Vapourware WOTC restricting content creation in new OGL - Paizo launches competing OGL - lol cancelled

[pakoito]

They don't have to threaten them individually, just DTRPG to take them down for them. Also itch, humble bundle, patreon...

The Eye is still up tho.

 

[NecroLord]

Apparently it angers the content cucks like Critical Role so I'm fine with it.

Why does it anger them?

 

[RPK]

Apparently it angers the content cucks like Critical Role so I'm fine with it.

Why does it anger them?

they would have to sign an agreement with WOTC and give them a cut just like anyone else using the OGL content. Speculation abounds that WOTC will give them a sweetheart deal though because they're so popular and generate a lot of revenue for D&D.

 

[NecroLord]

Speculation abounds that WOTC will give them a sweetheart deal though because they're so popular and generate a lot of revenue for D&D.

Yeah, I think this might be the case.
After all, Critical Role is popular with guys who are into NuD&D.
They can be a milk cow for WOTC.

 

[Dadd]

Apparently it angers the content cucks like Critical Role so I'm fine with it.

Why does it anger them?

they would have to sign an agreement with WOTC and give them a cut just like anyone else using the OGL content. Speculation abounds that WOTC will give them a sweetheart deal though because they're so popular and generate a lot of revenue for D&D.

I still don't understand why they're so popular. It's bad theater. Why not play with your friends instead. Or play a video game.

 

[NecroLord]

Apparently it angers the content cucks like Critical Role so I'm fine with it.

Why does it anger them?

they would have to sign an agreement with WOTC and give them a cut just like anyone else using the OGL content. Speculation abounds that WOTC will give them a sweetheart deal though because they're so popular and generate a lot of revenue for D&D.

I still don't understand why they're so popular. It's bad theater. Why not play with your friends instead. Or play a video game.

It makes NuD&D 5E more accessible to consoomers(as if it wasn't already). Having all sorts of actors in on the action also helps with that.

 

[pakoito]

Apparently it angers the content cucks like Critical Role so I'm fine with it.

Why does it anger them?

they would have to sign an agreement with WOTC and give them a cut just like anyone else using the OGL content. Speculation abounds that WOTC will give them a sweetheart deal though because they're so popular and generate a lot of revenue for D&D.

I still don't understand why they're so popular. It's bad theater. Why not play with your friends instead. Or play a video game.

Same reason why people watch Twitch instead of playing the games. Parasocial relationships, and those actors are cooler, roleplay better, and are less aggravating than your friends.

 

[Acrux]

If those people "roleplay" "better" and are less aggravating than your friends, get some new friends.

 

[Delterius]

Not to mention the current CEO at Hasbro is Cynthia Williams. She cut her teeth at Xbox LIVEs "player retention" department, yikes lmao.

i assume she did a swell job for microsoft then

 

[rusty_shackleford]

Nothing of value was lost.

 

[rusty_shackleford]

Hasbro is attempting to retroactively invalidate the OGL

They can't. It's a legally binding agreement, the content released under it cannot be taken back anymore than someone can remove something from the public domain.

 

[Volourn]

If they try to retroactively cancel ogl from already released projects, take them to court. They would lose barring bribing the judge.

 

[Gangrelrumbler]

The last time they had a stable stream of OGL products and pissed everyone off by making stupid decision the result was creation of Pathfinder which is now one of their biggest competitors.

 

[JamesDixon]

I think there may also be some OGL monsters that WotC could probably label as theirs and have a solid case... such as the otyugh.

Just rename the monster as only the name is trademarked.

what about the D&D-through-and-through terms such as "armor class" and "saving throws"?

Armor Class and Saving Throws are not trademarked. They can't be copyrighted either.

Armor Class appears in Age of Empires II and a whole slew of pen and paper RPGs not related to DANDINO/True D&D™. The same is true for Saving Throws or any other name for a mechanic. They've reached the point of common usage just like Xerox's name when it comes to copiers. What is trademarked is Dungeon Master and DM.

 

[pakoito]

Hasbro is attempting to retroactively invalidate the OGL

They can't. It's a legally binding agreement, the content released under it cannot be taken back anymore than someone can remove something from the public domain.

That's what we all think, but kwan's judges gonna kwan.

 

[JamesDixon]

Hasbro is attempting to retroactively invalidate the OGL

They can't. It's a legally binding agreement, the content released under it cannot be taken back anymore than someone can remove something from the public domain.

That's what we all think, but kwan's judges gonna kwan.

When it comes to IP law US judges take their jobs very seriously. You rarely see any shennanigans like you do in other court divisions due to the sheer amount of money involved on both sides.

 

[rojay]

The OGL isn't revocable. If it was, then WotC would've done it already to prevent Pathfinder from being created.

We'll have to wait and see exactly how they'll finagle around it.

Despite reassurances from Wizards of the Coast last month, the original OGL will become an “unauthorized” agreement, and it appears no new content will be permitted to be created under the original license.

This is outside my area of expertise, but I think the no "new" content is the key here. They can certainly revise the license for the new "one dnd" thing they're going to release, but I don't believe they can retroactively affect games like Solasta or KotC. Having said that, I've read articles that suggest that's exactly what they're doing, and Paizo, at least, has declined to comment in detail on what it means for them.

This is what will kill their OGL since they are claiming a copyright to game mechanics and mathematical formulas. That's not legal in the US.

1 (d)"Open Game Content" means the game mechanic and includes the methods, procedures, processes and routines to the extent such content does not embody the Product Identity

You are free in the US to write up the exact same mechanics, methods, procedures, processes, and routines for D&D provided you do not use any of their product identity including trademarks and copyrighted material. In this case, it's the exact expression used in their published books.

You can't trademark/copyright recipes, either. At least, not the "formula" part of the recipe. Your description about how the food tastes, or a name for a dish you've come up with are protected, but not the ingredients/amounts/timing etc.

I really don't know how this is going to shake out, but my best guess is that this is intended to limit what competitors can do in the future, and possibly not just with the "new" rules they're coming out with. That could mean problems for Pierre in the future, but I'd bet Paizo has an argument that Pathfinder is its own IP now and will tell WotC to fuck off.

The real problem is going to be for small producers, because litigation is expensive and I seriously doubt anyone - including Paizo - has any sort of insurance that would cover legal fees for this.

I represented a client once who received a cease and desist letter from the company that owns the rights to Lord of the Rings, because he was selling a product the name of which was a play on "Lord of the Rings." The product had nothing to do with anything Tolkien ever wrote and the company that owns the rights had never and will never release a similar product. There was no danger that someone seeing my client's product would think, "Hm... I wonder if that's connected to the Tolkien estate?"

My client could have won if it had gone to suit, but ultimately he would have paid me (or another lawyer) more than he will ever make selling his product to defend a lawsuit. I worked out a deal (and the company was reasonably generous with my client) and it went away, but if you're a small business the threat of getting sued is very, very real.

Maybe some non-profit that champions small businesses in these sort of things will step in and challenge it?

 

[vortex]

Apparently it angers the content cucks like Critical Role so I'm fine with it.

Fedora master is Critical role number one fan.

 

[NecroLord]

Apparently it angers the content cucks like Critical Role so I'm fine with it.

Fedora master is Critical role number on fan.

Also likes that shitty lewd character fan art.

 

[JamesDixon]

I really don't know how this is going to shake out, but my best guess is that this is intended to limit what competitors can do in the future, and possibly not just with the "new" rules they're coming out with.

Looking at Hasbro's Q3 2022 financials Wizards had a loss of $102.2 million which was better than what was in Q3 2021 that had $159.4 million loss. Their net revenues are $303.5 million which is a -16% change from the previous year. They're losing money with a net profit of $102.2 million. They go on with this route then they'll lose a whole lot more profit. We've seen this cycle before when someone with business smarts comes in with their grand ideas and literally attacks the fans/consumers with their anti-consumer practices. Do you happen to remember the prior CEO that did this? Her name was Lorraine Williams that was the CEO of TSR. She sicked the corporate lawyers on anyone that dared to publish any third party content on the early internet. That's why TSR's sales tanked in response.

This move is going to go down just like it did 30 years ago. WotC is going to cost Hasbro a ton of money. Wizards costs Hasbro a ton of money already as the rest of their business is 4 times what Wizards is bringing in. Think of the trickle on effect in Hasbro's other areas like toys. Not only will Wizards suffer financially, but Hasbro's other products will also.

 

[Average Manatee]

The idea that they can cancel products already existing under previous OGL agreements is of course lunacy. But they might be able to make the argument that each product someone releases is under a separate OGL agreement and they aren't offering that anymore. So future products will have to pay the WotC toll. Stuff already in development but not released could possibly avoid it (argument being that that they were part of an agreed contract when they started development), but past that WotC can probably do this.

OGL was obviously way too broad in its inception and every businessman must cringe at the idea of it, but trying to roll it back isn't going to go well. The level of openness in the original OGL makes it feel like it was written by a bunch of hippies that infiltrated the WotC legal department. Everyone else should have been able to see that giving people a blank check to compete with you with your own product was a bad move financially. Course everyone else should have been able to see that continually ruining your game more with each edition was a bad move, but they did that anyway.

 

[rojay]

I guess it's worth noting that the leaked language from the new OGL is just that, leaked. Hopefully it was drafted by a young lawyer trying to be as aggressive as possible, and the final version won't be as onerous.

Also, the language about the 1.0 OGL "no longer [being] an authorized license" suggests that the license available going forward will be the 1.1 license. In other words, nothing created under the 1.0 license should be affected, I think.

But the terms of the new OGL seem to me to be absurd. If a creator even has a license, WotC can terminate it at any time, and more importantly has an automatic right to use the creator's work for profit and without paying royalties. Why would anyone agree to that?

 

[JamesDixon]

Why would anyone agree to that?

Nobody and they're hoping to create a monopoly using DANDINO as a brand name. They literally want people to have to pay microtransactions only to Wizards of the Broke.

 

[rojay]

Right, but then why have an OGL at all? It's legitimately meaningless if they can revoke it at any time, for any reason and anything a creator has done is theirs anyway. It just makes no sense. Either there's something we don't know/understand or they are actually dumbasses. Usually I lean towards "I just don't know enough," but ...

 

[JamesDixon]

Right, but then why have an OGL at all? It's legitimately meaningless if they can revoke it at any time, for any reason and anything a creator has done is theirs anyway. It just makes no sense. Either there's something we don't know/understand or they are actually dumbasses. Usually I lean towards "I just don't know enough," but ...

Because Cynthia Williams wrote a patent with a bunch of other people for a storefront using fulfillers etc...

https://patents.google.com/patent/US8533074

I believe her hope is to turn OneD&D into a storefront like Apple's app store with all the other publishers using the OGL. If Wizards doesn't approve of your politics they can legally steal your property from you. The problem is that this patent won't work for copyrighted stuff like pen and paper rpgs. The entire underpinnings of an rpg are unpatentable and uncopyrightable. Not even using their patent will avoid problems like this.

It takes a company to willfully submit to another company using a license that has no legal standing under patent and copyright law. Only morons that didn't consult with an attorney or research the law would submit to the original OGL.