD at any time + the ability to change the license again any time they want + the huge and vague handicaps on other VTT's is showing their colors again. they are still trying to just destroy third party publishers, and more importantly they are trying to destroy any VTT that isn't their new one coming out or isn't linked to DnD beyond subscriptions. Because you may not be allowed to use anything outside the SRD on those VTT's anymore other than what players put in manually.
This is just as bad as the first draft leak, it is just a lot sneakier about it.
You aren't understanding the problem with the OR. It means they can REMOVE previous SRD's. By making it or, it means the future SRD's overwrite the previous SRD's which means they can remove magic missile, fireball literally anything they want. They can remove it whole sale. If it said AND then they could add stuff in the future, adding stuff isn't the problem.The problem is, unlike 1.0a, this provides absolutely 0 protection or guarantees to third party publishers at all.
And that is the other trick, as I said, if it is "not enforceable" there is a clause that allows them to toss the whole license agreement whole sale. So the clause that states that people can't sue them for wrongful termination turns out to be unenforceable the entire contract FOR EVERYONE is void instead of that one part being re-written.
There are ways to make a contract amendable, it is even set in 1.0a under what circumstances the contract could be changed. The idea that they CANT make a contract that is irrevocable is non-sense. It is what 1.0a was intended to be back in 2000. It was a PERPETUAL license which, at the time, meant irrevocable.
As long as they can revoke the license every single 3PP should be weary of writing on it or building their lively hood on it. It is the entire reason Kobold Press is making their own game system and why so many 3PP are banding together to make their own systems and their own Open license and probably still aren't touching this license with a 10 foot pole. This thing is loaded with loopholes and traps. It has nothing to do with a language clean up. This is them trying to take advantage of and destroy 3PP because they view them as competition rather than allies building their business and their communications have made that abundantly clear with the whole "this wasn't meant to fund competition". They are creating their competition by being hostile.
This license is just as trash as the first one.
The problem is still that WotC/Hasbro have decided to return D&D to what sadly is normal for media/IP stuff. They want total control. D&D was pretty much failing with TSR running the normal aggressive stands normal to most IP stuff, and became the dominant, close to monopoly power thing on the back of 3rd parties being pulled in by the OGL as a reaction to it -- a very unusual approach in all things IP. Now D&D is in a place where they don't need the 3rd parties anymore (would still need the DMs for TTRPG, but they are at the same time prioratizing computer games and other media anyways) and want to apply the standard practices. OGL stands in the way. It (the real thing/ idea) has to be defended at all costs. Any updates need to be iron clad open. 1.0a needs to stay and be it only as an option for bad days (such as those we are in...) and anything new needs to be open even stronger, not weaker. WotC/Hasbro has to be forced to make their money by making the better products and have their trademarks signal to players that this is where the better products are, not by killing competition by law department. It is a tall order to ask for, but D&D would probably not exist as a relevant brand anymore without the OGL based contributions and so we are very much in the right ethically -- and have to fight for and win that position.
As someone who was a Table Top Game Store manager, at what was once the Last Table Top Game store in my Region (1999-2002) I was there, I saw what was happening.
D&D was failing for a large list of reasons.
(Quick sample of the top ones, not all)
1: Video Games were easier.
2: Video Games Had Fantasy RPG that were better than most Games.
3: Poor Advertising from TSR, and a bad reputation for legal shenanigans.
4: Every Company was make games with very different rule sets, and there was no unity in the Community besides Friday Night Magic.
5: At our Store Games Workshop, 7 Seas, and Deadlands were the top sellers after Magic, and Pokémon. D&D wasn't even in the top10 most popular games. However, we had 5 or 6 DMs running games connected with our store. (Warhammer Fantasy Minis, were more popular for D&D than the semi-official ones, as they were more customizable, and better quality)
6: When the OGL launched with 3rd edition, that was the turn around for D&D, slowly it went from a dead game to being fairly popular. I would say the moment it turned around to being almost as popular as Magic, Yu-Gi-Oh!, and WH40k (2nd Ed), was the day D20 modern dropped. Things started to really peak, people were starting to accept the D20 system and the (No thAC0 method of D&D) Seriously people were playing D&D on 1st, 2nd, and 2.5 ed books for a good 5 years with no new purchases until D20 Modern. Not to say there wasn't people playing, they just had no motivation to buy new books.
The big reason D&D died in 1999, Reliance on Book Sales. Your customers were 1 person in 5, who used a Xerox Machine at Kinkos to run off Character sheets and copies of PHBs. They had all the books, but only the DM needed to buy them. Sure they had a Subscription to Dragon magazine and Dungeon Magazine. And they all purchased the 2.5 PHB because it was easy to read. But that was it. It's honestly the same issue D&D has now, but the saving grace is With all the 3rd party material, and Supplements People are buying more books, and not just the DMs. Partially due to Remote gaming. People want to read the rules for them selves, a Xerox copy in the 90s was sufficient, now it's a PDF, or DnDB and the modified WIki style Rules Books.
When this all started I was in Agreement, D&D is Under Monetized, always has been. The solution however is not to force the Community to Choose between WotC or 3rd Party Developers. The Solution is to use the D&D name, and Branding, and work with those 3rd party Creators to expand the customer base, encourage everyone to make more purchases, and license out the IP for Hasbro properties to third party developers to make new D&D books.
When's the last Darksun Book come out? When's the last Gamma World? WotC has over a dozen settings they could license out to Paizo and others to make content for. They could include My Little Pony and GI Joe. Two Hasbro Properties that would make great D&D campaign settings.
They have a VTT coming soon, instead of trying to shut out the competition, just integrate theirs to work with everyone, allow for 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th editions to go full SRD. Make GMs Guild integrated with DnDB, and the VTT. Include all editions and Pathfinder and other top games to sell on DnDB/GMs Guild, Hells, I would make deals with tch.io to allow integration as well.
Since ORC is underway, pay for it, work with everyone.
D&D could come out greater than ever if they worked with the community. But right now they want to fight the community, they want to lie and steal, and try and dominate the industry through underhanded practices, and not a good business model. They need to look at Steam and GOG. They need to also realize the TTRPG community is more like a family than random millions. I use to know Mike Mearls back in the day. I've interacted with just about everyone from all these companies at Gencon back in the 90s and early 2ks. Everyone at these Third Party Companies Either started at D&D, under contract to D&D, or was hired to the industry from someone who did. If I was to say the name of my store owner, I'm sure all the D&D Veterans at Piazo and a Few at WotC will mumble the same set of comments. (Not pleasant ones, but not mean) ie "BRB Brad" (Note :MTG Made a Joke play Card based on him, 7th Seas had made a card that looked like him.)
Everybody is free in deciding what is in open game content and what with OGL. The problem is if someone wants to take it back once it did its job to be open instead of producing better stuff based on it and rely on being the default anyways by brand representation through trademark and size.
To some extent I feel your pain, I don't have that problem, but I can imagine that for those that are purely digital the idea of DnDBeyond shutting down, not digital tools coming and 6e just going back to print game would significantly impact their ability to play.
To that, I can only say that I think... and in a way I hope, that Wizards of the Coasts takes a hard enough hit here and really feels it in their wallet and comes to understand that they never have and never will be in control of D&D, the community decides over D&D.. no one else. This collective doesn't agree on a single bloody thing and as such, the game must exist in all forms at the same time and this is why the OGL is such a critical and pivotal point. It allows our community to exist in all its forms simultaneously, unimpeded.
Sure sometimes its offensive, sometimes the content is just crap and other times its just outright stupid, but, for every book you find offensive, someone else finds funny and creative and this is the point. We as a community don't need to agree on much, the only thing we must absolutely agree on is that creative freedom must always be completely free and a corporation can never be allowed to decide for us what we can create or consume.
If we can't agree on that, the game IS going to die, I assure you. There is no scenario in which Wizards of the Coasts passes this OGL and the game survives in any recognizable form, this community will burn down the whole thing. We can only hope that Wizards of the Coast is wise enough to realize that.
That is not how the OGL 1.0a works. Literary works that are not part of the SRD are still protected as always in copyright law. The OGL 1.0/1.0a just allows to actively declare a bucket of things that might otherwise be protected to be used as defined by the license. What you are saying would be if everything WotC publishes would be published either as open game content or under a typical creative commons license. OGL with SRD is very different from what you seem to believe it to be.
Have you actually read the SRD? In this both post and the Foundry post you don't seem to understand what the SRD actually contains?
Here's a copy:
https://dnd.wizards.com/resources/systems-reference-document
If you use the OGL, you are permitted to use any of the contents of the SRD freely, and only the contents of the SRD. It acts as a gateway to 5e, allows third parties to create content compatible with 5e, which in turn encourages people to then purchase additional 5e content from Wizards.
The other thing to keep in mind is that it was partly created because you can't trademark mechanics, so they had nothing to lose by allowing people to use their terms rather than just rebranding the same mechanics under "unique" terminology. It made 5e the defacto default D20 system, allowed third parties to create compatible add-ons, and prevented the need for unnecessary legal costs.
I'd encourage you to read into what is actually being discussed before engaging with the topic.