> D&D phenomenon will outlive WotC ... gross mismanagement will not kill it.
while community driven projects _could_ live, it would be under constant legal threat, which prevents it from growing independently of WotC. Esp. if there's an aspect of commercialization in there. This means that any project would seek first to cooperate with WotC, which means they get a control, and may be commercial benefit.
There are plenty of D&D-adjacent works that exist with no legal dependency on WotC, which rely on how game mechanics (as distinct from the specific expression of them) can't be copyrighted.
Honestly, as a 30+ year DM who has played every edition from 1st to cap (except 4th- only made it to 6th), what people play at their table is wildly different from group to group. I don't know many experienced DMs who don't do a huge amount of homebrew.
And there is no legal threat to 95% of homebrew, never will be. Why? Because I just do what I want with their IP (Wotc) and it never reaches further than my players. Most people do not publish to the world, they present to their players. Very few folks make an official doc, get it printed, add their own mechanics, build a world atlas etc.
It will stop things like the "wheel of time" (books not tv) adaption, the reasonably widely available dark sun fan made version, "one night strahd" etc.
Now that is a shame. But. 50% + of it was drek. And half of what was good rode rough-shod over other folks ideas, vision and IP and made money for the writers for it. If you are re-doing elric's world in 5th ed, you owe a bit to Michael Moorcock (which is ironic as he dis-owns it as pulp and beneath him), and owe a bit to wizards-o-t-c because you are probably re-skinning their hard work.
What is more disappointing is that Wotc is actively trying to model their monetization of DnD in the future on mobile gaming and free-to-play computer games.. I kid you not. Luckily there are basic, adnd 1st ed, 2nd, 3rd, 3.5 and 5th ed to choose form for cool playable systems, and that's if you want to stick to "original" dnd. So 6th ed, with whatever horrible monetization they formulate may well just rot in it's own lonely purgatory with it's older brother 4th edition. (which, to be fair has a couple of cool things but overall was a failure, IMO)
Hasbro can do whatever they want to the OGL, or throw it completely away, and still just give CRP an actual license (which Hasbro's already done by directly publishing CRP-setting products). I mean, there's a fucking Critical Role CLUE.
"Gross mismanagement" and "D&D" are kind of synonyms: from Gygax' losing control to the incompetent Blume brothers (whose genius business decisions included trying to raise a 19th century shipwreck), to the takeover by Buck Rogers heiress/grifter Lorraine Williams.
Thankfully the game has so far successfully rolled all its Bad Management Saving Throws.
I completely agree with this. Much like when a “trademark” becomes common speech and loses its protection, cultural artefacts should move into the public domain.
Not based on time, based on their value to the culture.
I play a French RPG called Rôle'n Play, that's heavily based on the DRS, essentially adding new classes, species, spells, and a whole lot more content. I'd be crushed if I had to see it cancelled because WotC decided they didn't like the competition. With this move anyway, they ensured that I would nevemore buy any WotC licensed product, and I'll start by not watching, not even pirating the upcoming DnD movie. I do hope they'll backpedal, but it'll be a long time before they get my trust again.
I'm sad to see this kind of sentiment - D&D is fun, but there are so many TTRPGs out there. I'm highly recommending checking out all the lesser known games by companies like Chaosium, Modiphius, Free League (I just recently had some great sessions of Tales from the Loop and The One Ring), Atlas Games, Steve Jackson Games and others!
a fair bit of the popularity is due to the splat books; world building is hard, and the world of Forgotten Realms is huge and detailed - combine that with the large number of iconic IP that they have, it would be a shame to have to abandon everything D&D completely.
This leak feels like a trial balloon (sanctioned or not). I suspect there is enough "hmm is this a good idea" and pushback within wotc that this is a way to gauge how terrible of an idea this really is (it is terrible and would burn the brand down).
That's a separate matter. Perpetual just means it doesn't expire on its own - only if revoked by the authors. Separately, if you based a business on creating a work with a valid license, if the license is later revoked, there is a good chance courts will protect your right to keep selling the work you based your business on, even if the current license no longer allows it - that is what I understood the OP was explaining.
The problem with relying on a court to protect your small OGL derived business is that Hasbro has much deeper pockets to keep somebody tied up in litigation and appeals for years, that they probably can't afford.
You're missing the bigger picture... keep small fry tied up, make them not win and then nobody else has a precedent ruling. Take a proper money making business to court first time and you risk them actually fighting and winning.
Even if thechange does not apply to works that have already been published, this is still newspeak. This is lawyers chosing words to mean what they say they mean whenever they say it.
The Apache license does have the word irrevocable.
But BSD, MIT, EPL and others do not. Does that mean that if the copyright holder for lib v1.0 decides to change the licence for lib v1.0 (not subsequent versions) to something restrictive then everything using it gets frozen in time and nothing new can be made?
Right, and I think the person trying to legally poke the status quo on this issue is an idiot (as in, they are in Carlo M. Cipolla's lower left quadrant) because it will either blow up in their face or it will blow up in everyone's face.
Same as with Oracle vs Google, other than a bunch of court room sophists, nobody really gained anything.
No, unless they licensed their work in a way that makes the new OGL the correct license (like the "GPLv2 or later" language some software projects chose).
WOTC only has the ability to change the license of IP they own, even retroactively. However, works based on WOTC IP which were legal under the OGLv1.0 may no longer be legal under the new terms, putting them in a legal gray area (they may be illegal to distribute, or they may still be legal to distribute but only because they were legal at the time they were created).
Creating new works based on the old IP that would have been legal under the OGLv1.0 would almost certainly not be legal if WOTC changes the license, though.
Note that section 9 of the OGL is an "or later" clause allowing Wizards to publish new authorized versions. (Wizards are now also claiming they can deauthorize versions which is much more wishful on their behalf)
Please send this new definition to the compilers of my legal dictionary. What you write is arguable for the license as a while, but in no way inheres to the word itself. Interestingly there is a common law 'rule against perpetuities' due to the legal headaches they create in wills and trusts. This would probably bias a US court somewhat against a broad interpretation of the license, but then again it might also bias it against the licensor whose carelessness gave rise to the litigation in the first place.
Unless the original license includes a revocation or termination clause, it cannot be unilaterally revoked or terminated. The OGL does include a termination clause but it doesn't apply in this context
A license doesn't limit the rights of the licensor in any way that is not explicitly mentioned in the license text. So any license can be implicitly revoked if it doesn't explicitly say it is irrevocable (e.g. the GPL says exactly that, to avoid this kind of loophole).
The GPL v3 uses the word "irrevocable". The GPL v2 and earlier, and many other open source licenses, don't.
But that the authors of GPL v3 wanted to close this gotcha loophole that you and the forum lawyer calls attention to, doesn't mean the gotcha loophole would have worked. Nor that it's going to work, or even will continue working even if it's worked before.
Courts aren't computers just executing legal code - for good and bad.
Sure, nothing is certain related to legal matters. I was looking into this some more and there are apparently even arguments that even the GPLv3 is actually revokeable as long as all the copies were given away for free. Of course, others argue that even the BSD or MIT license are irrevocable.
There is little case law about software re-licensing at least, so yeah, it's hard to say.
Where in US statutory law or case law is there an implicit right to revoke a license unilaterally?
There is plenty of case law that says the opposite. For instance Cohen v. Paramount Picture shows that copyright licenses are not unilaterally revocable even if the original license doesn't explicitly state it is irrevocable.
A license is an enforceable contract. Revocation requires the consent of both parties, if no exception is provided for originally. Eisenberg, The Revocation of Offers covers many of the nuances of when a contract or even an offer is no longer revocable.
I don't speak legalese, but does the absence of a termination clause mean it cannot be terminated, or does the presence of a non-terminable clause mean it cannot be terminated?
That is, if it's not explicitly mentioned, which one applies?
There is a termination clause which lists the acceptable reason as being a failure to fix a breach of the license within 30 days of being notified of that breach.
The fact that there is no "we have a new version" clause listed in the termination section would likely go against wizards but they are likely to claim deauthorization is different to termination.
> "Perpetual" has a precise meaning: it lasts until it is explicitly revoked
I guess this explains why the Terms of Service for some sites that host user generated content state that as a user you grant the company a perpetual, irrevocable license to use your content. Makes sense, thank you.
Like many legal terms, it has a specific meaning influenced by statutes and case law that differs from and is more precise than the standard dictionary definition. You’re not likely to win a legal case if your defence is pointing at ‘perpetual’ in your Webster’s. Although the lawyers might have a good laugh if you try.
I'm more of a black's guy. I don't think it's a simple case for either side, rather that WOTC and whoever drafted the contract now face a years-long headache in which both sides play citation bingo until one of them runs out of money or willpower. Given that gamers are involved, it could go on a while.
That's a really common thing. In Polish copyright law, any license expires after five years by default unless it explicitly states that it's perpetual - which doesn't mean it becomes irrevocable at all (in fact, it's easier to revoke a perpetual license than a timed one).
That said, this is an open license rather than a regular two-sided contract, which makes a lot of things about it untested in courts and there are some pretty good legal arguments for considering it irrevocable flying around (just like in case of GPLv2, for example).
Also in the Magic world has WOTC been making a stir recently. They have reprinted non-playable versions of cards they promised never to reprint like Black Lotus and sell them at staggering prices. This has been seen as a breach of trust in a desperate attempt to fulfill their promise of growing profits[1] and even Bank of America has warned against their stock[2].
The high prices of the packs were ridiculous but the reserve list is tournament legal cards only, and as far as I can see almost every playgroup has a cube or commander decks with high quality proxies these days, so I don’t blame them for trying. Far worse is the systematic dismantling of organised play that has meant ‘tournament legal’ has become meaningless for many people, but perhaps the latest iteration of the Pro Tour will stick.
Can you say more about "the systematic dismantling of organised play" please? I've been out of the loop for a few years, but I used to play semi-competitively (i.e. I tried to play competitively but I sucked at it :)
But the Gizmodo article has an annoying unrelated video that starts to play when you scroll down in the article on mobile, and the video positions itself to the top of the screen and remains there as you scroll further.
For this reason I think the Gizmodo link does not deserve traffic.
I agree. Not only is the video irrelevant, it also covers 1/4 of the screen and can't be removed.
And they do show ads despite having the reject all button pressed.
Essentially you are allowed to use the rules of DnD (and other games that use the license) to make derivative work as long as its also published with OGL.
It allows homebrewed content to exist and is part of the reason the DnD community is so big.
WoTC (Wizards of the Coast, the owner of DnD) is “updating” the license from 1.0 to 1.1 and is using the update as an excuse to clamp down on competition and limit what can be used.
This has a far reaching effect because 1.0 would be revoked which means lots of content that has already been created would be put in a grey area, WoTC could sue anyone who made content for ownership even if it was made with the previous license.
It also puts entire games like Pathfinder into question as these are essentially modded DnD.
>WoTC could sue anyone who made content for ownership even if it was made with the previous license.
Unless I misunderstand, according to the submitted thread this isn't the case.
>The good news is that, because of the reliance principle, third party creators who have already created a work under the OGL likely could continue to sell that work even if the OGL were revoked. They just could not create any new works.
I think that there's some detail here that hasn't been addressed in the replies that you've received so far.
My understanding (relatively naive, though I am a long time consumre of D&D products) is that Hasbro has been making some questionable decisions recently particularly regarding their golden goose, which is Magic the Gathering. Some of those decisions have really annoyed the fan base, e.g. the Black Orchid debacle (they replublished a bunch of cards that they promised would never be republished, at hugely inflated prices).
In an attempt to shore up their share price and profits, they've reviewed their other product lines to see if there's any slack that can take up the load: which puts D&D in play. The bean counters believe that Hasbro is leaving a lot of money on the table; It's very popular and has had something of a resurgance recently due to popular media like Stranger Things and Critical Role, along with the well received 5th edition.
Ignoring direct IP licencing (e.g. games/movies/etc.), the majority of the revenue is from Games/Dungeon masters (as I understand it, in line with my experience), and not the players. DMs buy the books and run the game. DMs are a fraction of their player base, and there's certainly many who depend on free/open products to save costs. The powers that be believe that some of that can be monetised more effectively and they're trying to think of ways to extract more money from more people.
D&D 5e does fill an important niche; it's the public face of table-top role-play gaming, and it's pretty easy for anyone to pick up and run/play, however it's not the only product on the market and there are many products that serve the customers better (even if they're less accessible and require an understanding of the genre to choose) - Hasbro/WotC have to make this work, and quickly, or they run the risk of losing everything.
Paizo (via Pathfinder) probably has the most to win here; it's well known in the community and has much better support for people who prefer a "crunchy" game. Paizo are probably kicking themselves for not removing their dependency on the OGL when they released Pathfinder 2e (which is what my group plays most frequently).
3.5 is (as you'd expect) a revised edition of 3.0; Both are covered by the OGL 1.0 (which was created for the release of 3.0).
3.5 was an update released for balance reasons, as I understand it and didn't change core gameplay - it removed some of the more broken exploits, but you can use 3.0 material with 3.5 with relatively few, if any changes: most of the balance problem was player side.
I used to play basic D&D as a child, and then sort of ignored the whole genre until around 2005 when I picked it back up again, using 3.5, so I'm not an expert on it by any means.
In this case, it refers to a large part of the Dungeons & Dragons system, normally kept in books you have to pay for. Wizards of the Coast, who down the D&D IP, decided to "open source" most of the system and a lot of monsters as a way to drive 3rd party engagement. Remove any licensing restrictions, have at it nerds, build a community.
Hasboro has since acquired Wizards (years ago, actually), and has decided to reign in the licensing. Several other games / game systems / publishers are using these open source rules, and it threatens to alter or extinguish that community.
Interesting, so this seems analogous to trying to revoke or rescind a GPL license in the software world?
This is something that has been tried in the past, IIRC, when a project with a single contributor has attracted a commercial buyer that wants to take the product closed-source.
In the case I so vaguely remember (video software of some sort?), they tried to say that not only would future releases be closed, but that all previous GPL versions were now revoked, and continued use was copyright violation. From what I can remember, the community response was basically "LOL no".
Sure - IANAL, IANYL, legal matters are complex etc. But there is a reason why the GPL authors explicitly added the "irrevocable" clause, and it is that it strengthens the chances the copyright holder can't make retroactive changes.
Note that apparently some lawyers believe even the GPLv3 could in fact be retroactively revoked by the copyright holders, as long as the copies were given away for free, despite the explicit language to the contrary.
> Note that apparently some lawyers believe even the GPLv3 could in fact be retroactively revoked by the copyright holders, as long as the copies were given away for free, despite the explicit language to the contrary.
Doesn't mean much to me unless I know who's paying them to believe / worry about that.
Sure - and I'm not claiming they're automatically right. Here is the precise quote I read, just for completeness [0]:
> Eugene Volokh, a law professor at UCLA, said that Mattel might be able to argue that the GPL is invalid because users don't pay for the free software.
> "Nonexclusive licenses given for free are generally revocable, even if they purport to be irrevocable," Volokh said. "Even if the GPL license in cphack is treated as signed and is covered by 205(e), it might still be revocable by Mattel as the new owners of the cphack copyright."
> "It is unfortunately not quite as solid a case for the good guys as the GNU license theory would have at first led us to believe," he said.
The article itself was an interesting case, where Mattel acquired the rights to a program they wanted to stop the distribution of (cphack), which apparently had been released under the GPL, and successfully sued to stop anyone from distributing it anymore. However, whether those that created it in the first place had had the right to distribute it was in doubt, so it's probably not a good test of the GPL itself.
Here's some lawyers arguing the opposite, that a free software license is a binding contract, and in particular for the US one, that there is the consideration that the Mattel case argued wasn't there: https://lwn.net/Articles/747563/
This is like Games Workshop. Trying to control things after the horse has long bolted.
I don't actually know anyone still playing any version of D&D at this point. Everyone I know is either Pathfinder, OSR or some other indie RPG (MORK BORG seems popular right now).
5e is the most commonly played ttrpg currently I would gamble. Due to the recent mainstream adoption. When acquaintances hear that I DM ttrpgs that's what they ask me about and it's 70% because of Stranger things.
Which is ironic because I know it would be a challenge to even get to a first session with them in such a system. Instead I play Knave with them.
That's mysterious to me. 5th edition has a number of distinctly un D&D-ish features as I see it, as one who - like the fictional Stranger Things kids - played D&D in the late 80s.
I don't think it's actually Stranger Things driving 5th ed popularity, though. If it was, surely they'd go for something more retro. I think it's the big tabletop RPG streamers.
I haven't watched Stranger Things but I see where you are coming from. I tend to prefer OSR games these days myself and I think 5e is pretty bad.
But these people don't know anything about TTRPGs in general, they use Google and the SEO directs them into the sales funnel of 5e.
EDIT: The other big channel in is watching Critical Role streams. And if that is your only reference with their particular ads it will draw you into the current, and large, ecosystem of 5e.
Stranger Things doesn't go into that sort of detail at all. It just mentions D&D and a couple of monsters, and that's it. Specific editions of D&D are completely irrelevant to people excited about D&D because of Stranger Things. It just raises attention and that brings in new players, who have generally never heard of B/X, BECMI, AD&D or d20. It's just D&D.
I'm not sure what you're trying to refer to with that Games Workshop comment. They've generally been a very good steward of their IP and have brought a number of fan creators in-house.
There was a lot of drama but no creator was ever asked to stop producing fan-content. What did happen was some creators got bullied by the fanbase though. [1]
Some of those creators got full-time jobs and others were asked to stop monetising the content. I'm not sure why either of those are problems.
No one has to stop doing what they're doing and some folks get to work officially for an IP they're passionate about.
As far as the Space Marine book thing, sure, that was dumb but hardly a big deal and the Chapterhouse lawsuit was a decade ago. GW has changed significantly and noticeably since.
5e is sort of the "lingua franca" of TTRPGs in all of my friend groups. Some groups I know run Pathfinder, I've run FATE games before, but the majority continue to be 5e. Many people I know got into 5e through Critical Roll. I agree though that with the internet and accessible simulators it wouldn't be that hard to come up with a replacement if WotC insists on enforcing this license change.
A coworker of mine DM's our local Roll20 5e group. This fills the gap in my gaming left by COVID destroying my attendance at Friday Night Magic (EDH). That FLGS actually closed doors due to COVID.
Even playing online it's a nice chance to do something social with fellow English-speakers and away from my family responsibilities. As a system, I'm not hugely wedded to 5e. I'm actually doing a deep-dive worldbuilding with Traveller: The New Era (early 90's sci-fi).
This is why I've been seeing a big push for Pathfinder 2e, right? I suppose there are some game mechanics reasons too, but a project that isn't owned by a bully will probably see more organic support.
But Pathfinder depends on the SRDs under the 1.0 OGL - these changes would require Paizo to accept the new terms to publish anything new for 2e (or create a 3e that doesn't build off the D20 SRDs)
The comments on that thread are wild. Lawyers going back and forth about things I don't understand but can kinda loosely follow along with. Check it out if you're bored.
Having read the Gizmodo article[1] before this, I’m coming away confused about how licensing language works. In addition to revoking a “perpetual” license, there are hints that WotC plans to force any entity that is commercially selling products now to agree to the new license or cease sales. This sounds like they are planning to take a cut of all products by retroactively cancelling the 1.0a license. This is counter to what is explained in OP’s link about being able to continue selling existing products.
Aside from the confusing “perpetual” !== “irrevocable” language, how would it be legal to suddenly start taking cuts of existing businesses? If WotC were to attempt this, would it be legal? It sounds like it would be based on the explanation of being able to revoke an existing license. But that sounds like a giant legal loophole to me.
Perpetual refers to time only. Contracts have to contemplate an end date. In perpetuity is just an acknowledgement that the parties have thought about time, and have agreed that there is no natural end date, but that does not foreclose other termination triggers, like revocability.
The MIT license also doesn't explicitly say it is irrevocable. It doesn't even say the license is perpetual. Does that mean that any software that is MIT licensed (or any of the many other licenses that doesn't have that wording) could be revoked at any time? That could have some pretty bad repercussions.
My understanding is the software released as MIT is pereptually MIT. Additional updates could change the license, but that won't retroactiely affect previous releases. The MIT license explicitly allows sublicensing.
The crux of the argument is OGL section 9's use of "authorized":
> 9. Updating the License: Wizards or its designated Agents may publish updated versions of this License. You may use any authorized version of this License to copy, modify and distribute any Open Game Content originally distributed under any version of this License.
And 1.1's rumored revocation of that authorization. And no matter how clear in common sense it might be that Hasbro shouldn't be able to do that, I don't think we're going to find out exactly how that falls apart until it's ruled upon in a court.
It isn't defined what it means for a version to be "authorized" though, which means it is ambiguous. And the FAQ for the original OGL makes it pretty clear that that intent was that once a version is authorized, it can't be un-authorized. As a layman, non-lawyer that seems like a pretty tough argument for WOTC.
Does this mean that if I have released some MIT licensed, or contributed to a MIT licensed project, I can just call up a big company and tell them to pay me massive amounts of money now or stop using some product I have contributions in immediately?
In reality obviously not. Whenever things like these happen it's interpreted in a way that the big company wins. For you not saying irrevocable doesn't mean it's revocable, but the opposite holds.
Hmmm, I'm sure Hasbro/WOTC is using some MIT licensed software somewhere. What if the developers for some of that software threatened to revoke those licenses and sue WOTC?
They even distribute software in the form of MTG games on steam where one should be able to peruse the list of MIT software used if they comply with the license
But TFA says that they could prevent the release of new products, so would that mean you can't update your front end (even to fix a bug) until the offending code is removed?
My very layman's guess is that updates are fine, but new products are not. And courts are able to get technical assistance to find out a company that would try to sneak a new product as an update.
> Does this mean that if I have released some MIT licensed, or contributed to a MIT licensed project, I can just call up a big company and tell them to pay me massive amounts of money now or stop using some product I have contributions in immediately?
Companies that got burnt on this now require you to give up rights to any contributions you wish to make before merging (or just not use any of code not written by their employees).
A non-exclusive copyright license (such as most FOSS licenses) can be revoked at any time only if there was no consideration involved. The United States Federal Circuit Court of Appeal took this on in Jacobsen v. Katzer[1] in 2008 and ruled that there is consideration exchanged in the use of FOSS by a licensee. This indicates that an FOSS license that's silent on revocation is likely revocable only for violation of it's conditions.
But the answer may vary in other jurisdictions. Love to hear a lawyer chime in.
EDIT: In the UK and EU it's also likely irrevocable once you've relied on it, eg. via principle of estoppel. The second voted answer mentions an interesting talk[2] by a panel of lawyers/experts and this starts to be discussed around the 8m 30s mark.
> Aside from the confusing “perpetual” !== “irrevocable” language
This on the face of it seems needlessly confusing as well. Perpetual seems to just mean "may be revoked at any time". So why use the term at all instead of just talking in terms of revocation?
E.g. "irrevocable until 1 Jan 2025 except for situations listed in section 5" or "may be revoked at any time".
In law, "perpetual' means "indefinite", in contrast to its plain English meaning as "forever". It's nonsense like this that makes people hate the whole legal system and its players.
There is nothing about the OGL that makes it so Wizards can never revoke it. The license states that WotC grants the licensee "a perpetual, worldwide, royalty-free, nonexclusive license" to use the SRD (system reference document: the document that provides the D&D rules sans IP content). But "perpetual," in licensing law, does not mean "irrevocable." As it turns out, unless the word "irrevocable" appears in the license, the license can be revoked at any time, for any reason or for no reason.
This will make fan content nye impossible to publish.
While I agree with what you saying regarding "irrevocable"
> Does that mean the FSF can revoke the GPL v2 and force upgrade Linux to v3?
No, because what’s revoked is to use something under that license, but only the copyright holder of that something could revoke those rights, not whoever owns the copyright of the license.
But the GPLv2 is itself protected by copyright right? Could they revoke the license to that to force anything using GPLv2 to switch to a different license?
The FSF can't revoke the GPLv2, but Linus Torvalds could (for his contributions to Linux). The GPLv3 has explicit language granting irrevocable rights.
> Parties who have received copies, or rights, from you under this License will not have their licenses terminated so long as such parties remain in full compliance
Which, at least to me as a layperson, does indeed sound like it’s describing "irrevocable" with more words.
To me this sounds like it would have the same problem as the OGL.
Even if current recepients can still use it, new recepients are blocked.
And it is unclear if a current recepient can create new derivatives or nor.
If Alice grants Bob lib v1.0 under GPL v2. Bob creates Soft1 v1.0 under GPL v2 using lib v1.0. Alice then revokes the licence on lib v1.0. Bob can still distribute Soft1 v1.0 but can Bob create Soft 1 v2.0 or Soft2 using lib v1.0? Or is he considered a new recepient of lib with each derivative he creates? Can Charlie still get lib v1.0 under GPL v2 from Bob?
If the last answer is yes then there is no issue with the current situation either.
It would mean you can still get the SDR from anyone who already has the SDR under OGL 1.0 even if directly from WOTC you can only get it under the new license.
No he cant, he's NOT the owner of 99.9% of the linux kernel code, he is "just" the owner of the trademark "linux" and some code.
The Linux-Kernel-Code could just change license if every single contributor (or company) gives the "thump-up", otherwise that code would need to be rewritten.
I would say that (probably?) even his contributions have so much work (patches) from others in it, that he's not the solely owner of the code anymore (same with git), i would say it's nearly impossible to change the license once it's in the kernel.
It certainly feels like that should be practically the case, and if it ever goes to court I hope that's how it turns out! Copyright law wasn't written with software in mind and, strange as it seems, there's still a ton of unresolved questions about how exactly it works.
> The contributor is, of course, free to make no future grants, but they can’t withdraw past grants. The Guide's new section also explains how promissory estoppel is an additional legal safeguard ensuring the withdrawal of permission will not disrupt the use of those who rely on the software.
>Q: Can't Wizards of the Coast change the License in a way that I wouldn't like?
>A: Yes, it could. However, the License already defines what will happen to content that has been previously distributed using an earlier version, in Section 9. As a result, even if Wizards made a change you disagreed with, you could continue to use an earlier, acceptable version at your option. In other words, there's no reason for Wizards to ever make a change that the community of people using the Open Gaming License would object to, because the community would just ignore the change anyway.
If it goes to court I bet this quote will be mentioned. They cannot say this and then in small print do the opposite after people have relied on it for two decades.
I am guessing they say it means or want it to mean:
That it does not require periodic refreshing.
Compare to getting hired and being hired until you are fired vs you can have a fixed duration contract which you would have to explicitly extend otherwise it automatically ends.
Or think about an "immortal" who doesn't age but can still be killed.
Their "this is not specific personalised advice, consult your own lawyer" thoughts were:
1. The license does not specify revocable or irrevocable, but it would be likely a court would find it to be irrevocable because:
- other lanaguage in the license such as the perpetual term and the option to use later versions appears to anticipate it being non-revocable
- the section on termination only provides for breach of contract and protects sublicenses of the terminated work from being terminated unless the sub licenses were also infringing. The fact that it provides some grounds for termination but "we have a new license" isn't among them hurts their argument.
- There is mutual consideration and this is even spelled out in the contract as being consideration in terms of the derivative content being reciprocally licensed, plus the unspecified benefit to Wizards of having more complements to their product increasing its appeal. The licensee obviously gets the rights to use the covered content.
- The 23 year usage of OGL 1.0a may constitute reliance especially when combined with past clarifying public statements where Wizards official documents and then-active employees indicated it was intended to be non-revocable.
- Clauses in US law for copyright owners to terminate licenses require 35 years and do not affect sublicenses, so unlikely a court would assume a stricter unwritten standard of revocability than this
However, they also point out you can waive your rights to use content under 1.0a if you were to agree to 1.1, e.g. to get access to 6e content.
They also touch on the idea of if Wizards could use others OGL 1.0a licensed content under 1.1 which imposes lesser restrictions on wizards than 1.1. They're vaguer on this point, but imply probably not as its too much of a deviation from the previous license and raise the reliance part again
---
I will note the different lawyer angling for a publisher lawsuit linked in the Google drive elsewhere makes many of these arguments.
> It also looks like a lawyer advertising his services
How so? They are just clarifying that it’s not legal advice, something that would suddenly come with a ton of regulation (and would even be illegal in some jurisdictions).
Unbelievable that Hasbro is doing this again after how badly screwing over third parties went the last time. D&D 4th Edition had much more restrictive terms than 3.5e; one of the big selling points of 5e was the return to the OGL. I guess they're confident that they don't need third-party content or the goodwill of the broader tabletop community anymore. But if recent efforts like the Spelljammer book are any indication, they're dead wrong about that.
I don't think they're confident at all. The opposite, in fact. They're trying to kill off Pathfinder because, anecdotally, it seems like they're hemorrhaging players to 2e. They're trying to stop that, then I can guarantee they'll incorporate everything they think made 2e good into D&D 6.0. Basically this is just them trying to extract more profit and screw over their biggest competitor.
Pathfinder 2e seems to me like it was designed to only retain superficial elements from the D&D SRD. I wouldn't be surprised if Paizo had a plan for how to jettison the remaining content right from the start. So if this is meant to take PF out I think it's a foolish error (just like the existence of Pathfinder itself was due to their foolish error with the 4e licensing!).
I hope so, as I prefer what Pathfinder is doing a lot more. I first started getting interested in TTRPGs with 3.5e, and, to me, 5e has completely lost the feel of customisation that it had. They have finally released new races, but for the most part it's just sub-classes and "change the flavour text". PF 2e already has more ancestries and classes than 5e, and more fun ways of putting them together, and I absolutely love that. It makes the world feel more diverse, and really makes you feel like you can be what you want to be and find any class/race combo to fit your character idea as opposed to the opposite.
That said, I think PF will still have to reword quite a few spells, and possibly rename more than a few creatures and spells as well. Probably enough for a 2.5e, but I also wouldn't be surprised if they're working on it especially after this leak dropped.
I wonder why they are doing that at the same time they seem to cancel several of the games they were publishing[1] (not Baldur’s Gate 3 coming thus year). Is it just a coincidence or part of a big swift in their business plan?
This letter was sent to Wizards of the Coast yesterday, asking for clarification on the situation within 10 days.
The biggest effect from all of this that I can see is that everyone I know that's normally super enthusiastic about creating Dungeons & Dragons content (including myself!) is now deflated, not knowing what they should do about their upcoming projects (that they may have sunk thousands in already).
It's a letter from an affected publisher's lawyer, too long to post verbatim. They say they want to be able to keep publishing stuff under this license, give supporting citations and demand clarification.
They don't provide many citations though. They mostly mention that "authorized versions" is not defined in the license and they cite the FAQ (mentioned in the OP as well), hinting that reneging the words of the FAQ would constitute estoppel.
- Wizards of the Coast announced on December 21, 2022 that a new version of the Open Gaming License (OGL) would be released, causing confusion in the gaming community.
- The letter writer, who represents Sad Fishe Games and Prudence Holdings, has tried to contact Wizards of the Coast through various channels to seek clarification, but has not received a response.
- There are rumors that the new 1.1 version of the OGL will restrict the use of the 1.0a version and require contributors to share financial data and potentially pay a royalty to Wizards of the Coast for the use of OGL content.
- The letter writer argues that the 1.0a version of the OGL cannot be revoked and that Wizards of the Coast does not have the authority to terminate the license or force contributors to use the 1.1 version.
- The letter writer cites previous statements made by Wizards of the Coast and case law to support this interpretation.
- The letter writer requests that Wizards of the Coast provide a more definite statement on the 1.1 version of the OGL and deauthorize any attempt to repudiate the 1.0a version.
How so? A summary by a random person on the internet *here*, is probably even worse than a summary where ChatGPT was given exactly the content of that text and asked to summarize it.
ChatGPT is probably even better than those random Reddit news article summaries that were all the rage for a while.
It's accurate but for case law was not really cited. Also missed out on a few important nuances, including but not limited to:
- that the legal action to be taken against WotC would be focused around building a coalition for a "class action" injunction against WotC based on their "apparent intention to breach the 1.0a Open Gaming License".
- "22-23 years of conduct on the part of WotC which ratifies the important section",
- provided a very narrow alley for a semi-face-saving "out" to WotC in the form of "perhaps this was all a big misunderstanding".
- overall tone was very "we will 100% absolutely demolish you in court but would rather you just come to your senses".
- threatened legal subpoenas depositions with all that entails, namely the implications implicit in depositions that resulting information would either: cause great embarrassment to WotC or potentially open up perjury/etc charges against individuals if they obscured embarrassing testimony.
If I was posting a ChatGPT summary I would have used the ChatGPT output as a starting point and edited these points into it, and blending my style with OpenGPT's style. That's what I'd like others to do as well if they insist on using ChatGPT so much.
I don't know for him, but in my case I'm trying to boycott all GAFAM content, so I take it poorly when someone tries to force me to use them (especially when alternatives exist).
It's a Google Drive link, so it could very easily be a PDF or docx or anything with executable code; and I avoid reading random PDFs online unless they're provided by a reputable source. I also didn't click the super long link here.
And, since it's Google Drive, I don't want to deal with having to open the link in a private browser. For the person saying "isn't it easy just to open it in a private browser?" sure; but it's also friction I don't feel like dealing with, especially since it could easily be a PDF or whatever and my concerns remain.
They are stating that they intend to force this question in court if they have to, but are going to wait 10 days before filing to give both sides an opportunity to solve it in a simpler way.
It is arbitrary, and it really is nothing more than a letter. But it sets expectations on what consequences may arise if they choose not to respond. It is now up to Wizard of the Coast to decide whether and how to respond.
* they could have a book going to the publisher (book or website) in a few days
* forces the issue, and demands action from WoTC; fairly common
* keeps the issue front and center, ensures it is visible for the rest of the community, which means they can act accordingly (instead of it quietly happening behind the scenes, followed by targeted Cease and Desists, settlements, etc.)
* only requires a response; Hasboro might be able to buy time, offer an olive branch, etc.
Additionally also files for printing 3d minis and VTTs such as foundry, which doesn't come with d&d rulesets out of the box, but relies on community content to support it
I'm personally making adventures. Mostly little 40-page books that allow a group to play to a story. These are OGL-licensed so I can re-print existing SRD monster stat blocks with the adventure for ease of use, but don't really contain anything that could reasonably be called WotC's IP beyond that.
My take about license is that ip can always be relicensed to whatever suits the ip owner, but licenses already given and used by people can't be revoked on a whim. So no new ip are allowed, but already created stuff is safe.
Let’s say I decide that I want to publish a DnD adventure.
Even with OGL I can’t say it is for DnD. They say I can’t even say it is compatible with DnD, but I have my doubts about that.
I describe a unique set and setting. Not using any Wizards of the Coast trademark in it. (Which honestly I don’t want because I want my thing to feel fresh and unique.) I don’t think the OGL licence would help me with that.
Then of course there is game mechanics. I don’t want to repeat the players handbook. (You wouldn’t expect this kind of material to repeat the basic rules anyway.) But i do want to use terms from it. For example I would write: “The 3rd chest in the second level is locked and magically trapped. The DC of the trap is 13. On activativation it deals 1d6 poison damage. Inside the chest a Shimmering Ghillie Suit. The suit is a legendary magical item which grants its wearer advantage on stealth checks.” Obviously this uses a lot of DnD terminology. (DC, advantage, poison damage, stealth check, legendary item) But it does not infringe on the copyright on any WotC property. (Assuming that I have made a search for the Ghillie Suit not appearing in any published materials yet.) Do i need OGL to publish this?
If not who on earth needs OGL to publish anything they would want to publish?
> If not who on earth needs OGL to publish anything they would want to publish?
Fear keeps the local publishers in line. Wizards of the Coast is basically the only big player in the industry, backed by an even larger corporation.
"Third party publishers" are usually hobbyists or single-person operations, who really benefit not having to work under the threat of lawsuits or even C&Ds.
And the RPG industry does have a history of that: TSR, the originators of D&D, were rather litigious, resulting early game companies like Judges Guild having to really conceal their NPC stats to not use verbiage from AD&D.
Later TSR sued Mayfair for their Role Aids line (IIRC, Mayfair was helmed by one of the chief people now responsible at WotC).
And then there was Palladium, makers of quasi-D&D and the ultimate kitchen sink setting Rifts, who really didn't like early online presence.
Never mind that your most likely "publishing house" drivethrurpg.com has WotC as a big partner.
Technically legal is one thing, having a license that's shared by thousands of other people who would be on your side out of poor necessity seems like a better foundation for your small game company.
Paradox has net revenue of $1.6B while Hasbro has $4.7B. While Paradox's main business is outside tabletop games, so is Hasbro's. So they're a lot more comparable in size than you might think. Paizo is of course smaller, but googling indicates they're about $50M (being a private company, the figure is obviously less reliable), which is smaller but not "squash like a fly" small. I'd be more worried about the likes of MCDM (Matt Colville's adventure/rules publishing co) or Pelgrane Press (13th Age).
Paradox is a publicly traded company out of Sweden. Their net revenue is great but they're not rolling in dough the way Hasboro is, and they haven't been in the market anywhere near as long.
Plus there is little reason to pick a fight -- Paradox is an online publisher and has it's own slew of IPs. Not a fight worth picking, and one that might be expensive, esp. against an established player in a different market and country.
Paizo now might be able to, but Paizo wouldn't be what they are with a) the OGL and b) WotCs backing. I can't believe any scenario where WotC goes to D&D 4th edition, and some company just makes a continuation of 3rd edition the way Pathfinder did while sticking to legally distinct but compatible. The game would either be way to close legally, or read too different. But, of course, IANAL.
What Paizo would or could do now is a different matter. They might say that PF 2E is distinct enough, especially if some 2.5E thing would remove some remaining verbiage or direct lifts from old OGL material. They might also just do a deal with WotC. Gates and Jobs at Tanagra.
They never should have OGL'd PF 2E. There was no reason. If they were making a breaking system update, they could've made the changes to do without it. WotC doesn't have a copyright on using a 20-sided die or else no game would exist.
Dumbest decision I've seen Paizo make since the last one.
I mean, I think they were probably genuinely thinking about their own origin and not closing that off for others. Or it could be just that it's good PR to appear as much. So they kept with the license that'd let them mix with the existing OGL ecosystem where it made sense.
In retrospect if that was their goal, it would have made sense to use a different copyleft license for the open content that did not include a clause that paints Wizards as the body to update the license, especially given the mechanics of using PF 1E content in 2E requires subjective decision making compared to the relatively automatic 3.5 -> PF1E or PF1E -> SF compatibility.
Making breaking changes to the OGL-covered system defeats the purpose of making the succeeding content OGL-compatible. If PF2E content required conversion anyway, and they were writing an entirely new core rulebook for those new rules, there was no reason to retain the OGL.
I think the concern was if someone had released the fluff for a adventure or class or something under the OGL, then if you went and did a conversion of that for 2E and wanted to release it you'd have to do it under the OGL, but presumably you'd also want to use content from the PF 2E rulebook which would require you to use its open license, which would be a problem if that wasn't OGL. It's basically like the problem with GPL-incompatible open source licenses.
1. simplify things for 3rd party publishers. rather than worry about multiple licenses, just publish under the same one as pathfinder 1e, 3.5e, and 5e, that they already know like the back of their hand
2. save costs. writing a new license is expensive. it apparently would have delayed release of the pf2e system and significantly increased the cost
3. cover their ass just in case WotC thinks pf2e is still too similar to d&d
there’s really no way they could have foreseen a rugpull like this. everyone thought the OGL was ironclad until yesterday. hindsight is 20/20 though.
> I'd argue that Paizo and Paradox are also decently sized competitors that could go head to head with Wizards in a legal battle if they had to.
Could they?
This almost looks like a poison pill to me. If WotC was forward thinking enough, back in the 3.0 days they used the OGL to trick competitors into a trap.
As time has gone on the main competitor to 4e is now Pathfinder... thus taking the oxygen out of the room and leaving less space for non-OGL competition.
Now Paizo has enough of a real business built on Pathfinder, but not the endless war chest of Hasbro. It seems to me like they would probably need to cave and make a deal with Hasbro rather than try to carry on some kind of fight that puts their livelihoods on the line.
And as a player I can be dismayed with what Hasbro is doing, but knowing that Pathfinder is at risk now I have no reason to switch to them. But there's no obvious alternative to 5e and Pathfinder that has any real traction...
Wizards is not that forward thinking, if it was they would have pulled the plug on all the 3E content when 4E was floundering.
I don't think moving from a license which Wizards is trying to rely on ambiguity to claim it allows them to pull the plug to a license which definitively allows them to pull the plug is a business safe move. Especially since the new license requires you to accept the end of OGL v1.0a so there's no way back if you do sign.
Add to that that Wizards has pulled the plug on them before, _twice_, first by kicking them out of their official adventure publishing role, then pulling the plug on their position as an online retailer of first party 3E PDFs, and there can't be much trust for Wizards from Paizo.
Paizo could have made this decision before (without the one way nature, even), and chose not to in the 3E to 4E days. Charting their own path instead took them from the a small adventure path publisher to the #2 publisher in tabletop games, so it worked out for them, so I don't see why Paizo would choose to deal with Wizards here.
Finally, I'm not sure tabletop publishing is that high margin a business. I'm not sure Paizo could afford 25% of their revenue, or even if they got a sweetheart deal like 10% on account of their size. Plus the aforementioned trust issues regarding keeping that split long term would still be there
WoTC was pretty bad too for a while, trying to own the idea of "tapping" a card, and forcing everyone to make up their own terminology for basically the same actions.
I think OGL came from a realization that this sort of thing wasn't good.
> I think OGL came from a realization that this sort of thing wasn't good.
What it was created to do, and what Hasbro is leveraging it to do, are two different things. The same thing happened with 4E/the GSL, which everyone's forgotten but was essentially the beta run at Hasbro trying to invalidate the OGL.
The thing is, Hasbro doesn't even need to invalidate the OGL. They recaptured so much of the market with 5E and the OGL-agnostic, IP-friendly Dungeon Master's Guild that they could just stop publishing and supporting OGL-compatible products altogether. As long as One D&D doesn't botch things as badly as 4E, I don't think the current market would care.
While D&D has an unfortunate cultural monopoly in terms of general public mindshare thanks to a network of media deals that have basically turned D&D into a brand more than a game… it has so much competition in the marketplace of traditional style pen and paper role playing games that the very notion of it having a monopoly worthy of antitrust action is laughable.
It might sell the most right now but if this truly is WotC slicing off their own nose to spite their face with overly aggressive legal tactics to extract money and control the market for D&D related goods, and as a consequence the community turn away from them… there’s a huge sea of available options that are completely unrelated to D&D, Champions, Rifts, Genesys, Feng Shui, Fate, Numenera, the plethora of hand that are Powered by the Apocalypse… there’s not just a sea but entire oceans of RPGs out there that don’t descend from D&D in any way and most of them are just plain better RPGs! If the community leaves D&D behind they will find so many better games to play that honestly… I’m starting to hope WotC are about to accidentally cripple the D&D brand. It might just be the best possible thing for the RPG industry and the player community as well.
The courts aren't going to care about that. They are going to care about whether WotC can have a large effect on the RPG (or trading & collecting card) market and whether it was engaging in anticompetitive practices.
My current understanding is that you'd probably be fine to publish this without the OGL, as copyright law would _probably_ allow you to do this.
The OGL is a sort of "you're definitely safe under these restrictions" promise. If you comply with it, the promise is that you definitely won't be sued.
Of course, that promise is now being broken.
The US copyright office has stated that game mechanics are not copyrightable. So rolling a d20, the 6 attributes, etc. The actual words on page are copyrightable though. You obviously can't copyright 'bears' as monsters, but beholders and mindflayers, etc are copyrighted. The specific stats are a grey area, but if you 'clean room' your bestiary, you should be good.
You are absolutely right about this being more of a promise not to sue, more than anything else.
The OGL specifically protects use of the copyrightable text of the mechanics, that's the whole point of the OGL-compatible System Reference Document. Anyone can write a d20 system with the same mechanics, but the more literal text you crib from the SRD, the more you expose yourself to litigation — unless you agree to the OGL.
The OGL says, here, crib from and directly reference this copyrighted text so you can eliminate broad swaths of reinventing the wheel and focus on your compatible content. Third-party publishers on shoestrings adopted it en masse for both litigation safety and convenience.
This is my view as well. I guess they have a point with sourcebooks that provide subclasses for existing official classes, but those were never of much interest to me. What I'm interested in is a new campaign setting for use with a specific ruleset.
I understand setting an adventure in Faerun would be a derivative work, but surely it wouldn't if it's in a completely new setting? And repeating stat blocks from the Monster Manual is clearly a violation, but it seems to me I should be able to refer to the Monster Manual, as well as include my own custom stats for original creatures not from the Monster Manual, or even stats that I need to be different from those in the MM.
The fact that something competes is not enough; I can write a novel with wizards and dragons, and as long as I don't include characters or places from Tolkien or Harry Potter, it's not derivative, no matter how many themes and ideas are similar.
Referring to classes and spells from the Player's Handbook shouldn't be a problem, because the Harry Potter Encyclopedia can refer to everything from the Harry Potter book.
Am interesting aspect with publishing an adventure is of course that WotC also publishes adventures for D&D, but my adventure would not be derivative of those adventures; it exists entirely independent from them. It does not exist independently from the core rules (PHB, DMF and MM), but it doesn't compete with those.
If that would still count as a copyright violation, then the Harry Potter Encyclopedia would also be a copyright violation the moment Rowling publishes her own encyclopedia. I think that would be rather weird. Shouldn't a violation be a violation of a specific work, rather than the context around it?
> I understand setting an adventure in Faerun would be a derivative work, but surely it wouldn't if it's in a completely new setting?
Anyone can write a setting book. A setting book that references specific copyrighted text — like the contents of the SRD, including classes, spells, creatures, magic items, and certain non-mechanical terms — runs into OGL space.
If you create an entirely new set of terms and mechanics, you haven't created a derivative work, but you also haven't necessarily created a compatible work, and you certainly haven't created one as directly compatible as a potential competitor's OGL-compliant work.
If you aren't writing for distribution, then none of this matters anyway.
> And repeating stat blocks from the Monster Manual is clearly a violation
With the exception of some copyrighted monster names, it's explicitly not a violation under the OGL, and the ability to do so is a large part of the point of the OGL.
> but it seems to me I should be able to refer to the Monster Manual
You can't by name without a separate compatibility license, typically by way of publishing to the Dungeon Master's Guild, which is laden with a lot of other intellectual ownership gotchas.
> as well as include my own custom stats for original creatures not from the Monster Manual, or even stats that I need to be different from those in the MM.
If you can describe what "neutral good" or an "Armor Class" represents mechanically without resorting to a literal mechanical description in the SRD or covered by the OGL, go for it. The broader point of the OGL was not having to reinvent those wheels in every product a publisher created.
> You can't by name without a separate compatibility license
I understand that this is what they want you to believe. I don’t understand how it would be trademark or copyright infringement saying “go buy those people’s book and look up information there”.
> If you can describe what "neutral good" or an "Armor Class" represents mechanically without resorting to a literal mechanical description
But source books don’t do that. They say “so and so, neutral good, ac: 12” It is expected from the DM reading them that they already know what this kind of shorthand mean.
> I don’t understand how it would be trademark or copyright infringement saying “go buy those people’s book and look up information there”.
It's a violation of the OGL. So you can opt out of the OGL (and opt out of reprinting verbatim rules), try it, sell it, and see what happens:
> Use of Product Identity: You agree not to Use any Product Identity, including as an indication as to compatibility, except as expressly licensed in another, independent Agreement with the owner of each element of that Product Identity.
...
> The following items are designated Product Identity, as defined in Section 1(e) of the Open Game License Version 1.0a, and are subject to the conditions set forth in Section 7 of the OGL, and are not Open Content: Dungeons & Dragons, D&D, Player’s Handbook, Dungeon Master, Monster Manual, ...
This is why so many OGL works contain phrases like "core rule books of the 5th edition of the world's most popular pen and paper RPG" instead of "Monster Manual p. 132".
> Source books don’t do that. They say “so and so, neutral good, ac: 12” It is expected from the DM reading them that they already know what this kind of shorthand mean.
You're right, those are too generic of examples. Here are some real-world ones I've had to deal with as an OGL author:
- What are the mechanical ramifications of a sentient magic item with the Crusader special purpose that's engaging in a Conflict with its wielder?
- A creature has Burrow. Can they burrow through stone?
- "Eldritch Blast". Is it PI because of "Eldritch"? Is it OGL because one version of the SRD named it but omitted its mechanics?
- How do you sustain the spell effect of a Crown of Madness? Is that OGL because one version of the SRD omitted that paragraph?
- A dwarf has Dwarven Combat Training. What kind of hammer can they throw?
- Does the Grappler feat grant two or three benefits? If it's two, but your DMs' copy of the source text has three, which benefit was removed via errata? Do you assume your players/DMs even have the errata?
What you reference isn't always a detail you can assume the DM (sorry, GM) has available. The official SRD also isn't entirely OGL, and the contents of the SRD don't always match the text of their source works.
So when something you add to your setting, or to a creature or item, relies on the details an OGL/SRD wrinkle, do you play it safe and stick to what's covered by the OGL? Find something else? Ditch the OGL, rewrite all of the complicated interactions from scratch, and wind up creating a new game?
If you're a third-party publisher making three figures and paying freelancers by the word, do you tell the writer, "Sure, go ahead and rewrite all of the related rules from scratch", or do you tell them to stick to what's most clearly covered by the OGL?
> A creature has Burrow. Can they burrow through stone?
Idk. Do you want it to burrow through stone? Write that down. Do you not want it to burrow through stone? Write that down. Do you not have an opinion? Leave it to the DM.
I’m not even following what you are saying. You are saying that you choose to publish under OGL because then it is defined how burrowing works? Or what is exactly that you are saying?
> Does the Grappler feat grant two or three benefits?
What? The Grappler feat is in the basic rules. How does this come up in your own published material? If some NPC of your making has it you just say “has the grapler feat” and then people can look it up what that means.
> Do you assume your players/DMs even have the errata?
Why do you care? How often did you received feedback like this: “We were playing the adventure published by trynewideas. The setting was trully breath taking, and the maps gorgeous. The fun quirks of the NPCs made combat very memorable. My players lowed it. That is until it all came crashing down because the grappling feat of the gladiators in the amphiteatre were slightly ambigous. Ruined the whole module for us. Sad.”
> This is why so many OGL works contain phrases like "core rule books of the 5th edition of the world's most popular pen and paper RPG" instead of "Monster Manual p. 132".
But that's ridiculous, right? Anyone can refer to a page in a book. If the OGL takes that away, then what's even the point of it? Well, I guess being able to make derivative works, but what if I don't want to do that? What if I want to make my own campaign world that's merely meant to be compatible with the D&D rules? The same way anyone can make a game that runs on Windows without needing a license?
WotC's entire reasoning that you can't do that, sounds to me like a far too restrictive interpretation of copyright law. I'm not a lawyer, but as far as I know, WotC's interpretation has never been tested in court.
> With the exception of some copyrighted monster names, it's explicitly not a violation under the OGL, and the ability to do so is a large part of the point of the OGL.
I'm talking about copyright, not OGL.
> You can't by name without a separate compatibility license, typically by way of publishing to the Dungeon Master's Guild, which is laden with a lot of other intellectual ownership gotchas.
Says who? WotC doesn't decide the law. They can claim it's illegal, just like Apple can claim it's illegal to jailbreak an iPhone, but that doesn't make it law.
Just like the Harry Potter Encyclopedia can refer to Harry Potter characters without a license, an adventure should be able to refer to entries in the PHB or Monster Manual, as long as it doesn't directly copy significant amounts of text.
> If you can describe what "neutral good" or an "Armor Class" represents mechanically without resorting to a literal mechanical description in the SRD or covered by the OGL
My point is that I don't want to and don't have to. It's already described in another book that I expect people to own.
> But it does not infringe on the copyright on any WotC property.
It's not that simple. The main thing to remember is that even a threat of an expensive lawsuit is a pretty credible one in the US, because of how the system is set up.
Yes, frivolous suits get thrown out pretty fast, but that's still not cheap (because you need to hire an attorney to communicate with the court on your behalf, because, again, the system is set up that way), and when it comes to copyright very few things are that clear cut.
Just with a mod for a game it's easy to argue that without the game there's no mod, so the mod is a derivative work.
And if your campaign is bolted to the mechanics, then it's not hard to argue that the campaign is basically genre-bending fanfiction (ie. copies the same themes into a new setting), so one might argue it should get the same legal treatment as a derivative work.
Even if it's ~90% that you would win the case, it might cost you a lot, that's why this matters to businesses. (It likely doesn't matter to individuals or small clubs that publish things for free.)
The point of the OGL is so you can include or reference things from the System Reference Document in your publication.
EDIT: I realize people might not know what an SRD is. It's basically the bare-bones document explaining the game and its mechanics with all the IP-encumbered names filed off. D&D 5E has an SRD (copy: https://www.5esrd.com/) which 3PPs use when making their own content for the system.
It's a bold strategy, Cotton. Let's see if it pays off for 'em.
But seriously, if this goes wrong, if it's agreed that OGL 3rd and 5th Edition derivatives can continue under OGL1.0 in perpetuity, Wizards of the Coast and Hasbro stand to lose control of AD&D. They have already have lost significant mindshare to Pathfinder (a 3rd Ed fork), but this could be the final nail.
There's more than enough money in keeping OGL1 to fight this. This is a stupid fight for WotC to have picked. Any goodwill they had will be actively invested into other rulesets.
All of this advice without actually seeing the changes. People thinking Strength and Dexterity are mechanics. So much misinformation from a leak. I will say the confusion and concern are warranted but officially we don’t know what the next OGL is yet.
I remember when all my friends in high school got into MtG. They wanted me to play, and I said, "okay, but I'm going to make my own cards." You know, xerox some cards and laminate them myself. I was cheap. I wasn't about to pay real money for a bunch of fancy cardboard.
None of them would go for it. I tried and tried to get them to understand that there wasn't anything special about the WotC cards, I said "You know there are no real wizards at Wizards of the Coast, right?" These are "magic" cards, not magic cards, eh? But they wouldn't have it.
I gotta hand it to these folks. They convinced a generation that you have to pay them to use your own imagination. Maybe they are real wizards?
But this does not “cancel” existing licenses. Instead, what it does is create a hard fork, between 1.1 content and 1.0 content.
Basically… any content released under the 1.1 license is not usable under the 1.0 license.
The statement, in the new license, that the old license is “no longer an authorized license agreement” does not apply to existing licenses anyone may have to 1.0 content. Absent your consent to the 1.1 license, its terms don’t apply to you.
Instead, that language is meant to defeat the forward compatibility clauses in the 1.0 license. Absent that language you could freely use 1.1 content under the 1.0 terms because of the forward compatibility language in 1.0.
This means you can continue to “Use” (as defined in the 1.0 license) any of the content you were using before.
However, it also means if you “Use” any 1.1 licensed content, then either you are in violation of the 1.0 license (and then thus have no rights) or you are subject to the 1.1 license and its terms.
So, this does create some hazard, in that any one using 1.0 content under a 1.0 license needs to ensure they don’t in the future use any 1.1 content.
But if you stick to 1.0 licensed content you are ok.
This can still cause problems. If you are in the business of selling DnD compatible game content, you now suddenly have to make a choice between loosing forward compatibility and having control over your revenue.
It still sucks.
But any content you could sell yesterday you can still sell tomorrow.
The contract has explicit, custom, definitions for several basic elements of contract law. It explicitly declares what consideration exists and what offer and acceptance look like.
The party defining those terms is Wotc. They are bound by something called “promissory estoppel” from representing that those things weren’t present in the original 1.0 license. They cannot revoke your 1.0 license unless you breach the agreement.
They can set a trap for you, that will capture 25% of your revenue, if you end up incorporating 1.1 content into your previously 1.0 derived works.
So, be careful. But they can’t take away what you have now.
It can still also hurt various businesses to loose forward compatibility rights… but anything derived from purely 1.0 content is still 1.0 licensed and they can’t take that away unless you violate the 1.0 license terms somehow.
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[ 3.3 ms ] story [ 117 ms ] threadI grew up playing Dungeons and Dragons - I don’t want to play Oubliettes and Wyverns or whatever.
No matter how annoying. It they make a bad move they could mess it up. It is them who take the risk after all.
D&D does indeed predate me, but there's nothing stopping me from inhabiting their world.
I don't think they understand the extent to which moves like this harm their fanbase. Paying fans! They will soon find out.
What I am certain of is is that the D&D phenomenon will outlive WotC. It's a movement, an ethos, and gross mismanagement will not kill it.
while community driven projects _could_ live, it would be under constant legal threat, which prevents it from growing independently of WotC. Esp. if there's an aspect of commercialization in there. This means that any project would seek first to cooperate with WotC, which means they get a control, and may be commercial benefit.
And there is no legal threat to 95% of homebrew, never will be. Why? Because I just do what I want with their IP (Wotc) and it never reaches further than my players. Most people do not publish to the world, they present to their players. Very few folks make an official doc, get it printed, add their own mechanics, build a world atlas etc.
It will stop things like the "wheel of time" (books not tv) adaption, the reasonably widely available dark sun fan made version, "one night strahd" etc.
Now that is a shame. But. 50% + of it was drek. And half of what was good rode rough-shod over other folks ideas, vision and IP and made money for the writers for it. If you are re-doing elric's world in 5th ed, you owe a bit to Michael Moorcock (which is ironic as he dis-owns it as pulp and beneath him), and owe a bit to wizards-o-t-c because you are probably re-skinning their hard work.
What is more disappointing is that Wotc is actively trying to model their monetization of DnD in the future on mobile gaming and free-to-play computer games.. I kid you not. Luckily there are basic, adnd 1st ed, 2nd, 3rd, 3.5 and 5th ed to choose form for cool playable systems, and that's if you want to stick to "original" dnd. So 6th ed, with whatever horrible monetization they formulate may well just rot in it's own lonely purgatory with it's older brother 4th edition. (which, to be fair has a couple of cool things but overall was a failure, IMO)
*edited, spelling
But yeah your point is valid.
Thankfully the game has so far successfully rolled all its Bad Management Saving Throws.
Not based on time, based on their value to the culture.
> Beholder, Gauth, Carrion Crawler, Displacer Beast, Githyanki, Githzerai, Kuo-toa, Mind Flayer, Slaad, Umber Hulk, Yuan-ti, Tanar'ri, and Baatezu.
From https://writing.stackexchange.com/questions/41942/is-there-a...
(although it's a bit more complex than this, I think?)
Gives a bit of a boost to the ranger class.
I prefer worlds that are not intrinsically intertwined with any specific ruleset. And for general fantasy I will always come back to Middle-earth. :)
If you made something based on the license while it was in effect, you are perpetually covered.
Once they revoke the license, you can no longer make new work.
That's how I read it anyway
The Apache license does have the word irrevocable. But BSD, MIT, EPL and others do not. Does that mean that if the copyright holder for lib v1.0 decides to change the licence for lib v1.0 (not subsequent versions) to something restrictive then everything using it gets frozen in time and nothing new can be made?
Same as with Oracle vs Google, other than a bunch of court room sophists, nobody really gained anything.
I.e. a temporary license will expire by default, but a perpetual one will not.
This is not legal advice but rather my personal understanding of the matter which may or may not be factually correct.
Trust some more work went into the gpl if that is true.
WOTC only has the ability to change the license of IP they own, even retroactively. However, works based on WOTC IP which were legal under the OGLv1.0 may no longer be legal under the new terms, putting them in a legal gray area (they may be illegal to distribute, or they may still be legal to distribute but only because they were legal at the time they were created).
Creating new works based on the old IP that would have been legal under the OGLv1.0 would almost certainly not be legal if WOTC changes the license, though.
This one clearly shows the ambiguous definition:
https://thelawdictionary.org/perpetual
> Never ceasing; continuous ; enduring; lasting; unlimited in respect of time; continuing without intermission or interval.
But that the authors of GPL v3 wanted to close this gotcha loophole that you and the forum lawyer calls attention to, doesn't mean the gotcha loophole would have worked. Nor that it's going to work, or even will continue working even if it's worked before.
Courts aren't computers just executing legal code - for good and bad.
There is little case law about software re-licensing at least, so yeah, it's hard to say.
There is plenty of case law that says the opposite. For instance Cohen v. Paramount Picture shows that copyright licenses are not unilaterally revocable even if the original license doesn't explicitly state it is irrevocable.
A license is an enforceable contract. Revocation requires the consent of both parties, if no exception is provided for originally. Eisenberg, The Revocation of Offers covers many of the nuances of when a contract or even an offer is no longer revocable.
That is, if it's not explicitly mentioned, which one applies?
The fact that there is no "we have a new version" clause listed in the termination section would likely go against wizards but they are likely to claim deauthorization is different to termination.
I guess this explains why the Terms of Service for some sites that host user generated content state that as a user you grant the company a perpetual, irrevocable license to use your content. Makes sense, thank you.
That said, this is an open license rather than a regular two-sided contract, which makes a lot of things about it untested in courts and there are some pretty good legal arguments for considering it irrevocable flying around (just like in case of GPLv2, for example).
1 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33114181
2 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33613315
For this reason I think the Gizmodo link does not deserve traffic.
Essentially you are allowed to use the rules of DnD (and other games that use the license) to make derivative work as long as its also published with OGL.
It allows homebrewed content to exist and is part of the reason the DnD community is so big.
WoTC (Wizards of the Coast, the owner of DnD) is “updating” the license from 1.0 to 1.1 and is using the update as an excuse to clamp down on competition and limit what can be used.
This has a far reaching effect because 1.0 would be revoked which means lots of content that has already been created would be put in a grey area, WoTC could sue anyone who made content for ownership even if it was made with the previous license.
It also puts entire games like Pathfinder into question as these are essentially modded DnD.
Unless I misunderstand, according to the submitted thread this isn't the case.
>The good news is that, because of the reliance principle, third party creators who have already created a work under the OGL likely could continue to sell that work even if the OGL were revoked. They just could not create any new works.
Although that "likely" gives doubts.
> WoTC could sue anyone
isn't contradicted at all by that opinion.
My understanding (relatively naive, though I am a long time consumre of D&D products) is that Hasbro has been making some questionable decisions recently particularly regarding their golden goose, which is Magic the Gathering. Some of those decisions have really annoyed the fan base, e.g. the Black Orchid debacle (they replublished a bunch of cards that they promised would never be republished, at hugely inflated prices).
In an attempt to shore up their share price and profits, they've reviewed their other product lines to see if there's any slack that can take up the load: which puts D&D in play. The bean counters believe that Hasbro is leaving a lot of money on the table; It's very popular and has had something of a resurgance recently due to popular media like Stranger Things and Critical Role, along with the well received 5th edition.
Ignoring direct IP licencing (e.g. games/movies/etc.), the majority of the revenue is from Games/Dungeon masters (as I understand it, in line with my experience), and not the players. DMs buy the books and run the game. DMs are a fraction of their player base, and there's certainly many who depend on free/open products to save costs. The powers that be believe that some of that can be monetised more effectively and they're trying to think of ways to extract more money from more people.
D&D 5e does fill an important niche; it's the public face of table-top role-play gaming, and it's pretty easy for anyone to pick up and run/play, however it's not the only product on the market and there are many products that serve the customers better (even if they're less accessible and require an understanding of the genre to choose) - Hasbro/WotC have to make this work, and quickly, or they run the risk of losing everything.
Paizo (via Pathfinder) probably has the most to win here; it's well known in the community and has much better support for people who prefer a "crunchy" game. Paizo are probably kicking themselves for not removing their dependency on the OGL when they released Pathfinder 2e (which is what my group plays most frequently).
3.5 was an update released for balance reasons, as I understand it and didn't change core gameplay - it removed some of the more broken exploits, but you can use 3.0 material with 3.5 with relatively few, if any changes: most of the balance problem was player side.
I used to play basic D&D as a child, and then sort of ignored the whole genre until around 2005 when I picked it back up again, using 3.5, so I'm not an expert on it by any means.
In this case, it refers to a large part of the Dungeons & Dragons system, normally kept in books you have to pay for. Wizards of the Coast, who down the D&D IP, decided to "open source" most of the system and a lot of monsters as a way to drive 3rd party engagement. Remove any licensing restrictions, have at it nerds, build a community.
Hasboro has since acquired Wizards (years ago, actually), and has decided to reign in the licensing. Several other games / game systems / publishers are using these open source rules, and it threatens to alter or extinguish that community.
This is something that has been tried in the past, IIRC, when a project with a single contributor has attracted a commercial buyer that wants to take the product closed-source.
In the case I so vaguely remember (video software of some sort?), they tried to say that not only would future releases be closed, but that all previous GPL versions were now revoked, and continued use was copyright violation. From what I can remember, the community response was basically "LOL no".
So no, they are not analogous at all.
In legal matters, no one should be sure shit like that matters, unless they're paid to be sure of it.
Note that apparently some lawyers believe even the GPLv3 could in fact be retroactively revoked by the copyright holders, as long as the copies were given away for free, despite the explicit language to the contrary.
Doesn't mean much to me unless I know who's paying them to believe / worry about that.
> Eugene Volokh, a law professor at UCLA, said that Mattel might be able to argue that the GPL is invalid because users don't pay for the free software.
> "Nonexclusive licenses given for free are generally revocable, even if they purport to be irrevocable," Volokh said. "Even if the GPL license in cphack is treated as signed and is covered by 205(e), it might still be revocable by Mattel as the new owners of the cphack copyright."
> "It is unfortunately not quite as solid a case for the good guys as the GNU license theory would have at first led us to believe," he said.
The article itself was an interesting case, where Mattel acquired the rights to a program they wanted to stop the distribution of (cphack), which apparently had been released under the GPL, and successfully sued to stop anyone from distributing it anymore. However, whether those that created it in the first place had had the right to distribute it was in doubt, so it's probably not a good test of the GPL itself.
[0] https://www.wired.com/2000/03/mattel-ruling-confuses-hackers...
I don't actually know anyone still playing any version of D&D at this point. Everyone I know is either Pathfinder, OSR or some other indie RPG (MORK BORG seems popular right now).
Which is ironic because I know it would be a challenge to even get to a first session with them in such a system. Instead I play Knave with them.
I don't think it's actually Stranger Things driving 5th ed popularity, though. If it was, surely they'd go for something more retro. I think it's the big tabletop RPG streamers.
But these people don't know anything about TTRPGs in general, they use Google and the SEO directs them into the sales funnel of 5e.
EDIT: The other big channel in is watching Critical Role streams. And if that is your only reference with their particular ads it will draw you into the current, and large, ecosystem of 5e.
Or the time they clamped down on fan animations in Warhammer settings. [2]
Or their lawsuit against Chapterhouse. [3]
[1] https://gizmodo.com/games-workshop-is-still-claiming-to-own-...
[2] https://www.pcgamer.com/games-workshop-is-trying-to-shut-dow...
[3] https://www.reddit.com/r/HobbyDrama/comments/cqao2l/miniatur...
There was a lot of drama but no creator was ever asked to stop producing fan-content. What did happen was some creators got bullied by the fanbase though. [1]
Some of those creators got full-time jobs and others were asked to stop monetising the content. I'm not sure why either of those are problems.
No one has to stop doing what they're doing and some folks get to work officially for an IP they're passionate about.
As far as the Space Marine book thing, sure, that was dumb but hardly a big deal and the Chapterhouse lawsuit was a decade ago. GW has changed significantly and noticeably since.
[1] https://old.reddit.com/r/Warhammer40k/comments/onl8vf/a_stat...
under threat of litigation.
Even playing online it's a nice chance to do something social with fellow English-speakers and away from my family responsibilities. As a system, I'm not hugely wedded to 5e. I'm actually doing a deep-dive worldbuilding with Traveller: The New Era (early 90's sci-fi).
Aside from the confusing “perpetual” !== “irrevocable” language, how would it be legal to suddenly start taking cuts of existing businesses? If WotC were to attempt this, would it be legal? It sounds like it would be based on the explanation of being able to revoke an existing license. But that sounds like a giant legal loophole to me.
[1] https://gizmodo.com/dnd-wizards-of-the-coast-ogl-1-1-open-ga...
https://opensource.org/licenses/MIT
> 9. Updating the License: Wizards or its designated Agents may publish updated versions of this License. You may use any authorized version of this License to copy, modify and distribute any Open Game Content originally distributed under any version of this License.
And 1.1's rumored revocation of that authorization. And no matter how clear in common sense it might be that Hasbro shouldn't be able to do that, I don't think we're going to find out exactly how that falls apart until it's ruled upon in a court.
In reality obviously not. Whenever things like these happen it's interpreted in a way that the big company wins. For you not saying irrevocable doesn't mean it's revocable, but the opposite holds.
Companies that got burnt on this now require you to give up rights to any contributions you wish to make before merging (or just not use any of code not written by their employees).
The currently top-rated answer states:
A non-exclusive copyright license (such as most FOSS licenses) can be revoked at any time only if there was no consideration involved. The United States Federal Circuit Court of Appeal took this on in Jacobsen v. Katzer[1] in 2008 and ruled that there is consideration exchanged in the use of FOSS by a licensee. This indicates that an FOSS license that's silent on revocation is likely revocable only for violation of it's conditions.
But the answer may vary in other jurisdictions. Love to hear a lawyer chime in.
EDIT: In the UK and EU it's also likely irrevocable once you've relied on it, eg. via principle of estoppel. The second voted answer mentions an interesting talk[2] by a panel of lawyers/experts and this starts to be discussed around the 8m 30s mark.
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[1] https://scholar.google.com/scholar_case?case=177761825741712...
[2] https://archive.fosdem.org/2018/schedule/event/licenses_and_...
This on the face of it seems needlessly confusing as well. Perpetual seems to just mean "may be revoked at any time". So why use the term at all instead of just talking in terms of revocation?
E.g. "irrevocable until 1 Jan 2025 except for situations listed in section 5" or "may be revoked at any time".
This will make fan content nye impossible to publish.
The Apache licence is irrevocable but BSD, MIT, ---GPL and variants---, Eclipse and others say no such thing.
Does that mean they are all revocable? Does that mean the FSF can revoke the GPL v2 and force upgrade Linux to v3?
Edit: correction the GPL and family are irrevocable. But that still leaves a lot of OSI and FSF approved licenses with no such language.
> Does that mean the FSF can revoke the GPL v2 and force upgrade Linux to v3?
No, because what’s revoked is to use something under that license, but only the copyright holder of that something could revoke those rights, not whoever owns the copyright of the license.
ETA: The position of the FSF/SFC is that the GPLv2 is also irrevocable: https://sfconservancy.org/news/2018/sep/26/GPLv2-irrevocabil...
> Parties who have received copies, or rights, from you under this License will not have their licenses terminated so long as such parties remain in full compliance
Which, at least to me as a layperson, does indeed sound like it’s describing "irrevocable" with more words.
Even if current recepients can still use it, new recepients are blocked. And it is unclear if a current recepient can create new derivatives or nor.
If Alice grants Bob lib v1.0 under GPL v2. Bob creates Soft1 v1.0 under GPL v2 using lib v1.0. Alice then revokes the licence on lib v1.0. Bob can still distribute Soft1 v1.0 but can Bob create Soft 1 v2.0 or Soft2 using lib v1.0? Or is he considered a new recepient of lib with each derivative he creates? Can Charlie still get lib v1.0 under GPL v2 from Bob?
If the last answer is yes then there is no issue with the current situation either.
It would mean you can still get the SDR from anyone who already has the SDR under OGL 1.0 even if directly from WOTC you can only get it under the new license.
Are we stuck until all his contribs are rewritten. Aren't all contribs to Linux so intertwined as to be derivatives of each other.
Which Git commit is a derivative and which isn't?
No he cant, he's NOT the owner of 99.9% of the linux kernel code, he is "just" the owner of the trademark "linux" and some code.
The Linux-Kernel-Code could just change license if every single contributor (or company) gives the "thump-up", otherwise that code would need to be rewritten.
That's a good thing btw ;)
Past discussion on claims the GPLv2 is revocable because it doesn't explicitly say irrevocable
which was added when a bunch of GPLv2 contributors mused about revoking their contributions to Linux rather than comply with the project's new code of conduct: https://sfconservancy.org/news/2018/sep/26/GPLv2-irrevocabil...
> The contributor is, of course, free to make no future grants, but they can’t withdraw past grants. The Guide's new section also explains how promissory estoppel is an additional legal safeguard ensuring the withdrawal of permission will not disrupt the use of those who rely on the software.
https://web.archive.org/web/20040307094152/http://www.wizard...
I believe, at the time the OGL v1.0 was written, the intention of irrevocablility was there.
>A: Yes, it could. However, the License already defines what will happen to content that has been previously distributed using an earlier version, in Section 9. As a result, even if Wizards made a change you disagreed with, you could continue to use an earlier, acceptable version at your option. In other words, there's no reason for Wizards to ever make a change that the community of people using the Open Gaming License would object to, because the community would just ignore the change anyway.
If it goes to court I bet this quote will be mentioned. They cannot say this and then in small print do the opposite after people have relied on it for two decades.
That it does not require periodic refreshing. Compare to getting hired and being hired until you are fired vs you can have a fixed duration contract which you would have to explicitly extend otherwise it automatically ends.
Or think about an "immortal" who doesn't age but can still be killed.
I still think this is weaseling.
So a gaming podcast had a contract lawyer on to opine on this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MDuHjpwx5Q4
Their "this is not specific personalised advice, consult your own lawyer" thoughts were:
1. The license does not specify revocable or irrevocable, but it would be likely a court would find it to be irrevocable because:
- other lanaguage in the license such as the perpetual term and the option to use later versions appears to anticipate it being non-revocable
- the section on termination only provides for breach of contract and protects sublicenses of the terminated work from being terminated unless the sub licenses were also infringing. The fact that it provides some grounds for termination but "we have a new license" isn't among them hurts their argument.
- There is mutual consideration and this is even spelled out in the contract as being consideration in terms of the derivative content being reciprocally licensed, plus the unspecified benefit to Wizards of having more complements to their product increasing its appeal. The licensee obviously gets the rights to use the covered content.
- The 23 year usage of OGL 1.0a may constitute reliance especially when combined with past clarifying public statements where Wizards official documents and then-active employees indicated it was intended to be non-revocable.
- Clauses in US law for copyright owners to terminate licenses require 35 years and do not affect sublicenses, so unlikely a court would assume a stricter unwritten standard of revocability than this
However, they also point out you can waive your rights to use content under 1.0a if you were to agree to 1.1, e.g. to get access to 6e content.
They also touch on the idea of if Wizards could use others OGL 1.0a licensed content under 1.1 which imposes lesser restrictions on wizards than 1.1. They're vaguer on this point, but imply probably not as its too much of a deviation from the previous license and raise the reliance part again
---
I will note the different lawyer angling for a publisher lawsuit linked in the Google drive elsewhere makes many of these arguments.
This is more or less what Hasbro tried to do with 4E's GSL,[1] which is why nobody used it.
1: https://thealexandrian.net/wordpress/48761/roleplaying-games...
It also looks like a lawyer advertising his services. And I'm not sure I trust this lawyer any more than I trust Hasbro.
How so? They are just clarifying that it’s not legal advice, something that would suddenly come with a ton of regulation (and would even be illegal in some jurisdictions).
That said, I think PF will still have to reword quite a few spells, and possibly rename more than a few creatures and spells as well. Probably enough for a 2.5e, but I also wouldn't be surprised if they're working on it especially after this leak dropped.
[1] https://mobile.twitter.com/jasonschreier/status/161040530756...
This letter was sent to Wizards of the Coast yesterday, asking for clarification on the situation within 10 days.
The biggest effect from all of this that I can see is that everyone I know that's normally super enthusiastic about creating Dungeons & Dragons content (including myself!) is now deflated, not knowing what they should do about their upcoming projects (that they may have sunk thousands in already).
https://archive.is/EFalu
- Wizards of the Coast announced on December 21, 2022 that a new version of the Open Gaming License (OGL) would be released, causing confusion in the gaming community.
- The letter writer, who represents Sad Fishe Games and Prudence Holdings, has tried to contact Wizards of the Coast through various channels to seek clarification, but has not received a response.
- There are rumors that the new 1.1 version of the OGL will restrict the use of the 1.0a version and require contributors to share financial data and potentially pay a royalty to Wizards of the Coast for the use of OGL content.
- The letter writer argues that the 1.0a version of the OGL cannot be revoked and that Wizards of the Coast does not have the authority to terminate the license or force contributors to use the 1.1 version.
- The letter writer cites previous statements made by Wizards of the Coast and case law to support this interpretation.
- The letter writer requests that Wizards of the Coast provide a more definite statement on the 1.1 version of the OGL and deauthorize any attempt to repudiate the 1.0a version.
ChatGPT is probably even better than those random Reddit news article summaries that were all the rage for a while.
ChatGPT doesn't care about getting it right or wrong, and won't get rewarded / penalized for it.
- that the legal action to be taken against WotC would be focused around building a coalition for a "class action" injunction against WotC based on their "apparent intention to breach the 1.0a Open Gaming License".
- "22-23 years of conduct on the part of WotC which ratifies the important section",
- provided a very narrow alley for a semi-face-saving "out" to WotC in the form of "perhaps this was all a big misunderstanding".
- overall tone was very "we will 100% absolutely demolish you in court but would rather you just come to your senses".
- threatened legal subpoenas depositions with all that entails, namely the implications implicit in depositions that resulting information would either: cause great embarrassment to WotC or potentially open up perjury/etc charges against individuals if they obscured embarrassing testimony.
If I was posting a ChatGPT summary I would have used the ChatGPT output as a starting point and edited these points into it, and blending my style with OpenGPT's style. That's what I'd like others to do as well if they insist on using ChatGPT so much.
Would you mind explaining why you don't want to go into another person's Google Drive? Just Google tracking?
And, since it's Google Drive, I don't want to deal with having to open the link in a private browser. For the person saying "isn't it easy just to open it in a private browser?" sure; but it's also friction I don't feel like dealing with, especially since it could easily be a PDF or whatever and my concerns remain.
It is arbitrary, and it really is nothing more than a letter. But it sets expectations on what consequences may arise if they choose not to respond. It is now up to Wizard of the Coast to decide whether and how to respond.
* forces the issue, and demands action from WoTC; fairly common
* keeps the issue front and center, ensures it is visible for the rest of the community, which means they can act accordingly (instead of it quietly happening behind the scenes, followed by targeted Cease and Desists, settlements, etc.)
* only requires a response; Hasboro might be able to buy time, offer an olive branch, etc.
If they're self-publishing, well, it's a pity everyone forgot what happened with 4E and the GSL.
Let’s say I decide that I want to publish a DnD adventure.
Even with OGL I can’t say it is for DnD. They say I can’t even say it is compatible with DnD, but I have my doubts about that.
I describe a unique set and setting. Not using any Wizards of the Coast trademark in it. (Which honestly I don’t want because I want my thing to feel fresh and unique.) I don’t think the OGL licence would help me with that.
Then of course there is game mechanics. I don’t want to repeat the players handbook. (You wouldn’t expect this kind of material to repeat the basic rules anyway.) But i do want to use terms from it. For example I would write: “The 3rd chest in the second level is locked and magically trapped. The DC of the trap is 13. On activativation it deals 1d6 poison damage. Inside the chest a Shimmering Ghillie Suit. The suit is a legendary magical item which grants its wearer advantage on stealth checks.” Obviously this uses a lot of DnD terminology. (DC, advantage, poison damage, stealth check, legendary item) But it does not infringe on the copyright on any WotC property. (Assuming that I have made a search for the Ghillie Suit not appearing in any published materials yet.) Do i need OGL to publish this?
If not who on earth needs OGL to publish anything they would want to publish?
Or at least that’s my understanding with all I’ve learned today ;) Mechanics are fine, "Creative" things like classes not.
> If not who on earth needs OGL to publish anything they would want to publish?
IIRC the video game Solasta: Crown of the Magister is D&D5e under OGL, so they used a lot of SRD things.
> Turn-Based Tactical RPG based on the SRD 5.1 Ruleset
It is generally a wise idea to not anger the druids anyway. :)
> IIRC the video game Solasta
Oh yeah. I did not think about video games. Makes sense.
Fear keeps the local publishers in line. Wizards of the Coast is basically the only big player in the industry, backed by an even larger corporation.
"Third party publishers" are usually hobbyists or single-person operations, who really benefit not having to work under the threat of lawsuits or even C&Ds.
And the RPG industry does have a history of that: TSR, the originators of D&D, were rather litigious, resulting early game companies like Judges Guild having to really conceal their NPC stats to not use verbiage from AD&D.
Later TSR sued Mayfair for their Role Aids line (IIRC, Mayfair was helmed by one of the chief people now responsible at WotC). And then there was Palladium, makers of quasi-D&D and the ultimate kitchen sink setting Rifts, who really didn't like early online presence.
Never mind that your most likely "publishing house" drivethrurpg.com has WotC as a big partner.
Technically legal is one thing, having a license that's shared by thousands of other people who would be on your side out of poor necessity seems like a better foundation for your small game company.
https://magicuntapped.com/index.php/articles/item/501-filing...
Plus there is little reason to pick a fight -- Paradox is an online publisher and has it's own slew of IPs. Not a fight worth picking, and one that might be expensive, esp. against an established player in a different market and country.
What Paizo would or could do now is a different matter. They might say that PF 2E is distinct enough, especially if some 2.5E thing would remove some remaining verbiage or direct lifts from old OGL material. They might also just do a deal with WotC. Gates and Jobs at Tanagra.
Dumbest decision I've seen Paizo make since the last one.
In retrospect if that was their goal, it would have made sense to use a different copyleft license for the open content that did not include a clause that paints Wizards as the body to update the license, especially given the mechanics of using PF 1E content in 2E requires subjective decision making compared to the relatively automatic 3.5 -> PF1E or PF1E -> SF compatibility.
1. simplify things for 3rd party publishers. rather than worry about multiple licenses, just publish under the same one as pathfinder 1e, 3.5e, and 5e, that they already know like the back of their hand
2. save costs. writing a new license is expensive. it apparently would have delayed release of the pf2e system and significantly increased the cost
3. cover their ass just in case WotC thinks pf2e is still too similar to d&d
there’s really no way they could have foreseen a rugpull like this. everyone thought the OGL was ironclad until yesterday. hindsight is 20/20 though.
Could they?
This almost looks like a poison pill to me. If WotC was forward thinking enough, back in the 3.0 days they used the OGL to trick competitors into a trap.
As time has gone on the main competitor to 4e is now Pathfinder... thus taking the oxygen out of the room and leaving less space for non-OGL competition.
Now Paizo has enough of a real business built on Pathfinder, but not the endless war chest of Hasbro. It seems to me like they would probably need to cave and make a deal with Hasbro rather than try to carry on some kind of fight that puts their livelihoods on the line.
And as a player I can be dismayed with what Hasbro is doing, but knowing that Pathfinder is at risk now I have no reason to switch to them. But there's no obvious alternative to 5e and Pathfinder that has any real traction...
I don't think moving from a license which Wizards is trying to rely on ambiguity to claim it allows them to pull the plug to a license which definitively allows them to pull the plug is a business safe move. Especially since the new license requires you to accept the end of OGL v1.0a so there's no way back if you do sign.
Add to that that Wizards has pulled the plug on them before, _twice_, first by kicking them out of their official adventure publishing role, then pulling the plug on their position as an online retailer of first party 3E PDFs, and there can't be much trust for Wizards from Paizo.
Paizo could have made this decision before (without the one way nature, even), and chose not to in the 3E to 4E days. Charting their own path instead took them from the a small adventure path publisher to the #2 publisher in tabletop games, so it worked out for them, so I don't see why Paizo would choose to deal with Wizards here.
Finally, I'm not sure tabletop publishing is that high margin a business. I'm not sure Paizo could afford 25% of their revenue, or even if they got a sweetheart deal like 10% on account of their size. Plus the aforementioned trust issues regarding keeping that split long term would still be there
I think OGL came from a realization that this sort of thing wasn't good.
What it was created to do, and what Hasbro is leveraging it to do, are two different things. The same thing happened with 4E/the GSL, which everyone's forgotten but was essentially the beta run at Hasbro trying to invalidate the OGL.
The thing is, Hasbro doesn't even need to invalidate the OGL. They recaptured so much of the market with 5E and the OGL-agnostic, IP-friendly Dungeon Master's Guild that they could just stop publishing and supporting OGL-compatible products altogether. As long as One D&D doesn't botch things as badly as 4E, I don't think the current market would care.
It might sell the most right now but if this truly is WotC slicing off their own nose to spite their face with overly aggressive legal tactics to extract money and control the market for D&D related goods, and as a consequence the community turn away from them… there’s a huge sea of available options that are completely unrelated to D&D, Champions, Rifts, Genesys, Feng Shui, Fate, Numenera, the plethora of hand that are Powered by the Apocalypse… there’s not just a sea but entire oceans of RPGs out there that don’t descend from D&D in any way and most of them are just plain better RPGs! If the community leaves D&D behind they will find so many better games to play that honestly… I’m starting to hope WotC are about to accidentally cripple the D&D brand. It might just be the best possible thing for the RPG industry and the player community as well.
The OGL is a sort of "you're definitely safe under these restrictions" promise. If you comply with it, the promise is that you definitely won't be sued. Of course, that promise is now being broken.
You are absolutely right about this being more of a promise not to sue, more than anything else.
The OGL says, here, crib from and directly reference this copyrighted text so you can eliminate broad swaths of reinventing the wheel and focus on your compatible content. Third-party publishers on shoestrings adopted it en masse for both litigation safety and convenience.
I understand setting an adventure in Faerun would be a derivative work, but surely it wouldn't if it's in a completely new setting? And repeating stat blocks from the Monster Manual is clearly a violation, but it seems to me I should be able to refer to the Monster Manual, as well as include my own custom stats for original creatures not from the Monster Manual, or even stats that I need to be different from those in the MM.
The fact that something competes is not enough; I can write a novel with wizards and dragons, and as long as I don't include characters or places from Tolkien or Harry Potter, it's not derivative, no matter how many themes and ideas are similar.
Referring to classes and spells from the Player's Handbook shouldn't be a problem, because the Harry Potter Encyclopedia can refer to everything from the Harry Potter book.
Am interesting aspect with publishing an adventure is of course that WotC also publishes adventures for D&D, but my adventure would not be derivative of those adventures; it exists entirely independent from them. It does not exist independently from the core rules (PHB, DMF and MM), but it doesn't compete with those.
If that would still count as a copyright violation, then the Harry Potter Encyclopedia would also be a copyright violation the moment Rowling publishes her own encyclopedia. I think that would be rather weird. Shouldn't a violation be a violation of a specific work, rather than the context around it?
Anyone can write a setting book. A setting book that references specific copyrighted text — like the contents of the SRD, including classes, spells, creatures, magic items, and certain non-mechanical terms — runs into OGL space.
If you create an entirely new set of terms and mechanics, you haven't created a derivative work, but you also haven't necessarily created a compatible work, and you certainly haven't created one as directly compatible as a potential competitor's OGL-compliant work.
If you aren't writing for distribution, then none of this matters anyway.
> And repeating stat blocks from the Monster Manual is clearly a violation
With the exception of some copyrighted monster names, it's explicitly not a violation under the OGL, and the ability to do so is a large part of the point of the OGL.
> but it seems to me I should be able to refer to the Monster Manual
You can't by name without a separate compatibility license, typically by way of publishing to the Dungeon Master's Guild, which is laden with a lot of other intellectual ownership gotchas.
> as well as include my own custom stats for original creatures not from the Monster Manual, or even stats that I need to be different from those in the MM.
If you can describe what "neutral good" or an "Armor Class" represents mechanically without resorting to a literal mechanical description in the SRD or covered by the OGL, go for it. The broader point of the OGL was not having to reinvent those wheels in every product a publisher created.
I understand that this is what they want you to believe. I don’t understand how it would be trademark or copyright infringement saying “go buy those people’s book and look up information there”.
> If you can describe what "neutral good" or an "Armor Class" represents mechanically without resorting to a literal mechanical description
But source books don’t do that. They say “so and so, neutral good, ac: 12” It is expected from the DM reading them that they already know what this kind of shorthand mean.
It's a violation of the OGL. So you can opt out of the OGL (and opt out of reprinting verbatim rules), try it, sell it, and see what happens:
> Use of Product Identity: You agree not to Use any Product Identity, including as an indication as to compatibility, except as expressly licensed in another, independent Agreement with the owner of each element of that Product Identity.
...
> The following items are designated Product Identity, as defined in Section 1(e) of the Open Game License Version 1.0a, and are subject to the conditions set forth in Section 7 of the OGL, and are not Open Content: Dungeons & Dragons, D&D, Player’s Handbook, Dungeon Master, Monster Manual, ...
This is why so many OGL works contain phrases like "core rule books of the 5th edition of the world's most popular pen and paper RPG" instead of "Monster Manual p. 132".
> Source books don’t do that. They say “so and so, neutral good, ac: 12” It is expected from the DM reading them that they already know what this kind of shorthand mean.
You're right, those are too generic of examples. Here are some real-world ones I've had to deal with as an OGL author:
- What are the mechanical ramifications of a sentient magic item with the Crusader special purpose that's engaging in a Conflict with its wielder?
- A creature has Burrow. Can they burrow through stone?
- "Eldritch Blast". Is it PI because of "Eldritch"? Is it OGL because one version of the SRD named it but omitted its mechanics?
- How do you sustain the spell effect of a Crown of Madness? Is that OGL because one version of the SRD omitted that paragraph?
- A dwarf has Dwarven Combat Training. What kind of hammer can they throw?
- Does the Grappler feat grant two or three benefits? If it's two, but your DMs' copy of the source text has three, which benefit was removed via errata? Do you assume your players/DMs even have the errata?
What you reference isn't always a detail you can assume the DM (sorry, GM) has available. The official SRD also isn't entirely OGL, and the contents of the SRD don't always match the text of their source works.
So when something you add to your setting, or to a creature or item, relies on the details an OGL/SRD wrinkle, do you play it safe and stick to what's covered by the OGL? Find something else? Ditch the OGL, rewrite all of the complicated interactions from scratch, and wind up creating a new game?
If you're a third-party publisher making three figures and paying freelancers by the word, do you tell the writer, "Sure, go ahead and rewrite all of the related rules from scratch", or do you tell them to stick to what's most clearly covered by the OGL?
Idk. Do you want it to burrow through stone? Write that down. Do you not want it to burrow through stone? Write that down. Do you not have an opinion? Leave it to the DM.
I’m not even following what you are saying. You are saying that you choose to publish under OGL because then it is defined how burrowing works? Or what is exactly that you are saying?
> Does the Grappler feat grant two or three benefits?
What? The Grappler feat is in the basic rules. How does this come up in your own published material? If some NPC of your making has it you just say “has the grapler feat” and then people can look it up what that means.
> Do you assume your players/DMs even have the errata?
Why do you care? How often did you received feedback like this: “We were playing the adventure published by trynewideas. The setting was trully breath taking, and the maps gorgeous. The fun quirks of the NPCs made combat very memorable. My players lowed it. That is until it all came crashing down because the grappling feat of the gladiators in the amphiteatre were slightly ambigous. Ruined the whole module for us. Sad.”
But that's ridiculous, right? Anyone can refer to a page in a book. If the OGL takes that away, then what's even the point of it? Well, I guess being able to make derivative works, but what if I don't want to do that? What if I want to make my own campaign world that's merely meant to be compatible with the D&D rules? The same way anyone can make a game that runs on Windows without needing a license?
WotC's entire reasoning that you can't do that, sounds to me like a far too restrictive interpretation of copyright law. I'm not a lawyer, but as far as I know, WotC's interpretation has never been tested in court.
I'm talking about copyright, not OGL.
> You can't by name without a separate compatibility license, typically by way of publishing to the Dungeon Master's Guild, which is laden with a lot of other intellectual ownership gotchas.
Says who? WotC doesn't decide the law. They can claim it's illegal, just like Apple can claim it's illegal to jailbreak an iPhone, but that doesn't make it law.
Just like the Harry Potter Encyclopedia can refer to Harry Potter characters without a license, an adventure should be able to refer to entries in the PHB or Monster Manual, as long as it doesn't directly copy significant amounts of text.
> If you can describe what "neutral good" or an "Armor Class" represents mechanically without resorting to a literal mechanical description in the SRD or covered by the OGL
My point is that I don't want to and don't have to. It's already described in another book that I expect people to own.
It's not that simple. The main thing to remember is that even a threat of an expensive lawsuit is a pretty credible one in the US, because of how the system is set up.
Yes, frivolous suits get thrown out pretty fast, but that's still not cheap (because you need to hire an attorney to communicate with the court on your behalf, because, again, the system is set up that way), and when it comes to copyright very few things are that clear cut.
Just with a mod for a game it's easy to argue that without the game there's no mod, so the mod is a derivative work.
And if your campaign is bolted to the mechanics, then it's not hard to argue that the campaign is basically genre-bending fanfiction (ie. copies the same themes into a new setting), so one might argue it should get the same legal treatment as a derivative work.
Even if it's ~90% that you would win the case, it might cost you a lot, that's why this matters to businesses. (It likely doesn't matter to individuals or small clubs that publish things for free.)
EDIT: I realize people might not know what an SRD is. It's basically the bare-bones document explaining the game and its mechanics with all the IP-encumbered names filed off. D&D 5E has an SRD (copy: https://www.5esrd.com/) which 3PPs use when making their own content for the system.
But seriously, if this goes wrong, if it's agreed that OGL 3rd and 5th Edition derivatives can continue under OGL1.0 in perpetuity, Wizards of the Coast and Hasbro stand to lose control of AD&D. They have already have lost significant mindshare to Pathfinder (a 3rd Ed fork), but this could be the final nail.
There's more than enough money in keeping OGL1 to fight this. This is a stupid fight for WotC to have picked. Any goodwill they had will be actively invested into other rulesets.
None of them would go for it. I tried and tried to get them to understand that there wasn't anything special about the WotC cards, I said "You know there are no real wizards at Wizards of the Coast, right?" These are "magic" cards, not magic cards, eh? But they wouldn't have it.
I gotta hand it to these folks. They convinced a generation that you have to pay them to use your own imagination. Maybe they are real wizards?
But this does not “cancel” existing licenses. Instead, what it does is create a hard fork, between 1.1 content and 1.0 content.
Basically… any content released under the 1.1 license is not usable under the 1.0 license.
The statement, in the new license, that the old license is “no longer an authorized license agreement” does not apply to existing licenses anyone may have to 1.0 content. Absent your consent to the 1.1 license, its terms don’t apply to you.
Instead, that language is meant to defeat the forward compatibility clauses in the 1.0 license. Absent that language you could freely use 1.1 content under the 1.0 terms because of the forward compatibility language in 1.0.
This means you can continue to “Use” (as defined in the 1.0 license) any of the content you were using before.
However, it also means if you “Use” any 1.1 licensed content, then either you are in violation of the 1.0 license (and then thus have no rights) or you are subject to the 1.1 license and its terms.
So, this does create some hazard, in that any one using 1.0 content under a 1.0 license needs to ensure they don’t in the future use any 1.1 content.
But if you stick to 1.0 licensed content you are ok.
This can still cause problems. If you are in the business of selling DnD compatible game content, you now suddenly have to make a choice between loosing forward compatibility and having control over your revenue.
It still sucks.
But any content you could sell yesterday you can still sell tomorrow.
The contract has explicit, custom, definitions for several basic elements of contract law. It explicitly declares what consideration exists and what offer and acceptance look like.
The party defining those terms is Wotc. They are bound by something called “promissory estoppel” from representing that those things weren’t present in the original 1.0 license. They cannot revoke your 1.0 license unless you breach the agreement.
They can set a trap for you, that will capture 25% of your revenue, if you end up incorporating 1.1 content into your previously 1.0 derived works.
So, be careful. But they can’t take away what you have now.
It can still also hurt various businesses to loose forward compatibility rights… but anything derived from purely 1.0 content is still 1.0 licensed and they can’t take that away unless you violate the 1.0 license terms somehow.