Why the heck does WotC want my opinion on 1.2 OGL?
I am not a lawyer, I don't represent anyone that falls under this License, I will likely never sign this document anyway regardless of its language... Why does my opinion matter on this topic? Why do they want me, a player and DM to learn legal jargon for a License they have with PUBLISHERS and content creators... to give feedback.
Why are they asking you, are you a publisher? Lawyer? Content Creator? Someone who use an OGL? Does this really affect you other than potentially having less compatible adventures... maybe your preferred VTT can't offer all its features for DnD? Are you qualified to talk about this?
They tell me they want to do one thing with smooth words and FAQs, but their License that their expensive lawyers drafted says something else. Leaves it open to exploitation. How does that happen? WHOOPSIE, Dan who gets paid 1k an hour thought he was just adding onto the term Irrevocable and not changing the definition completely. But its in there now guys! LOOK WERE TRYING! Sowwy UwU
I think it speaks volumes where the Publishers and content creators are turning their attention.
Consider this my official feelback WotC, leave 1.0a alone and please stop trying to wall off the game I love from the impressive creative community around it. VTTs and all
If WotC/Hasbro was real about working on a fair new license that will allow a healthy community and 3rd party creators ecosystem to flurish they would not (pretend to) involve 99+ percent non qualified customers but invite those creators and other publishers to register to take part in an open discusion without NDAs and best in a public forum, and run iterations of drafts (then a correct term finally) collaboratively.
This farce is just to placate us and play for time, while getting a better idea what they will get away without losing any of their major goals. Unless there is a simple iron clad new version which is pretty much 1.0a (why bother then) 1.0a needs to stay as an option for future publications.
Yes, OGL is special and not at all what a publicly traded corporation owning any big IP would like to have instead of the Disney-like total control of their IP, but that is what they made over 20 years ago in order to prevent D&D just fading away lacking of a healthy community, lacking of 3rd party publications (when the IP wasn't large enough to do all the publishing themselves). Now they are pretty much saying: thanks for growing our IP, f... of and die now!
And it wouldn't even be necessary. Just make the better VTT and the better products instead of being afraid of the community and the creativity of 3rd party publishers who are almost all 1-5 people doing some publishing work in the evening and on the weekends. Maybe talk to your old buddies at Microsoft, Cythia, Chris, and talk with them about the chances open stuff such as C++ or Linux can provide to your products (or just talk to the people who were around when the OGL took hold and D&D exploded instead of dying), and create value for customers instead of relying on your lawyers to kill competition.
My opinion said better by someone else, they also called me right so I'm biased :D
For starters, the major part of this is rebuilding trust--players had an outcry and said they wanted their voices heard, so Wizards is giving folks the chance to get their voices heard.
But, a significant secondary goal with the public comment is covered by some of the points in your thread.
OGL 1.0 is a really poorly written legal document full of ambiguity, terms that could be more clearly defined, and failure to cover a number of situations it probably should. Part of the reason for that: Wizards did a really bad mish mash trying to have legalese, while also making it short and something a layperson can read. With 1.2, they tried to do something similar in terms of making the language brief and accessible to a layperson, while still having functional legal language (which 1.0 decidedly lacks).
And that is why they want the opinion of people like you. As you note in your post, you are not a lawyer, you are not familiar with legal jargon, you are not a publisher. You are a layperson--and even if you might not ever use the document, you share traits of the target audience they want to be able to read and understand the license. Your layperson comprehension of the document is important to them--it's why they are specifically asking about how comfortable you feel understanding the text as presently listed. That information is incredibly valuable to Wizards as they try to make something that straddles the difficult line between legalese and readability.
OGL 1.0 is a really poorly written legal document full of ambiguity, terms that could be more clearly defined, and failure to cover a number of situations it probably should. Part of the reason for that: Wizards did a really bad mish mash trying to have legalese, while also making it short and something a layperson can read. With 1.2, they tried to do something similar in terms of making the language brief and accessible to a layperson, while still having functional legal language (which 1.0 decidedly lacks).
Are you a contract lawyer? Can you please provide any sources for this claim? Not trying to come at you, I am Grumpy, I just want to do my due diligence since this burden is apparently being place on me.. a concerned 3rd party. Everything I'm hearing is that the license is based on Open Source Software licenses from the same Era. That some companies which utilize open source software may have a vested interest in not allowing an open source license to be "de-autherized". De-Autherized, which from a contract lawyer someone who authored a PHD Thesis on OGL, called mumbojumbo
I have listened to a few publishers saying they are just fine as is, the people who wrote the damn thing say it was written to be irrevocable. If its a matter of a "Layperson" like LIL OL ME, understanding this contract, then why aren't they just writing a new authorized version "easier to read" and leaving 1.0a to the Megaminds? What's badly worded about that hasn't been perverted in 22 years its been out, but now IT MUST CHANGE AT ALL COSTS?!
I think one argument i saw you make here was that the 1.0a had 'authorized' meaning that it COULD be deauthorized. But that's not how all the other open source software licenses work who use the same language, from what I have found in my own "research". The people who wrote it AND Wizard's own FAQ up until a year or two ago said the same thing, that it 1.0a can't be removed.
OGL 1.0 is a really poorly written legal document full of ambiguity, terms that could be more clearly defined, and failure to cover a number of situations it probably should. Part of the reason for that: Wizards did a really bad mish mash trying to have legalese, while also making it short and something a layperson can read. With 1.2, they tried to do something similar in terms of making the language brief and accessible to a layperson, while still having functional legal language (which 1.0 decidedly lacks).
Are you a contract lawyer? Can you please provide any sources for this claim? Not trying to come at you, I am Grumpy, I just want to do my due diligence since this burden is apparently being place on me.. a concerned 3rd party. Everything I'm hearing is that the license is based on Open Source Software licenses from the same Era. That some companies which utilize open source software may have a vested interest in not allowing an open source license to be "de-autherized". De-Autherized which from a contract lawyer was called mumbojumbo
I have listened to a few publishers saying they are just fine as is, the people who wrote the damn thing say it was written to be irrevocable. If its a matter of a "Layperson" like LIL OL ME, understanding this contract, then why aren't they just writing a new authorized version "easier to read" and leaving 1.0a to the Megaminds? What's badly worded about that hasn't been perverted in 22 years its been out, but now IT MUST CHANGE AT ALL COSTS?!
I think one argument i saw you make here was that the 1.0a had 'authorized' meaning that it COULD be deauthorized. But that's not how all the other open source software licenses work who use the same language, from what I have found in my own research. Which this license is based off of, so says the people who wrote it and said they based it off of open source software.
Yeah caerwyns a lawyer, but from what i understand (I myself am not a lawyer) about the whole sitaution is that they saw something else happen with one of their products at least, and dont want it happening to dnd, because dnd is one of wotc big money makers, they dont want anything..."bad" associated with the game, thats why they have been trying so hard to remove words like race and stuff from the lingo, all it takes is one bad press release no matter if its true or not to **** with their money
Yeah caerwyns a lawyer, but from what i understand (I myself am not a lawyer) about the whole sitaution is that they saw something else happen with one of their products at least, and dont want it happening to dnd, because dnd is one of wotc big money makers, they dont want anything..."bad" associated with the game, thats why they have been trying so hard to remove words like race and stuff from the lingo, all it takes is one bad press release no matter if its true or not to **** with their money
Ok so bring back the D20 badge, similar to the creator badge. Basically its a separate guideline to use, which says wizards sanctions this product and its created for our systems. Then people using the badge have to adhere to the new principles. Species, Orcs are friends not food, Tabaxi don't always land on their feet. OGL 1.0a stays in place and wizards can't catch flack for the coming wave of hate-filled content.
The first thing I am going to say is that, despite what I am going to say, I am going to participate in the survey. I have always believed that you have to give the benefit of the doubt, I include those who have shown their worst face. Then I'm going to give WoTC the benefit of the doubt.
Well, having said that, in my opinion WoTC doesn't want our opinion at all. In fact, they already know our opinion. They know it so well that 1.2 includes several elements that not even the most WoTC pros out there will accept. Why include those elements then? Because they never intended that they were in the final license. But, instead, since almost everyone will vote against it, it will serve to say: "We heard you."
Those elements are the most abusive of the license. For example, renouncing to take them to court except in the specific case of plagiarism. And, even in that case, with the conditions imposed it is impossible to win the trial. How are you going to prove that they did it intentionally? Unless WoTC admits he did it on purpose, perhaps through powers of hypnosis, or the existence of an accusatory video, it's impossible to prove that. That could change too. Even part of the wording regarding hateful content and so on.
Those little things can change. And, in fact, I'm pretty sure they're going to change. And then WoTC will come out on the balcony and shout:
It's a very muddy and churned open field for average players to cross at the moment.
For those who have followed it closely and understand the issues there are camps on opposite sides of the field and sometimes the responses have got ugly.
The simplest way to explain this to the average user is that:
Hasbro (the game company) purchased WOTC (Wizards of the Coast) recently and together they own D&D Beyond and the license of most things D&D.
Over 20 years ago an open agreement to let other people and companies use most of the D&D content to make their games was created and everyone thought the agreement was forever until ..
Hasbro decided recently it was NOT forever and along with some other decisions and actions that destroyed all trust and goodwill between the majority of players, almost all of the 3 party producers of D&D stuff (who all decided to band together) and with some other recent decisions that cost Hasbro stockholders a lot of money a month or so prior Hasbro has now started backpedaling or what it tried to do.
The survey is to determine how much damage was done and how much Hasbro will have to give up if it wants to survive. If the upcoming movie they produced is boycotted for more that 7 to 14 days there is a really good chance Hasbro could go under if a group of Shareholders tries again to separate WOTC from Hasbro. That group of shareholders tried before a few months ago because they realized while WOTC was a small part of Hasbro it produces at or over 70% of the profits for all of Hasbro.
The fly in the ointment is that not a single lawyer that has examined the last paperwork Hasbro and WOTC released that thinks there is anything to prevent Hasbro from reverting back to what it tried before and the two most important issues Hasbro has not budged off of and likely never will for if they did, they would not be able to prevent serious threats to their future VTT platform from continuing to exist or be able to exert more pressure to “nudge” users to 6 edition.
I am not a lawyer and am NOT giving legal advice or opinions. I have read up and watched real lawyers who are experts in IP law and other areas and have played since before the original OGL when the owners of D&D went very close to broke twice and have watched D&D grow and make real money under that first OGL. The fact that Hasbro and WOTC are asking opinions before they have even produced a final version of their new one is telling.
In the end this dust up might have been avoided if Hasbro executives had listened to the Wizards of The Coast executives and people and the 3 party creators but that has never been the policy of the heads of Hasbro for, they are a business in the business of making more and more money and in their recorded meeting they decided to go for making as much as they could push for and now it may cost them dearly regardless of what happens now. That trust from the players that do understand the 20-year-old agreement will never trust Hasbro again so it might be best if WOTC is separated from Hasbro but Hasbro knows they can not survive without WOTC.
This is an attempt to be as unbiased as possible in explain what is going on for those who do not follow this. I welcomed Hasbro initially but after reading up on what was happening with Magic the Gathering and other things I have soured on their upper leadership. I mention that now. I am not sure you can find anyone who is knowledgeable on everything that has happened in the last month that can unbiased.
Edit - added the word NOT
Edit changed "is" to "in" in the last sentence. No more 3: AM editing for me...
Those elements are the most abusive of the license. For example, renouncing to take them to court except in the specific case of plagiarism. And, even in that case, with the conditions imposed it is impossible to win the trial. How are you going to prove that they did it intentionally? Unless WoTC admits he did it on purpose, perhaps through powers of hypnosis, or the existence of an accusatory video, it's impossible to prove that. That could change too. Even part of the wording regarding hateful content and so on.
Yeah, they would pay you whatever small fee if any and STILL BE ABLE TO PUBLISH IT AND MAKE MONEY OFF IT!
The fly in the ointment is that not a single lawyer that has examined the last paperwork Hasbro and WOTC released that thinks there is anything to prevent Hasbro from reverting back to what it tried before and the two most important issues Hasbro has not budged off of and likely never will for if they did, they would not be able to prevent serious threats to their future VTT platform from continuing to exist or be able to exert more pressure to “nudge” users to 6 edition.
Your whole post summarizes my understanding very well, thank you RedSix. I have been absorbed in videos and these forums trying to get the full picture and to me it just seems like a huge money grab gone wrong. "Well crap, that didn't work they found out.. Ok well lets see how they feel if we nerf the VTTs that could catch up to us and we can micro transaction the players for new shirts, pants, limited time only christmas hats. Or try to pull one over with veiled language."
Meanwhile NO PUBLISHER WOULD SIGN THIS. It seems pretty clear this will end up in court for the 'de-authorization' of OGL 1.0a.
Hasbro (the game company) purchased WOTC (Wizards of the Coast) recently [...]
I don't know if there is a grammatical error there. In any case, it must be clarified that Hasbro bought WoTC in the late 90's (in 99 if I'm not mistaken). I don't think it can be considered recent.
I filled out the survey but I have to admit the whole principle of the survey seems to be to simply appease an outraged community. No one seriously believes they are going to use the survey for anything right? I mean seriously, this is a corporation trying to make money, they don't care what you think or what you want, they are going to take whatever actions they think will make them the most money.
So I agree I think the survey is just a farse... a distraction to try and calm a community that is basically in hardcore boycott mode.
The smartest thing Wizards of the Coast could do right now is abandon this entire effort, admit it was stupid, apologize and put this entire mess behind them. The D&D community does not need to be governed by Wizards of the Coast and any attempt to do so is going to backfire and make the situation worse.
It's pretty simple actually - because the customer base is able to drum up by far the most outrage and immediate effects to WotC's bottom line if they are pissed off, and because they are going to be the easiest to placate to relieve pressure on WotC by some simple choice wording. By placating the community with a few nice sounding words that those without some legal knowledge or background won't truly and fully understand, the community will start putting pressure on the more hardliners outraged (the third party publishers themselves and their big fans) to tone police each other and relieve pressure in turn. Once this happens, the community will start to go silent, and leave the third party publishers who are most effected and vulnerable (because their livelihoods depend on this matter) to fight alone against a corporation which they simply cannot do without community grassroots action, ultimately pressuring them to accept a seemingly nicely worded but still shitty licensing agreement.
Why the heck does WotC want my opinion on 1.2 OGL?
I am not a lawyer, I don't represent anyone that falls under this License, I will likely never sign this document anyway regardless of its language... Why does my opinion matter on this topic?
...
WotC, leave 1.0a alone and please stop trying to wall off the game I love from the impressive creative community around it. VTTs and all
Genuinely can't figure out if this is parody or not, so kudos if it is
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
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Askatu, hyperfocused vedalken freedom fighter in Wildspace (Zealot barb/Swashbuckler rogue/Battle Master fighter) Green Hill Sunrise, jaded tabaxi mercenary trapped in the Dark Domains (Battle Master fighter) Xhekhetiel, halfling survivor of a Betrayer Gods cult (Runechild sorcerer/fighter)
To the OP, likely they don't. There is literally no reason to think that WOTC or Hasbro give a flip about your opinion on their proposed OGL change.
"But they listened to the community and are now open to feedback."
And I'm 100% certain that when they announce the "results" of that feedback it will be exactly what the majority of the community wants and NOT 100% what WOTC/Hasbro wants...
100% ... yup... This can't POSSIBLY be WOTC/Hasbro just going through the motions and giving people the illusion of choice while they push the changes they want to make anyway, right?
I mean, call me a pessimist, but can anyone state a legitimate reason why WOTC/Hasbro should be trusted?
Here is the thing everyone seems to be missing, there is no need to get rid of OGL 1.0a. Hasbro and WotC are just trying to use buzz words to get people to accept that changes need to be made. The future issue if we move forward with OGL 1.2 is that once it is put into place, without certain language in it, they can change it however they want and there is nothing we will be able to do at that point. THAT is the only reason they want to get rid of 1.0a. Plus this thing about the CCL is just a distraction, game rules and mechanics CANNOT be copyrighted, they are just trying to distract us from the issue.
Now as a mod will be redacting this comment I will be screenshotting it and when that happens it will go everywhere as proof that I was right about their intentions.
The OP is correct. If WotC/Hasbro was real about working on a fair new license that will allow a healthy community and 3rd party creators ecosystem to flurish they would not (pretend to) involve 99+ percent non qualified customers but invite those creators and other publishers to register to take part in an open discusion without NDAs and best in a public forum, and run iterations of drafts (then a correct term finally) collaboratively.
This farce is just to placate us and play for time, while getting a better idea what they will get away without losing any of their major goals. Unless there is a simple iron clad new version which is pretty much 1.0a (why bother then) 1.0a needs to stay as an option for future publications.
Yes, OGL is special and not at all what a publicly traded corporation owning any big IP would like to have instead of the Disney-like total control of their IP, but that is what they made over 20 years ago in order to prevent D&D just fading away lacking of a healthy community, lacking of 3rd party publications (when the IP wasn't large enough to do all the publishing themselves). Now they are pretty much saying: thanks for growing our IP, f... of and die now!
And it wouldn't even be necessary. Just make the better VTT and the better products instead of being afraid of the community and the creativity of 3rd party publishers who are almost all 1-5 people doing some publishing work in the evening and on the weekends. Maybe talk to your old buddies at Microsoft, Cythia, Chris, and talk with them about the chances open stuff such as C++ or Linux can provide to your products (or just talk to the people who were around when the OGL took hold and D&D exploded instead of dying), and create value for customers instead of relying on your lawyers to kill competition.
Why the heck does WotC want my opinion on 1.2 OGL?
I am not a lawyer, I don't represent anyone that falls under this License, I will likely never sign this document anyway regardless of its language... Why does my opinion matter on this topic? Why do they want me, a player and DM to learn legal jargon for a License they have with PUBLISHERS and content creators... to give feedback.
Why are they asking you, are you a publisher? Lawyer? Content Creator? Someone who use an OGL?
Does this really affect you other than potentially having less compatible adventures... maybe your preferred VTT can't offer all its features for DnD?
Are you qualified to talk about this?
They tell me they want to do one thing with smooth words and FAQs, but their License that their expensive lawyers drafted says something else. Leaves it open to exploitation. How does that happen? WHOOPSIE, Dan who gets paid 1k an hour thought he was just adding onto the term Irrevocable and not changing the definition completely. But its in there now guys! LOOK WERE TRYING! Sowwy UwU
I think it speaks volumes where the Publishers and content creators are turning their attention.
Consider this my official feelback WotC, leave 1.0a alone and please stop trying to wall off the game I love from the impressive creative community around it. VTTs and all
[edit] upgraded image
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ANSWER:
My opinion said better by someone else, they also called me right so I'm biased :D
For starters, the major part of this is rebuilding trust--players had an outcry and said they wanted their voices heard, so Wizards is giving folks the chance to get their voices heard.
But, a significant secondary goal with the public comment is covered by some of the points in your thread.
OGL 1.0 is a really poorly written legal document full of ambiguity, terms that could be more clearly defined, and failure to cover a number of situations it probably should. Part of the reason for that: Wizards did a really bad mish mash trying to have legalese, while also making it short and something a layperson can read. With 1.2, they tried to do something similar in terms of making the language brief and accessible to a layperson, while still having functional legal language (which 1.0 decidedly lacks).
And that is why they want the opinion of people like you. As you note in your post, you are not a lawyer, you are not familiar with legal jargon, you are not a publisher. You are a layperson--and even if you might not ever use the document, you share traits of the target audience they want to be able to read and understand the license. Your layperson comprehension of the document is important to them--it's why they are specifically asking about how comfortable you feel understanding the text as presently listed. That information is incredibly valuable to Wizards as they try to make something that straddles the difficult line between legalese and readability.
Are you a contract lawyer? Can you please provide any sources for this claim? Not trying to come at you, I am Grumpy, I just want to do my due diligence since this burden is apparently being place on me.. a concerned 3rd party. Everything I'm hearing is that the license is based on Open Source Software licenses from the same Era. That some companies which utilize open source software may have a vested interest in not allowing an open source license to be "de-autherized". De-Autherized, which from
a contract lawyersomeone who authored a PHD Thesis on OGL, called mumbojumboI have listened to a few publishers saying they are just fine as is, the people who wrote the damn thing say it was written to be irrevocable. If its a matter of a "Layperson" like LIL OL ME, understanding this contract, then why aren't they just writing a new authorized version "easier to read" and leaving 1.0a to the Megaminds? What's badly worded about that hasn't been perverted in 22 years its been out, but now IT MUST CHANGE AT ALL COSTS?!
I think one argument i saw you make here was that the 1.0a had 'authorized' meaning that it COULD be deauthorized. But that's not how all the other open source software licenses work who use the same language, from what I have found in my own "research". The people who wrote it AND Wizard's own FAQ up until a year or two ago said the same thing, that it 1.0a can't be removed.
Yeah caerwyns a lawyer, but from what i understand (I myself am not a lawyer) about the whole sitaution is that they saw something else happen with one of their products at least, and dont want it happening to dnd, because dnd is one of wotc big money makers, they dont want anything..."bad" associated with the game, thats why they have been trying so hard to remove words like race and stuff from the lingo, all it takes is one bad press release no matter if its true or not to **** with their money
Ok so bring back the D20 badge, similar to the creator badge. Basically its a separate guideline to use, which says wizards sanctions this product and its created for our systems. Then people using the badge have to adhere to the new principles. Species, Orcs are friends not food, Tabaxi don't always land on their feet. OGL 1.0a stays in place and wizards can't catch flack for the coming wave of hate-filled content.
The first thing I am going to say is that, despite what I am going to say, I am going to participate in the survey. I have always believed that you have to give the benefit of the doubt, I include those who have shown their worst face. Then I'm going to give WoTC the benefit of the doubt.
Well, having said that, in my opinion WoTC doesn't want our opinion at all. In fact, they already know our opinion. They know it so well that 1.2 includes several elements that not even the most WoTC pros out there will accept. Why include those elements then? Because they never intended that they were in the final license. But, instead, since almost everyone will vote against it, it will serve to say: "We heard you."
Those elements are the most abusive of the license. For example, renouncing to take them to court except in the specific case of plagiarism. And, even in that case, with the conditions imposed it is impossible to win the trial. How are you going to prove that they did it intentionally? Unless WoTC admits he did it on purpose, perhaps through powers of hypnosis, or the existence of an accusatory video, it's impossible to prove that. That could change too. Even part of the wording regarding hateful content and so on.
Those little things can change. And, in fact, I'm pretty sure they're going to change. And then WoTC will come out on the balcony and shout:
"D&D community, we heard you!"
It's a very muddy and churned open field for average players to cross at the moment.
For those who have followed it closely and understand the issues there are camps on opposite sides of the field and sometimes the responses have got ugly.
The simplest way to explain this to the average user is that:
The survey is to determine how much damage was done and how much Hasbro will have to give up if it wants to survive. If the upcoming movie they produced is boycotted for more that 7 to 14 days there is a really good chance Hasbro could go under if a group of Shareholders tries again to separate WOTC from Hasbro. That group of shareholders tried before a few months ago because they realized while WOTC was a small part of Hasbro it produces at or over 70% of the profits for all of Hasbro.
The fly in the ointment is that not a single lawyer that has examined the last paperwork Hasbro and WOTC released that thinks there is anything to prevent Hasbro from reverting back to what it tried before and the two most important issues Hasbro has not budged off of and likely never will for if they did, they would not be able to prevent serious threats to their future VTT platform from continuing to exist or be able to exert more pressure to “nudge” users to 6 edition.
I am not a lawyer and am NOT giving legal advice or opinions. I have read up and watched real lawyers who are experts in IP law and other areas and have played since before the original OGL when the owners of D&D went very close to broke twice and have watched D&D grow and make real money under that first OGL. The fact that Hasbro and WOTC are asking opinions before they have even produced a final version of their new one is telling.
In the end this dust up might have been avoided if Hasbro executives had listened to the Wizards of The Coast executives and people and the 3 party creators but that has never been the policy of the heads of Hasbro for, they are a business in the business of making more and more money and in their recorded meeting they decided to go for making as much as they could push for and now it may cost them dearly regardless of what happens now. That trust from the players that do understand the 20-year-old agreement will never trust Hasbro again so it might be best if WOTC is separated from Hasbro but Hasbro knows they can not survive without WOTC.
This is an attempt to be as unbiased as possible in explain what is going on for those who do not follow this. I welcomed Hasbro initially but after reading up on what was happening with Magic the Gathering and other things I have soured on their upper leadership. I mention that now. I am not sure you can find anyone who is knowledgeable on everything that has happened in the last month that can unbiased.
Edit - added the word NOT
Edit changed "is" to "in" in the last sentence. No more 3: AM editing for me...
Yeah, they would pay you whatever small fee if any and STILL BE ABLE TO PUBLISH IT AND MAKE MONEY OFF IT!
Your whole post summarizes my understanding very well, thank you RedSix. I have been absorbed in videos and these forums trying to get the full picture and to me it just seems like a huge money grab gone wrong. "Well crap, that didn't work they found out.. Ok well lets see how they feel if we nerf the VTTs that could catch up to us and we can micro transaction the players for new shirts, pants, limited time only christmas hats. Or try to pull one over with veiled language."
Meanwhile NO PUBLISHER WOULD SIGN THIS. It seems pretty clear this will end up in court for the 'de-authorization' of OGL 1.0a.
I don't know if there is a grammatical error there. In any case, it must be clarified that Hasbro bought WoTC in the late 90's (in 99 if I'm not mistaken). I don't think it can be considered recent.
I filled out the survey but I have to admit the whole principle of the survey seems to be to simply appease an outraged community. No one seriously believes they are going to use the survey for anything right? I mean seriously, this is a corporation trying to make money, they don't care what you think or what you want, they are going to take whatever actions they think will make them the most money.
So I agree I think the survey is just a farse... a distraction to try and calm a community that is basically in hardcore boycott mode.
The smartest thing Wizards of the Coast could do right now is abandon this entire effort, admit it was stupid, apologize and put this entire mess behind them. The D&D community does not need to be governed by Wizards of the Coast and any attempt to do so is going to backfire and make the situation worse.
It's pretty simple actually - because the customer base is able to drum up by far the most outrage and immediate effects to WotC's bottom line if they are pissed off, and because they are going to be the easiest to placate to relieve pressure on WotC by some simple choice wording. By placating the community with a few nice sounding words that those without some legal knowledge or background won't truly and fully understand, the community will start putting pressure on the more hardliners outraged (the third party publishers themselves and their big fans) to tone police each other and relieve pressure in turn. Once this happens, the community will start to go silent, and leave the third party publishers who are most effected and vulnerable (because their livelihoods depend on this matter) to fight alone against a corporation which they simply cannot do without community grassroots action, ultimately pressuring them to accept a seemingly nicely worded but still shitty licensing agreement.
"Hasbro to Acquire D&D Beyond" is from April of 2022 if I am not mistaken and what I should have added there at the end.
fixed error
Genuinely can't figure out if this is parody or not, so kudos if it is
Active characters:
Askatu, hyperfocused vedalken freedom fighter in Wildspace (Zealot barb/Swashbuckler rogue/Battle Master fighter)
Green Hill Sunrise, jaded tabaxi mercenary trapped in the Dark Domains (Battle Master fighter)
Xhekhetiel, halfling survivor of a Betrayer Gods cult (Runechild sorcerer/fighter)
Thank you, still waking up.
To the OP, likely they don't. There is literally no reason to think that WOTC or Hasbro give a flip about your opinion on their proposed OGL change.
"But they listened to the community and are now open to feedback."
And I'm 100% certain that when they announce the "results" of that feedback it will be exactly what the majority of the community wants and NOT 100% what WOTC/Hasbro wants...
100% ... yup... This can't POSSIBLY be WOTC/Hasbro just going through the motions and giving people the illusion of choice while they push the changes they want to make anyway, right?
I mean, call me a pessimist, but can anyone state a legitimate reason why WOTC/Hasbro should be trusted?
D&D Beyond was a separate entity until they bought it. The actual D&D franchise has been part of WotC since the 90s
Thanks for the correction.
Here is the thing everyone seems to be missing, there is no need to get rid of OGL 1.0a. Hasbro and WotC are just trying to use buzz words to get people to accept that changes need to be made. The future issue if we move forward with OGL 1.2 is that once it is put into place, without certain language in it, they can change it however they want and there is nothing we will be able to do at that point. THAT is the only reason they want to get rid of 1.0a. Plus this thing about the CCL is just a distraction, game rules and mechanics CANNOT be copyrighted, they are just trying to distract us from the issue.
Now as a mod will be redacting this comment I will be screenshotting it and when that happens it will go everywhere as proof that I was right about their intentions.
The OP is correct. If WotC/Hasbro was real about working on a fair new license that will allow a healthy community and 3rd party creators ecosystem to flurish they would not (pretend to) involve 99+ percent non qualified customers but invite those creators and other publishers to register to take part in an open discusion without NDAs and best in a public forum, and run iterations of drafts (then a correct term finally) collaboratively.
This farce is just to placate us and play for time, while getting a better idea what they will get away without losing any of their major goals. Unless there is a simple iron clad new version which is pretty much 1.0a (why bother then) 1.0a needs to stay as an option for future publications.
Yes, OGL is special and not at all what a publicly traded corporation owning any big IP would like to have instead of the Disney-like total control of their IP, but that is what they made over 20 years ago in order to prevent D&D just fading away lacking of a healthy community, lacking of 3rd party publications (when the IP wasn't large enough to do all the publishing themselves). Now they are pretty much saying: thanks for growing our IP, f... of and die now!
And it wouldn't even be necessary. Just make the better VTT and the better products instead of being afraid of the community and the creativity of 3rd party publishers who are almost all 1-5 people doing some publishing work in the evening and on the weekends. Maybe talk to your old buddies at Microsoft, Cythia, Chris, and talk with them about the chances open stuff such as C++ or Linux can provide to your products (or just talk to the people who were around when the OGL took hold and D&D exploded instead of dying), and create value for customers instead of relying on your lawyers to kill competition.