Is the omission of certain material a violation of the GSL?

[Vartan]

I'm a paralegal, and a pretty smart one, who reads statutes, helps draft contracts, etc. all the time, but for some reason I can't wrap my mind around parts of the GSL. Maybe crossing the wires between work and fun blew a fuse in my brain I understand that posting on EN World is no substitute for legal advice, but I wanted to know if anyone had any informal feedback regarding my concern.

I'm working on a campaign setting and series of related adventures that I intend to publish myself for commercial gain. Part of designing this setting, which is based on my home campaign world, is "pruning" the list of available races, classes, and items available. I have no interest in tweaking, renaming or redefining anything, but I want to explicitly omit numerous system references from the campaign because in my creative opinion they just don't belong in the setting.

Thanks for taking the time to read, and for all the information I've been able to pull from this forum so far. Game on!

 

[Marius Delphus]

IMO, leaving out stuff is fine.

The GSL is, in part, meant to allow the publication of adventures, after all, and not every adventure can include everything in the GSL. [EDIT: Argh. I mean in the SRD. GSL = terms and conditions for using WOTC's property; SRD = property that can be used.]

 

[EP]

Agreed. Should be fine.

I would suggest not making a point of omitting them, however. Just never reference them.

 

[Roger]

I want to explicitly omit numerous system references from the campaign because in my creative opinion they just don't belong in the setting.

As far as I can tell it's an issue of just how explicit you intend to be. Never mentioning gnomes is probably fine. "Gnomes do not exist in the World of Vartania" is quite possibly problematic.

That being said, would WotC go after this sort of GSL violation? Hard to say.



Cheers,
Roger

 

[Vartan]

As far as I can tell it's an issue of just how explicit you intend to be. Never mentioning gnomes is probably fine. "Gnomes do not exist in the World of Vartania" is quite possibly problematic.

That being said, would WotC go after this sort of GSL violation? Hard to say.



Cheers,
Roger

Thanks to all of you for your input. The last two posts speak directly to what worries me about my project. If I were to say that "Gnomes don't exist in Vartainia" then one could say that I might have redefined the "Gnome" system reference. If I were to say "Races x, y, and z are available as player character races in Vartania" then I wonder if I'm not getting too close to the "don't provide instructions for character creation" (exact verbiage not at my hand) portion of the GSL.

EDIT: here's the language re: character creation:

describe a process for creating a character or applying the effects of experience to a character​

Obviously you wouldn't give step-by-step "Here's how you do attributes, here's how you do skills" instructions, but in a narrow interpretation one could say that this phrase prohibits describing available options. This narrow interpretation would be pretty crippling to the design of GSL campaign settings since so much of what makes a setting unique are the available chargen options.

 

[EP]

By that token, not referring a large number of creatures in any 3pp violates the GSL. My personal opinion is that you're perfectly safe to simply reference races you choose to use and simply leave out references to the others. Odds are a player will pop one of the banished races anyway and the DM'll find a way to make it happen.

 

[Roger]

I think statements along the lines of "The most commonly-found civilized races in Vartania are X, Y, and Z" are going to be fine. Throw in some racial-specific feats and paragon paths for those races, and I'd probably get the hint.



Cheers,
Roger

 

[Marius Delphus]

From the GSL FAQ on WOTC's website (www.wizards.com/d20):

Q: Do I have to use the Defined Terms in my product?
A: No, you are not required to use any specific Defined Term although it would be difficult to avoid using them. You are, however, required to reprint the legal text identified in the GSL.
...
Q. Section 5.5 states that Character Creators are not available under the license. What does this mean?
A: Character creation means the process of generating and assigning initial scores to abilities, selecting a race, selecting a starting class, assigning initial skill points, selecting initial feats, selecting initial talents, selecting an occupation, and picking an initial alignment. You should refer readers to the section Character Creation in the 4th Edition Player’s Handbook for the process of Character Creation. Character Creation does not include creating or modifying the description of a race, class, skill, talent, or feat in accordance with the rules of the GSL.

I agree with what Roger says above: this means you could influence character creation in a campaign setting product but not really restrict it, to wit: "The vast majority of PCs are humans, halflings, elves, or dwarves."