There ye go. Source cited. Wizards cannot contest any use of the SRD for any reason, no matter how heinous. Literally anyone can publish literally anything they want and Wizards has to smile, nod, and say "Yep, we sure do support that usage of our valuable IP."
Which, as stated, is gonna be just so great.
This doesn't give those publishers a right to use D&D protected IP, including their logo and name.
So using the OGL for a bad actor would be no different than not using the OGL.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
"Orcs are savage raiders and pillagers with stooped postures, low foreheads, and piggish faces with prominent lower canines that resemble tusks." MM p245 (original printing) You don't OWN your books on DDB: WotC can change them any time. What do you think will happen when OneD&D comes out?
On the plus side we won't be stopped from creating content that Wizards could decided is too "controversial" to be associated with, morality clauses swing hard with political winds and its not hard to imagine them being turned as a weapon against minority communities. I'm stuck here on Terf island and the current line of attack is lobbying companies to erase LGBTQ+ people from advertising and product targeting under the accusation that they are indoctrinating youths and normalizing deviant behaviour, there nothing to say wizards couldn't fall foul of a similar movement in the US.
Wizards has explicitly said they do not believe things like that and stand in support of communities that have been marginalized. They support streamers who often play as LGBTQ+ characters and put several LGBTQ+ characters in some of their books. This clause is meant to protect - not hurt - groups like this who have long been discriminated against. As such, the removal of this morality clause is extremely disappointing.
There ye go. Source cited. Wizards cannot contest any use of the SRD for any reason, no matter how heinous. Literally anyone can publish literally anything they want and Wizards has to smile, nod, and say "Yep, we sure do support that usage of our valuable IP."
Which, as stated, is gonna be just so great.
This doesn't give those publishers a right to use D&D protected IP, including their logo and name.
So using the OGL for a bad actor would be no different than not using the OGL.
Except they could be sued for doing the former and are legally protected when doing the latter.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
BoringBard's long and tedious posts somehow manage to enrapture audiences. How? Because he used Charm Person, the #1 bard spell!
He/him pronouns. Call me Bard. PROUD NERD!
Ever wanted to talk about your parties' worst mistakes? Do so HERE. What's your favorite class, why? Share & explainHERE.
There ye go. Source cited. Wizards cannot contest any use of the SRD for any reason, no matter how heinous. Literally anyone can publish literally anything they want and Wizards has to smile, nod, and say "Yep, we sure do support that usage of our valuable IP."
Which, as stated, is gonna be just so great.
This doesn't give those publishers a right to use D&D protected IP, including their logo and name.
So using the OGL for a bad actor would be no different than not using the OGL.
Except they could be sued for doing the former and are legally protected when doing the latter.
No. No matter which way they do it (OGL or not) if a publisher uses WotC/D&D's logo/name or protected IP, WotC can sue and stop them.
The OGL does not let you use D&D branding or protected IP.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
"Orcs are savage raiders and pillagers with stooped postures, low foreheads, and piggish faces with prominent lower canines that resemble tusks." MM p245 (original printing) You don't OWN your books on DDB: WotC can change them any time. What do you think will happen when OneD&D comes out?
There ye go. Source cited. Wizards cannot contest any use of the SRD for any reason, no matter how heinous. Literally anyone can publish literally anything they want and Wizards has to smile, nod, and say "Yep, we sure do support that usage of our valuable IP."
Which, as stated, is gonna be just so great.
This doesn't give those publishers a right to use D&D protected IP, including their logo and name.
So using the OGL for a bad actor would be no different than not using the OGL.
Except they could be sued for doing the former and are legally protected when doing the latter.
Not as D&D (with the dragon thing). And there is indeed no was to copyright game mechanics (just that nobody knows what that means...), so you could always publish the most hateful stuff that is legal and write ", compatible to Dungeons and Dragons 5e" on it (not using the dragon or any other trademark, other than just the name, because for just naming the compatibility there cannot be an exclusion). 1.1 or 1.2 could have done nothing for you. Plus I still find it fascinating that any community of people that need protection would chose a publicly traded LLC for that protection, that is pretty much by law required to be agnostic to moral/ethics maximizing profit limited by law only.
On the plus side we won't be stopped from creating content that Wizards could decided is too "controversial" to be associated with, morality clauses swing hard with political winds and its not hard to imagine them being turned as a weapon against minority communities. I'm stuck here on Terf island and the current line of attack is lobbying companies to erase LGBTQ+ people from advertising and product targeting under the accusation that they are indoctrinating youths and normalizing deviant behaviour, there nothing to say wizards couldn't fall foul of a similar movement in the US.
Thank you!
As a person who has been involved in anti-oppressive organizing for over a decade, the faith that people who are pro-Hasbro have in corporate capitalism to protect people who are marginalized and not just tokenize and pick pockets is blowing my mind.
This is no victory, this is just evidence that WotC doesn’t give a 💩 about 5e anymore and they’re already dumping everything into 1DD which will in no way be covered under OGL1.0a.
But that's up to them. I mean, the win is that they're not going to touch OGL 1.0a, which was what the community was asking for.
And they have also included the SRD 5.1 in CC, which can no longer be reversed.
What they do with One D&D is up to them. And we'll see how it turns out. 4e was put in GSL and it was a flop. We'll see what happens with One D&D. If One D&D is released under a license whose terms are acceptable to publishers who publish third-party content, we will see third-party content. If they're not acceptable, hardly anyone will put out third-party content for One D&D. And the consumer will decide if it is worth buying that edition, or if he prefers to stick with 5e.
It is a victory. And a greater victory than anyone expected, dare I say.
Don’t you understand that all those 3PPs will be out of work in two years unless 1DD/6e/whatever they call it has an OGL?!? This was a pyrrhic “victory.”
No, they can continue releasing material for 5e. SRD 5.1 is on CC, and that's forever. There is no going back. It cannot be cancelled.
If One D&D comes out under an abusive license, those companies will be able to just keep releasing their material for 5e. Something that already happened in 4e, and that led, among other reasons, to the creation of Pathfinder.
In any case, WoTC has no moral obligation to allow third-party content for One D&D. That is a business decision. If they don't want to do it, they are within their rights. And the consumer will decide whether to buy that edition or let it die like they did with 4e.
What they couldn't do was retire OGL 1.0a. They had no right to do that. And besides, it was very unethical. And they won't. And they have also included SRD 5.1 in CC, shielding third-party content for 5e. That's more than I expected, frankly. And a move that should begin to restore WoTC's lost credibility, IMO.
Don’t you understand that nobody will be spending money on 5e once the new edition comes out?!? Who cares that I’ll be able to release content for an edition that nobody buys anymore for all eternity?!? It’s the next edition I care about. 5e is dying, and nothing to do with it will matter soon.
Yep, just like how 4th edition TOTALLY killed off 3.5...
Oh wait...
Or maybe more like how 3e killed 2e, or how 5e killed 3/3.5. Like I said:
This is no victory, this is just evidence that WotC doesn’t give a 💩 about 5e anymore and they’re already dumping everything into 1DD which will in no way be covered under OGL1.0a.
But that's up to them. I mean, the win is that they're not going to touch OGL 1.0a, which was what the community was asking for.
And they have also included the SRD 5.1 in CC, which can no longer be reversed.
What they do with One D&D is up to them. And we'll see how it turns out. 4e was put in GSL and it was a flop. We'll see what happens with One D&D. If One D&D is released under a license whose terms are acceptable to publishers who publish third-party content, we will see third-party content. If they're not acceptable, hardly anyone will put out third-party content for One D&D. And the consumer will decide if it is worth buying that edition, or if he prefers to stick with 5e.
It is a victory. And a greater victory than anyone expected, dare I say.
Don’t you understand that all those 3PPs will be out of work in two years unless 1DD/6e/whatever they call it has an OGL?!? This was a pyrrhic “victory.”
No, they can continue releasing material for 5e. SRD 5.1 is on CC, and that's forever. There is no going back. It cannot be cancelled.
If One D&D comes out under an abusive license, those companies will be able to just keep releasing their material for 5e. Something that already happened in 4e, and that led, among other reasons, to the creation of Pathfinder.
In any case, WoTC has no moral obligation to allow third-party content for One D&D. That is a business decision. If they don't want to do it, they are within their rights. And the consumer will decide whether to buy that edition or let it die like they did with 4e.
What they couldn't do was retire OGL 1.0a. They had no right to do that. And besides, it was very unethical. And they won't. And they have also included SRD 5.1 in CC, shielding third-party content for 5e. That's more than I expected, frankly. And a move that should begin to restore WoTC's lost credibility, IMO.
Don’t you understand that nobody will be spending money on 5e once the new edition comes out?!? Who cares that I’ll be able to release content for an edition that nobody buys anymore for all eternity?!? It’s the next edition I care about. 5e is dying, and nothing to do with it will matter soon.
We'll see. Maybe your predictions come true, or maybe not. I'm just telling you to look to the past, to what happened in the step from 3.5 to 4e
We have that precedent. And we don't know what that new license for One D&D will be like either. Perhaps WoTC has learned its lesson, and is not so abusive. Maybe it's a license people want to publish under. Or maybe not. We do not know.
What we know is what has happened. And what has happened is that the SRD 5.1 is in CC, and that the OGL 1.0a is not touched. That's a fact. There is no need to get bitter thinking about what could be or not be, because we still don't know.
I’m well aware of what happened, I lived through it. It was the reason I boycotted WotC for 10 years until 5e brought me back. I would rather not pin all my hopes on WotC effing up that badly againagain.
Y'know...except now, with the Creative Commons license, people can damage D&D's good name as much as they please and Wizards has no redress or recourse.
The key part of CC-BY-4.0 is
No endorsement. Nothing in this Public License constitutes or may be construed as permission to assert or imply that You are, or that Your use of the Licensed Material is, connected with, or sponsored, endorsed, or granted official status by, the Licensor or others designated to receive attribution as provided in Section 3(a)(1)(A)(i).
The text in the SRD associated with that license includes an attribution block
Please do not include any other attribution regarding Wizards other than that provided above. You may, however, include a statement on your work that it is “compatible with fifth edition” or “5E compatible.”
That is not meaningless text; if a third party tries to imply any endorsement of Wizards beyond what is permitted above:
Their license automatically terminates (under 6(A) of CC-BY-4.0) so Wizards can sue to shut them down.
They're probably in violation of Wizards' trademarks so Wizards can sue for that as well.
Oh, man....Pantagruel, buddy, you're breaking my back here. I expect this sort of thing from the "Open D&D" avatar crowd, but from you? That's just heartbreaking.
Nobody NEEDS to "imply endorsement" for their hateful product to be associated with D&D and damage the game for everybody involved - Wizards, creatives, and players. They do not need it. They have never needed it. The sheer fact of the book's explicitly licensed compatibility with D&D 5e means it's by default a D&D book. That means everything in it is D&D stuff. That means Wizards, who authorized the use of the SRD "for any purpose", allowed the use of D&D for hatred, discrimination, and exclusion.
You can all yabber on about how "but legally Wizards can't be associated with anything bad!" all you like, but you're being disingenuous and you know it. That is EXACTLY the logic the general public will use when the headlines are ranting about D&D becoming a bastion for bigotry and every last one of you knows it.
Stop pretending you don't know exactly what's going to happen when somebody uses their explicitly granted chance to peddle their hatred using D&D and all y'all buy it like it's a Black Friday Super Deal.
Honestly shocked that WotC/Hasbro reversed so hard on a new OGL.
The lack of a hateful conduct provision is THE major downside of this reversal, but I don't agree with blaming this loss entirely on the community. WotC messed up so catastrophically w.r.t. to the leaked OGL, and even some parts of the proposed Version 1.2, that THEY basically forced the only objectively good change to be a casualty of their reversal.
I see some posters here chastising fans and the community for caring more about the freedom of a license than the bigotry that is allowed under that license. And I absolutely agree that the inability to legally prevent hateful content is a loss. But if that's how you feel about the community, you need to wag that same finger WotC's way. If their primary goal was to protect the community and their game from bigots, this was probably the worst way they could have gone about doing so, and their own actions caused irreparable harm to achieving that goal any time soon.
Becoming the thing that you don't like is never the way to win.
My prediction is that 6E or whatever they decide to call it will have its own restrictive license, which will in turn cause another 4E situation (in terms of licensing, yeah, this isn't the first time they tried to get rid of the OGL, just last time internet outrage was less of a thing). It will be an unpopular version of D&D, a sizeable portion of the audience will stick with 5E and we'll see a bunch of new TTRPG systems.
All of that already looks plausible and happening to some degree already.
I doubt it, not if they want it to sell. Otherwise, everyone will start looking elsewhere or just stay with the 5e products that are most likely going to keep releasing almost perpetually at this point. They've put themselves in a position where they need to offer temptingly favorable terms for OneDnD or they lose sales to their own older product, even if it's just 3rd parties still releasing material for that product.
This is no victory, this is just evidence that WotC doesn’t give a 💩 about 5e anymore and they’re already dumping everything into 1DD which will in no way be covered under OGL1.0a.
But that's up to them. I mean, the win is that they're not going to touch OGL 1.0a, which was what the community was asking for.
And they have also included the SRD 5.1 in CC, which can no longer be reversed.
What they do with One D&D is up to them. And we'll see how it turns out. 4e was put in GSL and it was a flop. We'll see what happens with One D&D. If One D&D is released under a license whose terms are acceptable to publishers who publish third-party content, we will see third-party content. If they're not acceptable, hardly anyone will put out third-party content for One D&D. And the consumer will decide if it is worth buying that edition, or if he prefers to stick with 5e.
It is a victory. And a greater victory than anyone expected, dare I say.
Don’t you understand that all those 3PPs will be out of work in two years unless 1DD/6e/whatever they call it has an OGL?!? This was a pyrrhic “victory.”
No, they can continue releasing material for 5e. SRD 5.1 is on CC, and that's forever. There is no going back. It cannot be cancelled.
If One D&D comes out under an abusive license, those companies will be able to just keep releasing their material for 5e. Something that already happened in 4e, and that led, among other reasons, to the creation of Pathfinder.
In any case, WoTC has no moral obligation to allow third-party content for One D&D. That is a business decision. If they don't want to do it, they are within their rights. And the consumer will decide whether to buy that edition or let it die like they did with 4e.
What they couldn't do was retire OGL 1.0a. They had no right to do that. And besides, it was very unethical. And they won't. And they have also included SRD 5.1 in CC, shielding third-party content for 5e. That's more than I expected, frankly. And a move that should begin to restore WoTC's lost credibility, IMO.
Don’t you understand that nobody will be spending money on 5e once the new edition comes out?!? Who cares that I’ll be able to release content for an edition that nobody buys anymore for all eternity?!? It’s the next edition I care about. 5e is dying, and nothing to do with it will matter soon.
Yep, just like how 4th edition TOTALLY killed off 3.5...
Oh wait...
Or maybe more like how 3e killed 2e, or how 5e killed 3/3.5. Like I said:
This is no victory, this is just evidence that WotC doesn’t give a 💩 about 5e anymore and they’re already dumping everything into 1DD which will in no way be covered under OGL1.0a.
But that's up to them. I mean, the win is that they're not going to touch OGL 1.0a, which was what the community was asking for.
And they have also included the SRD 5.1 in CC, which can no longer be reversed.
What they do with One D&D is up to them. And we'll see how it turns out. 4e was put in GSL and it was a flop. We'll see what happens with One D&D. If One D&D is released under a license whose terms are acceptable to publishers who publish third-party content, we will see third-party content. If they're not acceptable, hardly anyone will put out third-party content for One D&D. And the consumer will decide if it is worth buying that edition, or if he prefers to stick with 5e.
It is a victory. And a greater victory than anyone expected, dare I say.
Don’t you understand that all those 3PPs will be out of work in two years unless 1DD/6e/whatever they call it has an OGL?!? This was a pyrrhic “victory.”
No, they can continue releasing material for 5e. SRD 5.1 is on CC, and that's forever. There is no going back. It cannot be cancelled.
If One D&D comes out under an abusive license, those companies will be able to just keep releasing their material for 5e. Something that already happened in 4e, and that led, among other reasons, to the creation of Pathfinder.
In any case, WoTC has no moral obligation to allow third-party content for One D&D. That is a business decision. If they don't want to do it, they are within their rights. And the consumer will decide whether to buy that edition or let it die like they did with 4e.
What they couldn't do was retire OGL 1.0a. They had no right to do that. And besides, it was very unethical. And they won't. And they have also included SRD 5.1 in CC, shielding third-party content for 5e. That's more than I expected, frankly. And a move that should begin to restore WoTC's lost credibility, IMO.
Don’t you understand that nobody will be spending money on 5e once the new edition comes out?!? Who cares that I’ll be able to release content for an edition that nobody buys anymore for all eternity?!? It’s the next edition I care about. 5e is dying, and nothing to do with it will matter soon.
We'll see. Maybe your predictions come true, or maybe not. I'm just telling you to look to the past, to what happened in the step from 3.5 to 4e
We have that precedent. And we don't know what that new license for One D&D will be like either. Perhaps WoTC has learned its lesson, and is not so abusive. Maybe it's a license people want to publish under. Or maybe not. We do not know.
What we know is what has happened. And what has happened is that the SRD 5.1 is in CC, and that the OGL 1.0a is not touched. That's a fact. There is no need to get bitter thinking about what could be or not be, because we still don't know.
I’m well aware of what happened, I lived through it. It was the reason I boycotted WotC for 10 years until 5e brought me back. I would rather not pin all my hopes on WotC effing up that badly againagain.
The difference is CC. 4.0 failed because they did not revoke 1.0a and therefore 3rd parties could just stick with 3rd. This time they tried to fix that mistake. Now, that the community told them to think again they put 5e under CC which will not ever be broken. No titan would have defended OGL, but breaking CC would require inventing legal theory that would break all open source stuff, too (not because CC [well, maybe even that], but because GPL and others use the same principles), leading to it being defended by small business like Apple, Alphabet, Microsoft, Google, GE, Siemens, ...
So now 3rd parties could once more stay with the old edition (now 5e) if WotC tried to establish 6e without putting its SRD under CC. That is the difference.
Yurei and all the other "OGL1.1 aganst hate speech clause lovers" who would have led us into a nasty future with the OGL 1.1 or 1.2 should take it down a notch. Democracy and community have to be able to withstand a bit and there is never an absolute safe haven for the only right opinion. If you go on holiday in the wrong country, that's it for free opinion. WotC have made a good first step with the CC licence and that the OGL 1.0a remains intact. So a healing can occur and we look forward. If the OGL 2.0 includes great hate speech clauses and you feel safer on earth with it, gladly accept it. If the 6ed is unfavourable for us, we don't have to change. If the 6ed is better than the 4ed or 5ed, then you just have to think about it, they all have their good points and the future for WotC and our hobby looks much better now than it did yesterday.
I personally think that taking a chance that a few 'bad' books getting through by keeping the 3PP able and secure to produce content is worth the potential down the road. Will someone abuse it, hell yah... but at the same time, what any two people believe is hateful can be complete opposites and I honestly believe (including what I'm putting in this post) there is nothing that is ever said by anyone that doesn't find offense with someone else. Hell, even not saying something can be considered offensive, so it is a darned if you do, darned if you don't scenario. Personally, I'd rather err on the side of the ability to express oneself than live in constant fear of being 'cancelled'.
"Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety." - Benjamin Franklin
And we have a sterling example of the exact attitude that will cause this "community" to embrace hateful content. "Nobody can decide what 'hateful' is, and you can't ever do anything that won't offend somebody, so why bother trying not to offend people? Publish anything, and let people buy what they want!" I've seen too many people openly support hate, discrimination, bigotry and exclusion on this very website to believe that The Community can do what Kyle asked us to do and defend D&D from this sort of shit.
Guess I better get used to it. Was nice to actually feel like I could safely play the game for a while.
Why can’t you still safely play the game? Last I checked, you still can choose who you associate with and what you and your group bring to the table.
Today perhaps, but I suspect if it came to a choice between people like myself and their bottom line I'd be dumped in a ditch faster than a Tabaxi monk. If the right wing succeeds in smearing the LGBTQ+ community as predators sufficiently Wizards will side with them and clauses like this will simply make it easier to isolate and exclude us.
Y'know...except now, with the Creative Commons license, people can damage D&D's good name as much as they please and Wizards has no redress or recourse.
The key part of CC-BY-4.0 is
No endorsement. Nothing in this Public License constitutes or may be construed as permission to assert or imply that You are, or that Your use of the Licensed Material is, connected with, or sponsored, endorsed, or granted official status by, the Licensor or others designated to receive attribution as provided in Section 3(a)(1)(A)(i).
The text in the SRD associated with that license includes an attribution block
Please do not include any other attribution regarding Wizards other than that provided above. You may, however, include a statement on your work that it is “compatible with fifth edition” or “5E compatible.”
That is not meaningless text; if a third party tries to imply any endorsement of Wizards beyond what is permitted above:
Their license automatically terminates (under 6(A) of CC-BY-4.0) so Wizards can sue to shut them down.
They're probably in violation of Wizards' trademarks so Wizards can sue for that as well.
The point is not about actual legal endorsement. The point is that some muckraker looking for a fresh target to go on the attack against, and they could legitimately describe some hate piece under 1.0a as something like "Product with License from Dungeons and Dragons Publisher Wizards of the Coast Promotes Racial Inequality". Everything about that statement would be correct, and they could spin up a lot of controversy from that without crossing the line into libel. And WotC can't even say they're looking to close that path going forward now. Yes, they can point out there is no official connection or collaboration between them and the publisher besides that they took up an open license, but that can only come after the big fiery headline and the net result will still be bad press for WotC.
Oh, man....Pantagruel, buddy, you're breaking my back here. I expect this sort of thing from the "Open D&D" avatar crowd, but from you? That's just heartbreaking.
Nobody NEEDS to "imply endorsement" for their hateful product to be associated with D&D and damage the game for everybody involved - Wizards, creatives, and players. They do not need it. They have never needed it. The sheer fact of the book's explicitly licensed compatibility with D&D 5e means it's by default a D&D book. That means everything in it is D&D stuff. That means Wizards, who authorized the use of the SRD "for any purpose", allowed the use of D&D for hatred, discrimination, and exclusion.
It's always been possible to do that. You could have done it under 1.2, because there are lots of ways to make something compatible with D&D without incorporating the SRD in the first place. They just don't gain any new tools.
Morality clauses are always bad because, like legal texts or licence texts, they are not irrevocable and can be interpreted quite differently in 23 years. We have just seen it. In 23 years, "irrevocable" can mean I buy a bottle of milk. Life, tricks and the world keep turning and do not wait for absolute certainty.
Stop pretending you don't know exactly what's going to happen when somebody uses their explicitly granted chance to peddle their hatred using D&D and all y'all buy it like it's a Black Friday Super Deal.
Says the person touting they know exactly what will happen with this scenario and the future of DnD lol.
This doesn't give those publishers a right to use D&D protected IP, including their logo and name.
So using the OGL for a bad actor would be no different than not using the OGL.
"Orcs are savage raiders and pillagers with stooped postures, low foreheads, and piggish faces with prominent lower canines that resemble tusks." MM p245 (original printing)
You don't OWN your books on DDB: WotC can change them any time. What do you think will happen when OneD&D comes out?
Wizards has explicitly said they do not believe things like that and stand in support of communities that have been marginalized. They support streamers who often play as LGBTQ+ characters and put several LGBTQ+ characters in some of their books. This clause is meant to protect - not hurt - groups like this who have long been discriminated against. As such, the removal of this morality clause is extremely disappointing.
BoringBard's long and tedious posts somehow manage to enrapture audiences. How? Because he used Charm Person, the #1 bard spell!
He/him pronouns. Call me Bard. PROUD NERD!
Ever wanted to talk about your parties' worst mistakes? Do so HERE. What's your favorite class, why? Share & explain
HERE.Except they could be sued for doing the former and are legally protected when doing the latter.
BoringBard's long and tedious posts somehow manage to enrapture audiences. How? Because he used Charm Person, the #1 bard spell!
He/him pronouns. Call me Bard. PROUD NERD!
Ever wanted to talk about your parties' worst mistakes? Do so HERE. What's your favorite class, why? Share & explain
HERE.No. No matter which way they do it (OGL or not) if a publisher uses WotC/D&D's logo/name or protected IP, WotC can sue and stop them.
The OGL does not let you use D&D branding or protected IP.
"Orcs are savage raiders and pillagers with stooped postures, low foreheads, and piggish faces with prominent lower canines that resemble tusks." MM p245 (original printing)
You don't OWN your books on DDB: WotC can change them any time. What do you think will happen when OneD&D comes out?
Not as D&D (with the dragon thing). And there is indeed no was to copyright game mechanics (just that nobody knows what that means...), so you could always publish the most hateful stuff that is legal and write ", compatible to Dungeons and Dragons 5e" on it (not using the dragon or any other trademark, other than just the name, because for just naming the compatibility there cannot be an exclusion). 1.1 or 1.2 could have done nothing for you. Plus I still find it fascinating that any community of people that need protection would chose a publicly traded LLC for that protection, that is pretty much by law required to be agnostic to moral/ethics maximizing profit limited by law only.
Thank you!
As a person who has been involved in anti-oppressive organizing for over a decade, the faith that people who are pro-Hasbro have in corporate capitalism to protect people who are marginalized and not just tokenize and pick pockets is blowing my mind.
At least a smart move that might motivate me to keep on playing D&D in the future.
Or maybe more like how 3e killed 2e, or how 5e killed 3/3.5. Like I said:
Creating Epic Boons on DDB
DDB Buyers' Guide
Hardcovers, DDB & You
Content Troubleshooting
I just reactivated my subscription, well done Wizards.
Oh, man....Pantagruel, buddy, you're breaking my back here. I expect this sort of thing from the "Open D&D" avatar crowd, but from you? That's just heartbreaking.
Nobody NEEDS to "imply endorsement" for their hateful product to be associated with D&D and damage the game for everybody involved - Wizards, creatives, and players. They do not need it. They have never needed it. The sheer fact of the book's explicitly licensed compatibility with D&D 5e means it's by default a D&D book. That means everything in it is D&D stuff. That means Wizards, who authorized the use of the SRD "for any purpose", allowed the use of D&D for hatred, discrimination, and exclusion.
You can all yabber on about how "but legally Wizards can't be associated with anything bad!" all you like, but you're being disingenuous and you know it. That is EXACTLY the logic the general public will use when the headlines are ranting about D&D becoming a bastion for bigotry and every last one of you knows it.
Stop pretending you don't know exactly what's going to happen when somebody uses their explicitly granted chance to peddle their hatred using D&D and all y'all buy it like it's a Black Friday Super Deal.
Please do not contact or message me.
Becoming the thing that you don't like is never the way to win.
I doubt it, not if they want it to sell. Otherwise, everyone will start looking elsewhere or just stay with the 5e products that are most likely going to keep releasing almost perpetually at this point. They've put themselves in a position where they need to offer temptingly favorable terms for OneDnD or they lose sales to their own older product, even if it's just 3rd parties still releasing material for that product.
The difference is CC. 4.0 failed because they did not revoke 1.0a and therefore 3rd parties could just stick with 3rd. This time they tried to fix that mistake. Now, that the community told them to think again they put 5e under CC which will not ever be broken. No titan would have defended OGL, but breaking CC would require inventing legal theory that would break all open source stuff, too (not because CC [well, maybe even that], but because GPL and others use the same principles), leading to it being defended by small business like Apple, Alphabet, Microsoft, Google, GE, Siemens, ...
So now 3rd parties could once more stay with the old edition (now 5e) if WotC tried to establish 6e without putting its SRD under CC. That is the difference.
Yurei and all the other "OGL1.1 aganst hate speech clause lovers" who would have led us into a nasty future with the OGL 1.1 or 1.2 should take it down a notch. Democracy and community have to be able to withstand a bit and there is never an absolute safe haven for the only right opinion. If you go on holiday in the wrong country, that's it for free opinion. WotC have made a good first step with the CC licence and that the OGL 1.0a remains intact. So a healing can occur and we look forward. If the OGL 2.0 includes great hate speech clauses and you feel safer on earth with it, gladly accept it. If the 6ed is unfavourable for us, we don't have to change. If the 6ed is better than the 4ed or 5ed, then you just have to think about it, they all have their good points and the future for WotC and our hobby looks much better now than it did yesterday.
Why can’t you still safely play the game? Last I checked, you still can choose who you associate with and what you and your group bring to the table.
Today perhaps, but I suspect if it came to a choice between people like myself and their bottom line I'd be dumped in a ditch faster than a Tabaxi monk. If the right wing succeeds in smearing the LGBTQ+ community as predators sufficiently Wizards will side with them and clauses like this will simply make it easier to isolate and exclude us.
The point is not about actual legal endorsement. The point is that some muckraker looking for a fresh target to go on the attack against, and they could legitimately describe some hate piece under 1.0a as something like "Product with License from Dungeons and Dragons Publisher Wizards of the Coast Promotes Racial Inequality". Everything about that statement would be correct, and they could spin up a lot of controversy from that without crossing the line into libel. And WotC can't even say they're looking to close that path going forward now. Yes, they can point out there is no official connection or collaboration between them and the publisher besides that they took up an open license, but that can only come after the big fiery headline and the net result will still be bad press for WotC.
It's always been possible to do that. You could have done it under 1.2, because there are lots of ways to make something compatible with D&D without incorporating the SRD in the first place. They just don't gain any new tools.
Morality clauses are always bad because, like legal texts or licence texts, they are not irrevocable and can be interpreted quite differently in 23 years. We have just seen it. In 23 years, "irrevocable" can mean I buy a bottle of milk. Life, tricks and the world keep turning and do not wait for absolute certainty.
Says the person touting they know exactly what will happen with this scenario and the future of DnD lol.