4e D&D GSL Live

[Treebore]

Like I said in the 4E forum about this GSL if its as strong armed as it seems to be against 3rd party publishers then not only will I not DM 4E, I will not play it and ban it completely. Even 3rd party publishers who bow to the bully and publish under the GSL. WOTC will make me not only refuse DM the newest version of D&D, refuse to play 4E, but will also make me decide I will never play any version of D&D ever made by WOTC from now on.

So I hope the FAQ and future public dialogue shows the GSL is much nicer than it sounds, but if it is as controlling as it sounds, goodbye WOTC and all future versions of D&D made by them.

I'll stick with the nice and friendly comraderie and community of the current 3rd party publishers.

Come on WOTC, show you can be big and friendly, rather than so fearful that you become a control freak.

 

[pawsplay]

The SRD seems to suggest that if you make some sort of mechanical change, you can print the stat block.

So I guess we're going to see a lot of monsters with class levels, templates, and/or advanced natural Hit Dice in third-party products (or they'll just change their weapons and armor and say that's enough).

Or they'll just change the name of the critter.

 

[Cthulhudrew]

It looks like you can't use any of the existing paragon paths or epic destinies. I find that rather odd.

Could be they're planning on adding it later, but only after they've put out their own Paragon and Epic adventures? (Thus keeping any 3pps from preemptively jumping on that bandwagon before they get there.)

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

Could be they're planning on adding it later, but only after they've put out their own Paragon and Epic adventures? (Thus keeping any 3pps from preemptively jumping on that bandwagon before they get there.)

That's my guess.

 

[shinmizu]

And the bad press of the attempt would create far too much ill will in exactly the people they count on buying their product.

Again, that didn't stop TSR (hence the devlopment of such lovely names as "T$R" and "They Sue Regularly," and I can't name a single soul that's a fan of Lorraine Williams). Never underestimate the potential idiocy of any company's legal department, marketing department, or upper management (especially with Hasbro in the picture).

I have a hard time believing WotC would want to really, really bugger 3pps, because bad PR would not help them.

On the other hand, WotC could be banking on the fact that 95% of D&D players know jack about 3pps and the GSL, and it wouldn't effect their sales too much.

This is a very strong incentive for them to ignore potential bad press.

 

[frankthedm]

I have a hard time believing WotC would want to really, really bugger 3pps, because bad PR would not help them.

I think the license says more than enough on that subject.

Come on WOTC, show you can be big and friendly, rather than so fearful that you become a control freak.

This is not the Peter Adkinson Wotc that Birthed 3E and the SRD & real OGL.

 

[Cthulhudrew]

Never underestimate the potential idiocy of any company's legal department, marketing department, or upper management (especially with Hasbro in the picture).

WotC seems to have a much better idea of how quickly information spreads these days (as opposed to TSR in the blossoming days of the online community), and in general does a better idea of taking that into account.

That said, you have a good point (re: Idiocy in upper management).

 

[resistor]

The clause I find interesting is that if you make a GSL product, you can never make that product an OGL product EVEN AFTER THE LICENSE TERMINATES.

Actually, I don't think that's quite correct. If you look at Section 6.3, the punishment for re-publishing something back under the OGL is having your GSL license terminated. So, in the case that your license was terminated for other reasons, they can't exactly re-terminate it to punish you. ;-)

Even if my reading is incorrect, a restraint against publication under the OGL after termination seems legally shaky to me. The closest parallel I can think of is a non-compete clause in an employment contract. The legality of those varies widely from state to state, but in general they require that the scope of the clause be geographically and/or temporally limited, and that it not bar the contractee from being able to earn a livelihood in their field.

It would be interesting to see if a court would agree with such an analogical argument.

 

[jmucchiello]

It would be interesting to see if a court would agree with such an analogical argument.

Yes, but who has the money to actually take it to court?

 

[argash]

After reading section 5.5 I can't help but think that WotC put that in there specifically because they know how badly they suck at software. By limiting competition it will force everyone to use their craptacular software products even if they don't exist *cough* D&Di *cough*

I'd be interested to hear the opinion of an IP lawyer to determine what a publisher could do on their own without the GSL under the guise of current IP laws as far as fair use.