Open Game License

[Char-Vell]

This may be of interest to any pencil and paper RPG players out there. Particularly OSR D&D players.

[bonesaw]

Wow, Hasbro has been on a tear lately. They completely botched the Heroscape resurrection, wanting fans to pony up unreasonable startup money for an inferior product. It failed. They showed their further greed with Magic's 30th Anniversary sale. Close to a grand for "the experience" of opening up some cards from a past era (that are not tournament legal) and now this.

There are so many of these huge companies, detached from reality that I want so badly to watch crash and burn, hopefully slowly and painfully so I can take delight in it over a long period of time.

[Jason Aiken]

I'm siding with all the little guys in this fight. D&D is no longer Gary Gygax's baby, it's another whore property for Hasbro now.

[Erik]

Been hearing a lot about this nonsense lately, and I'm definitely siding with the little guys too. I still play Pathfinder 1st edition, actually, which uses the OGL and was Paizo's response to the disappointment of D&D 4th ed. If this actually happens, there are companies like Paizo that will certainly fight it.

[bonesaw]

The timing of this is funny. I just started talking to my young boys (12, 9, 9) about Dungeons and Dragons- how it uses your imagination, dice, pencil and paper. They LOVED the HeroQuest boardgame so I think they will also love D&D. I have the original red box Basic set from the 80s that we will start with, then it is on to 2nd Edition, The Jungles of Chult, Forgotten Realms and Ravenloft of which I have plenty of modules.

2nd Edition for life!

It brings a tear to my eye thinking back to how awesome things used to be. Gen Con in Milwaukee was great! Dungeon players filling the Mecca arena floor, just tables everywhere. Pickup games of magic everywhere too. I remember complaining about paying 20 bucks for a Black Lotus Magic card back then. In hindsight, I should have bought them all. I'm happy with the one that I have though. The vendor floor would have the giant TSR castle at the center, artists all over the place. I got Boris, Julie Bell, Elmore, Parkinson, Brom and others autograph in a D&D art book.

Yeah, now we have this tripe.

[Jason Aiken]

Paizo kicks Hasbro in the greedy corporate teeth:

gizmodo.com/paizo-wizards-of-the-coast-dnd-open-rpg-ogl-1-1-1849982443

[Von K]

Thanks for the update Jason. Just caught up with this.

More info on the 1.1 version of the OGL here:



gizmodo.com/dnd-wizards-of-the-coast-ogl-1-1-open-gaming-license-1849950634

Hasbro's new licensing rules basically boil down to:



Vader was ultimately redeemable. Hasbro? Well - we'll see.

[Erik]

Jan 12, 2023 20:13:10 GMT -5 Jason Aiken said:

Paizo kicks Hasbro in the greedy corporate teeth:

gizmodo.com/paizo-wizards-of-the-coast-dnd-open-rpg-ogl-1-1-1849982443

Haha yes!  This is excellent.    Been playing Pathfinder for well over a decade, ever since D&D came out with the terrible 4th edition rules, and Paizo pulled through back then by creating their own version of the 3rd edition rules.  Glad to see they're standing up against Hasbro once again.

[Von K]

Yeah, Pathfinder was the best thing to come out of that awkward and baffling 4th edition. Paizo have made awesome refinements to the rules over the years since and built a great community around it.

Here's a short but enlightening vid by D+D Shorts on youtube that shows some of the nasty stuff that certain corporate execs at WotC were planning. He explains we only got to know about this because some brave creators (threatened with NDA's) and employees at WotC risked their careers to let the community know what was going on.

Exposing Every Lie In Wizards' Offical Statement

DnD Shorts

1 day ago

I don't want WotC to go out of business. I truly believe there is a way to have a hugely profitable company, make a great game, and not screw over your audience.



But to do that, we need trust. Wizards' are so terrified of admitting a mistake, they immediatly resort to lying and manipulation. They don't seem to realise that the battle isn't for the OGL anymore, it's for their entire companies reputation in the eyes of the community.



IMPORTANT: Every source I have at WotC who have spoken out in support of this movement has made special note that Jeremy Crawford and the design team are passionate creators and irl good people. The fight is with WotC, the company, not WotC employees. They are doing all they can too. We're in this together. Now let's win.

[Von K]

Paizo Announces System-Neutral Open RPG License

Thursday, January 12, 2023

For the last several weeks, as rumors of Wizards of the Coast’s new version of the Open Game License began circulating among publishers and on social media, gamers across the world have been asking what Paizo plans to do in light of concerns regarding Wizards of the Coast’s rumored plan to de-authorize the existing OGL 1.0(a). We have been awaiting further information, hoping that Wizards would realize that, for more than 20 years, the OGL has been a mutually beneficial license which should not–and cannot–be revoked. While we continue to await an answer from Wizards, we strongly feel that Paizo can no longer delay making our own feelings about the importance of Open Gaming a part of the public discussion.

We believe that any interpretation that the OGL 1.0 or 1.0(a) were intended to be revocable or able to be deauthorized is incorrect, and with good reason.

We were there.

Paizo owner Lisa Stevens and Paizo president Jim Butler were leaders on the Dungeons & Dragons team at Wizards at the time. Brian Lewis, co-founder of Azora Law, the intellectual property law firm that Paizo uses, was the attorney at Wizards who came up with the legal framework for the OGL itself. Paizo has also worked very closely on OGL-related issues with Ryan Dancey, the visionary who conceived the OGL in the first place.

Paizo does not believe that the OGL 1.0a can be “deauthorized,” ever. While we are prepared to argue that point in a court of law if need be, we don’t want to have to do that, and we know that many of our fellow publishers are not in a position to do so.

We have no interest whatsoever in Wizards’ new OGL. Instead, we have a plan that we believe will irrevocably and unquestionably keep alive the spirit of the Open Game License.

paizo.com/community/blog/v5748dyo6si7v?Paizo-Announces-SystemNeutral-Open-RPG-License#discuss

Edit: Ayargh! I managed to miss that the article Jason posted above already linked to this. Howthesomever I think we should have a direct link to it here in this thread for reference.

[Von K]

Update from Paizo:

The ORC Alliance Grows

paizo.com/community/blog/v5748dyo6si7y?The-ORC-Alliance-Grows#discuss

Meanwhile, D+D Shorts provides a glimpse which seems to be the closest we'll get as to why Hasbro/WotC are taking this route:

Every Insider Leak I've Been Given On Wizards of the Coast

Although bias is inevitable in any account from a human, I believe that when multiple people (across multiple departments) are saying the same things, we can put a lot more trust in that information.

However, I'd ask that your remember two things:

1) These employees felt the need to risk their livelihoods to come forward. It is unlikely they would have done so had they not had extremely serious concerns regarding Wizards of the Coast and the OGL. Please bear this in mind when evalutating their comments. Content employees usually don't risk everything to break silence.

2) I am merely representing to the best of my ability what these people have told me. I do not work at Wizards. However, I believe all the information I present in this video to be true. Not only was it verified by multiple people, but it tracks with leaks others have exposed (from insiders I am not in contact with), and explains a great deal of WotC's actions over the last year in a way that WotC's own accounts of their behaviour do not.

[Von K]

Wizards Surrender The OGL! WotC's Full Statement Is Wild

DnD Shorts
3 hours ago
Thank you, to everyone who fought. From the insiders at WotC to the outsiders to the community who joined for what they saw was right.

Paizo have experienced a massive sales boost over the last two weeks. They are out of inventory and needing to print more. They haven't yet released an official statement on their blog.

[Von K]

Dungeons & Dragons Scraps Plans to Update Its Open Game License

gizmodo.com/dungeons-dragons-will-no-longer-deauthorize-its-open-1850041837

If Dungeons & Dragons follows through with all its promises in this statement, it’s possible that they could restore the goodwill it lost between then and now.

[Erik]

Ha! I had a feeling they'd give up. They may be able to restore their goodwill, but it might take awhile. For now, much of the damage has already been done.

[Von K]

Good value digital deal from Paizo:

Paizo Partners With Humble Bundle to Tempt New Players

gizmodo.com/paizo-humble-bundle-pathfinder-pf2e-new-player-rules-1850067658

After selling out of physical products, Paizo offers a huge deal on digital products to challenge D&D's control over the TTRPG industry.

By Linda Codega