Is it even possible to trust someone who is on the board of directors of literally the largest tobacco company in the USA?
For decades tobacco companies just kept up the same blatant lies that cigarettes don't cause cancer.
How do you trust someone who is so invested in the death stick business?
That's even before they made another invention to get a whole new generation of young people addicted to nicotine.
You know - if you want people to trust a company maybe not put someone in charge who literally sells cancer and tried to make product that appeal to children to get them addicted and get cancer? Is that too high a bar?
Step 3: Abandon all plans to deauthorize OGL 1.0a.
Step 4: Stop trying to bully other VTTs out of the market and redirect focus to making Project Sandcastle the best product it can be.
Step 5: Continue to have any and all plans for a new OGL public and to provide surveys for community feedback.
Step 6: Demonstrably change drafts of the new OGL to reflect the survey results.
Step 7: Negotiate and publicly announce deals with third-party creators to digitally publish their work on either D&D Beyond, Project Sandcastle, or both. This would show a commitment to investing in third-party creators and allow WOTC to make money. It’s a win for everyone.
Step 8: Be consistently transparent with the community going forward.
Do those things, and eventually my trust at least will be regained. I doubt they will listen to me, but I will be happy to be proven wrong.
If you can't say anything honest, say nothing and instead act. The insincere apologies of yore have diminished any hope of genuine acts of consumer benefit being trusted. The only thing left to do now is to take on the feedback and act upon it. Do not release the OGL until the obvious tripe is cut out completely. I get the necessity for Newspeak, legalese, and putting things in a way that the average player can understand, but please don't underestimate your readership: a lot of the hobbyists you're appealing to are called 'rules lawyers' for a reason. If there's something we don't understand, help us to understand it. You've gone from irregular dishonest damage control to now constant, non-insightful damage control.
Stop jumping the gun. Scrap every plan of OGL 1.2 until you've given a good enough reason to bin the first one. You begin your VTT Policy outline with language appealing to emotion, and then ask "why" you need a VTT policy, not "do" you need it? The answer to the latter question is 'no'. The "tricky questions" you pose are indeed tricky because they're made up scenarios. 'How many AA batteries can I fit in my toaster on a Wednesday' is indeed a tricky question, but totally useless and is only worth entertaining because of how drastically it can affect VTT's ability to monetise themselves. I suspect the reasoning behind these 'tricky questions' is so that you can police VTTs out of having certain features which will be present in your own come D&DOne. The image that comes to mind is WotC fouling themselves to offend others with the smell.
Be realistic. I appreciate that due to D&D's size it has to be - short of becoming a generic system - all things to all people, but the language in recent documentation has also encompassed more than it perhaps should (for example, will WotC go through a too-successful competitor's content with a fine toothed comb in order to declare it obscene and thus take out the competition? After all, there's no legal recourse). What is your OGL's hateful content and conduct policy going to achieve that hate speech laws cannot? How will you police this when - not six months ago - you had an incident of, err, not being able to police your own hateful content? Set reasonable expectations and build on them when you've accumulated enough trust to do so. This would be fine in the hands of other, much more trustworthy companies. Take note.
Take your time. Burping up blog posts isn't helpful and doesn't give you enough time to formulate an answer that satisfies anyone. You're speaking, but you're not conversing. I would like to hear Kyle Brink and co. on the forums, holding an AMA, hosting a livestream. I can't say it'll be a pleasant experience, and I'm sure the moderators are working overtime as is, but it would be the first step in a long path of good faith. There is no expediting this process.
That's all I can think of. While I agree with the sentiment of sacking the CEOs and such, I don't think that's going to be considered on this here forum. Even my own expectations are rather lofty, but I must say it's nice to get things off my chest.
Zero is the most important number in D&D: Session Zero sets the boundaries and the tone; Rule Zero dictates the Dungeon Master (DM) is the final arbiter; and Zero D&D is better than Bad D&D.
"Let us speak plainly now, and in earnest, for words mean little without the weight of conviction."
As long as Hasbro is calling the shots it really does not matter who is in what position below the Hasbro board of directors.
I see no good endings in this as long as Hasbro is in charge so I hope WOTC is split off from Hasbro if another shareholder takeover is attempted like what happened the last time.
All Hasbro does is say "make more money". All of these decisions are coming from WotC. They don't have thier own corporate structure as a lark. Stop pretending this billion dollar corporation is your friend. Hasbro doesn't need to sell or split off WotC. WotC needs to sell D&D to a company that actually wants to make a game rather than monetize an IP.
Step 3: Abandon all plans to deauthorize OGL 1.0a.
Step 4: Stop trying to bully other VTTs out of the market and redirect focus to making Project Sandcastle the best product it can be.
Step 5: Continue to have any and all plans for a new OGL public and to provide surveys for community feedback.
Step 6: Demonstrably change drafts of the new OGL to reflect the survey results.
Step 7: Negotiate and publicly announce deals with third-party creators to digitally publish their work on either D&D Beyond, Project Sandcastle, or both. This would show a commitment to investing in third-party creators and allow WOTC to make money. It’s a win for everyone.
Step 8: Be consistently transparent with the community going forward.
Do those things, and eventually my trust at least will be regained. I doubt they will listen to me, but I will be happy to be proven wrong.
This would actually pretty much fix it from what I can tell. It's too bad no one at Wizards has enough sense to be able to figure it out, but you're not wrong my dude.
Like I know I'm very vitriolic at times but honesty can go a long way for a giant company, I don't think any of us expect them to make the best choices all the time, but once they own up to their mistakes and acknowledge them we're able to move past them. If they just try and insist that things never happened that way, forever, there's no way trust can be rebuilt with the same customer base - at best you just get a new customer base as people grow up and generations shift and the next wave of customers doesn't remember how you screwed them over like the last wave. Basically my point is, I don't think any of us would even hold this mistake against them if they were just willing to own up to it and move on. But they're not.
Step 7: Negotiate and publicly announce deals with third-party creators to digitally publish their work on either D&D Beyond, Project Sandcastle, or both. This would show a commitment to investing in third-party creators and allow WOTC to make money. It’s a win for everyone.
-SNIP-
Now where's that comming from? Sorry, i seem not up to date. Someone cares to elaborate?
Step 7: Negotiate and publicly announce deals with third-party creators to digitally publish their work on either D&D Beyond, Project Sandcastle, or both. This would show a commitment to investing in third-party creators and allow WOTC to make money. It’s a win for everyone.
-SNIP-
Now where's that comming from? Sorry, i seem not up to date. Someone cares to elaborate?
I heard about it from Mark Seifter on Roll for Combat, I believe. In their recent episode discussing the leaks from employees shown by DnD Shorts, and how they were consistent with Roll for Combats past predictions?
Step 7: Negotiate and publicly announce deals with third-party creators to digitally publish their work on either D&D Beyond, Project Sandcastle, or both. This would show a commitment to investing in third-party creators and allow WOTC to make money. It’s a win for everyone.
-SNIP-
Now where's that comming from? Sorry, i seem not up to date. Someone cares to elaborate?
I heard about it from Mark Seifter on Roll for Combat, I believe. In their recent episode discussing the leaks from employees shown by DnD Shorts, and how they were consistent with Roll for Combats past predictions?
Thx, mate. Found some system designer dude profile while googling it, who claims to be doing development on it since Nov 2021. Weird stuff.
Step 7: Negotiate and publicly announce deals with third-party creators to digitally publish their work on either D&D Beyond, Project Sandcastle, or both. This would show a commitment to investing in third-party creators and allow WOTC to make money. It’s a win for everyone.
-- SNIP --
None of the OGL drama really impacts me or my players, though I understand the sentiment. I am absolutely astounded that Wizards of the Coast did not immediately try to go this route of having D&D Beyond become the Steam for 5e TTRPG with all the convenient tools, references, and character integration that already exists. I would 100% write 3rd party material to publish on a D&D Beyond marketplace.
DM's Guild is supposed to sort of serve this function... but it would be way more convenient, modernized, and visible to just transition to having D&D Beyond serve that purpose. It also gives Wizards of the Coast the ability to receive community feedback on 3rd party material that is offensive or hateful, i.e., self-policed community, where Wizards could then take action if necessary.
Hope someone from D&D Beyond/Wizards sees this, because this would be a GREAT feature that also serves the intention of the OGL to protect against offensive material. Steam also takes a cut from games sold on their marketplace... Wizards could do that too and get some revenue in return for promoting and hosting the 3rd party material.
I just can't believe this missed opportunity - seems to solve many of the things Wizards has been trying to do with the OGL, in a far less egregious way.
Are you seeing this Wizards/D&D Beyond/Hasbro? Please take note!
Nobody SHOULD trust WOTC right now; they've blatantly lied so many times and treated the community with naked, giggling contempt.
As for what "could" fix this... well; a major shift in tone and leadership would be the start, but the longer answer would be YEARS of better behavior. They've in a month burned goodwill that it took years if not decades to get.
None of the OGL drama really impacts me or my players, though I understand the sentiment. I am absolutely astounded that Wizards of the Coast did not immediately try to go this route of having D&D Beyond become the Steam for 5e TTRPG with all the convenient tools, references, and character integration that already exists. I would 100% write 3rd party material to publish on a D&D Beyond marketplace.
This is exactly what I 'm thinking too. Wizards of the Coast is in an excellent position to make the already excellent D&D Beyond platform into an inclusive, non exclusive but very profitable marketplace akin to what STEAM is to videogames. By selling it's own 5e content (and other editions, past and future) as well as letting third party creator content (both from small creator as well as from larger publishing companies) be published and used on D&D Beyond for a cut of the profits, Wizards of the Coast would be significantly monetizing their platform without having to resort to cheap microtransaction inspired by the worst practices of the videogame industry thats so rebarbative to a vast majority of our community.
I have been a Steam user since december 2003 and have seen it grow from a platform to sell Half-Life 2 into probably of one the most profitable business in the world. (I am aware that selling TTRPS's is never going to be as profitable as selling hundreds of millions of units of videogames but it can still be very very profitable if done properly). As a player it's where I purchase ALL my PC games and let me tell you that I'm happy to shell hundreds of dollars per year to access pretty much any game that I want.
As a video game executive producer I have been selling third party content on Steam since 2008 and, while I still think that the 30% cut they take is a bit too high, it's still is a no brainer for EVERYONE to sell their games on Steam as its by far the largest revenue driver for the vast majority of PC games.
The fact that Wizard of the Coast isn't working actively toward a solution like this, that would benefit literally everyone without antagonizing it's faithful community, tells me that their current leadership isn't fit to stay in place and should be replaced by people who actually get it.
The fact that Wizard of the Coast isn't working actively toward a solution like this, that would benefit literally everyone without antagonizing it's faithful community, tells me that their current leadership isn't fit to stay in place and should be replaced by people who actually get it.
I'll just point out that the current CEO of WOTC worked for Phillip Morris for over 10 years and is currently on the Board of Directors of the largest tobacco company in the USA.
It's pubic record that Tobacco companies conducted a half-century campaign of lies, intimidation and overall underhanded business dealings and it's documented that their advertising was designed to attract new and younger consumers with for example, bubblegum or fruity flavored vape cartridges.
It's hard to imagine how it is possible to even begin to trust a company that where the person in charge learned how to do things at a company like Phillip Morris. Of course she will see the customer base as people to exploit and deceive and critics as people to bully, attack and harrass.
Of course all this was to be obviously expected considering the resume of the CEO.
The only thing that would do it for me is if the IP was sold to a non-publicly traded company. It is impossible to build trust with an endless supply of interchangeable talking heads who are legally obligated to endlessly and exponentially increase $ at all costs.
The concept that it is possible to trust these paperclip maximizers that we called corporations is dangerously naïve.
I think it is important to remember that this is not a friend to friend relationship. It is consumer to corporation. Friends care about making amends and trust... Corporations mostly just care about getting your money. So yeah, your trust so that you will buy their products but they're not going to do trust falls or anything with you. Hasbro and WotC are not spouses who cheated on you. They are companies looking to maximize their profits. That is what they are supposed to do. Do they misstep? Definitely... But expecting them to have empathy and sympathy and to be a human being is being a bit naive... No matter what the Supreme Court says, corporations are NOT people.
And, always remember when talking about major corporations: Look at what they are willing to do to people for a profit and ask yourself if you can "trust" a company whose profits are buit on exploitation. I'm not asying "boycott hasboro" - just I could never "trust" them. I guarantee they'd put me and my entire community in forced labor factory with dangerous conditions if it wasn't illegal where I live.
In all honesty? They wouldn't have trust but they would have had more respect if they had killed the OGL completely from the start which judging by 1.1 was their intent. They're clearly trying to kill 3PPs in the cradle or making sure the only ones who are willing to do content are the ones who will be proud to have their leash hanging up in Cynthia Williams' closet. They also want to do this by making themselves look like lawful good paladins while doing it. Judging by many comments on this forum they're succeeding at just that. Maybe they don't need to rebuild trust because that was always a disposable resource for their plans anyway at least the trust from us drooling brain dead peons who just don't know better and our greedy 3PP fatcat masters.
Short of that, scrapping 1.2 and giving out a 1.whatever that is basically 1.0a but with tighter legal language but in the same spirit. Both have a snowball's chance now so maybe most of Hasbro's c-suite getting pink slips but that's unlikely too.
Is it even possible to trust someone who is on the board of directors of literally the largest tobacco company in the USA?
For decades tobacco companies just kept up the same blatant lies that cigarettes don't cause cancer.
How do you trust someone who is so invested in the death stick business?
That's even before they made another invention to get a whole new generation of young people addicted to nicotine.
You know - if you want people to trust a company maybe not put someone in charge who literally sells cancer and tried to make product that appeal to children to get them addicted and get cancer? Is that too high a bar?
Step 1: Stop lying to us.
Step 2: Admit they lied and genuinely apologize.
Step 3: Abandon all plans to deauthorize OGL 1.0a.
Step 4: Stop trying to bully other VTTs out of the market and redirect focus to making Project Sandcastle the best product it can be.
Step 5: Continue to have any and all plans for a new OGL public and to provide surveys for community feedback.
Step 6: Demonstrably change drafts of the new OGL to reflect the survey results.
Step 7: Negotiate and publicly announce deals with third-party creators to digitally publish their work on either D&D Beyond, Project Sandcastle, or both. This would show a commitment to investing in third-party creators and allow WOTC to make money. It’s a win for everyone.
Step 8: Be consistently transparent with the community going forward.
Do those things, and eventually my trust at least will be regained. I doubt they will listen to me, but I will be happy to be proven wrong.
Dev updates + Cao being fired
That's all I can think of. While I agree with the sentiment of sacking the CEOs and such, I don't think that's going to be considered on this here forum. Even my own expectations are rather lofty, but I must say it's nice to get things off my chest.
Zero is the most important number in D&D: Session Zero sets the boundaries and the tone; Rule Zero dictates the Dungeon Master (DM) is the final arbiter; and Zero D&D is better than Bad D&D.
"Let us speak plainly now, and in earnest, for words mean little without the weight of conviction."
- The Assemblage of Houses, World of Warcraft
All Hasbro does is say "make more money". All of these decisions are coming from WotC. They don't have thier own corporate structure as a lark. Stop pretending this billion dollar corporation is your friend. Hasbro doesn't need to sell or split off WotC. WotC needs to sell D&D to a company that actually wants to make a game rather than monetize an IP.
This would actually pretty much fix it from what I can tell. It's too bad no one at Wizards has enough sense to be able to figure it out, but you're not wrong my dude.
Like I know I'm very vitriolic at times but honesty can go a long way for a giant company, I don't think any of us expect them to make the best choices all the time, but once they own up to their mistakes and acknowledge them we're able to move past them. If they just try and insist that things never happened that way, forever, there's no way trust can be rebuilt with the same customer base - at best you just get a new customer base as people grow up and generations shift and the next wave of customers doesn't remember how you screwed them over like the last wave. Basically my point is, I don't think any of us would even hold this mistake against them if they were just willing to own up to it and move on. But they're not.
Now where's that comming from? Sorry, i seem not up to date. Someone cares to elaborate?
I heard about it from Mark Seifter on Roll for Combat, I believe. In their recent episode discussing the leaks from employees shown by DnD Shorts, and how they were consistent with Roll for Combats past predictions?
Thx, mate. Found some system designer dude profile while googling it, who claims to be doing development on it since Nov 2021. Weird stuff.
None of the OGL drama really impacts me or my players, though I understand the sentiment. I am absolutely astounded that Wizards of the Coast did not immediately try to go this route of having D&D Beyond become the Steam for 5e TTRPG with all the convenient tools, references, and character integration that already exists. I would 100% write 3rd party material to publish on a D&D Beyond marketplace.
DM's Guild is supposed to sort of serve this function... but it would be way more convenient, modernized, and visible to just transition to having D&D Beyond serve that purpose. It also gives Wizards of the Coast the ability to receive community feedback on 3rd party material that is offensive or hateful, i.e., self-policed community, where Wizards could then take action if necessary.
Hope someone from D&D Beyond/Wizards sees this, because this would be a GREAT feature that also serves the intention of the OGL to protect against offensive material. Steam also takes a cut from games sold on their marketplace... Wizards could do that too and get some revenue in return for promoting and hosting the 3rd party material.
I just can't believe this missed opportunity - seems to solve many of the things Wizards has been trying to do with the OGL, in a far less egregious way.
Are you seeing this Wizards/D&D Beyond/Hasbro? Please take note!
Nobody SHOULD trust WOTC right now; they've blatantly lied so many times and treated the community with naked, giggling contempt.
As for what "could" fix this... well; a major shift in tone and leadership would be the start, but the longer answer would be YEARS of better behavior. They've in a month burned goodwill that it took years if not decades to get.
This is exactly what I 'm thinking too. Wizards of the Coast is in an excellent position to make the already excellent D&D Beyond platform into an inclusive, non exclusive but very profitable marketplace akin to what STEAM is to videogames. By selling it's own 5e content (and other editions, past and future) as well as letting third party creator content (both from small creator as well as from larger publishing companies) be published and used on D&D Beyond for a cut of the profits, Wizards of the Coast would be significantly monetizing their platform without having to resort to cheap microtransaction inspired by the worst practices of the videogame industry thats so rebarbative to a vast majority of our community.
I have been a Steam user since december 2003 and have seen it grow from a platform to sell Half-Life 2 into probably of one the most profitable business in the world. (I am aware that selling TTRPS's is never going to be as profitable as selling hundreds of millions of units of videogames but it can still be very very profitable if done properly). As a player it's where I purchase ALL my PC games and let me tell you that I'm happy to shell hundreds of dollars per year to access pretty much any game that I want.
As a video game executive producer I have been selling third party content on Steam since 2008 and, while I still think that the 30% cut they take is a bit too high, it's still is a no brainer for EVERYONE to sell their games on Steam as its by far the largest revenue driver for the vast majority of PC games.
The fact that Wizard of the Coast isn't working actively toward a solution like this, that would benefit literally everyone without antagonizing it's faithful community, tells me that their current leadership isn't fit to stay in place and should be replaced by people who actually get it.
I'll just point out that the current CEO of WOTC worked for Phillip Morris for over 10 years and is currently on the Board of Directors of the largest tobacco company in the USA.
It's pubic record that Tobacco companies conducted a half-century campaign of lies, intimidation and overall underhanded business dealings and it's documented that their advertising was designed to attract new and younger consumers with for example, bubblegum or fruity flavored vape cartridges.
It's hard to imagine how it is possible to even begin to trust a company that where the person in charge learned how to do things at a company like Phillip Morris. Of course she will see the customer base as people to exploit and deceive and critics as people to bully, attack and harrass.
Of course all this was to be obviously expected considering the resume of the CEO.
The only thing that would do it for me is if the IP was sold to a non-publicly traded company. It is impossible to build trust with an endless supply of interchangeable talking heads who are legally obligated to endlessly and exponentially increase $ at all costs.
The concept that it is possible to trust these paperclip maximizers that we called corporations is dangerously naïve.
I think it is important to remember that this is not a friend to friend relationship. It is consumer to corporation. Friends care about making amends and trust... Corporations mostly just care about getting your money. So yeah, your trust so that you will buy their products but they're not going to do trust falls or anything with you. Hasbro and WotC are not spouses who cheated on you. They are companies looking to maximize their profits. That is what they are supposed to do. Do they misstep? Definitely... But expecting them to have empathy and sympathy and to be a human being is being a bit naive... No matter what the Supreme Court says, corporations are NOT people.
And, always remember when talking about major corporations: Look at what they are willing to do to people for a profit and ask yourself if you can "trust" a company whose profits are buit on exploitation. I'm not asying "boycott hasboro" - just I could never "trust" them. I guarantee they'd put me and my entire community in forced labor factory with dangerous conditions if it wasn't illegal where I live.
https://www.cnbc.com/2018/12/07/nightmare-at-chinese-factories-making-hasbro-and-disney-toys.html
In all honesty? They wouldn't have trust but they would have had more respect if they had killed the OGL completely from the start which judging by 1.1 was their intent. They're clearly trying to kill 3PPs in the cradle or making sure the only ones who are willing to do content are the ones who will be proud to have their leash hanging up in Cynthia Williams' closet. They also want to do this by making themselves look like lawful good paladins while doing it. Judging by many comments on this forum they're succeeding at just that. Maybe they don't need to rebuild trust because that was always a disposable resource for their plans anyway at least the trust from us drooling brain dead peons who just don't know better and our greedy 3PP fatcat masters.
Short of that, scrapping 1.2 and giving out a 1.whatever that is basically 1.0a but with tighter legal language but in the same spirit. Both have a snowball's chance now so maybe most of Hasbro's c-suite getting pink slips but that's unlikely too.
So nothing? I guess I'm a rabid hyena. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯