Annoying Conspiricy Thread

[LeaderDesslok]

I guess I better throw a note in here that this is mostly in good fun, so please don't take it too seriously. There's enough griping about 3E vs. 4E to o around, this isn't meant to be another thread in that vein.

Please forgive me if I've mislead anyone.

 

[Glyfair]

I'm pretty sure Gary and family weren't getting a dime after he got kicked out by the Bad Lady whose name I forget.

Yeah, I misread the original post and thought it admitted that he knew that Gygax wasn't getting anything. It's pretty well established that Gygax sold whatever rights he had to TSR.

 

[JohnRTroy]

I dunno. Gary said he never got royalties from D&D once he left, but Monte Cook said Gary was being paid something in his obituary, and Peter Atkinson might have done something for both Gary and Dave. But I doubt it.

If I was gonna bet anything, I suspect there could be a change for one of these things.

Protection against reverse-engineering. There are people who might want to attempt to reverse-engineer 4e by building on the 3e SRD and making changes. If a legal battle ensues, I believe that WoTC will claim that this version of D&D is not derived from any prior version of the game and thus the credit is no longer given to the original creators (or writers of 2nd and 3e rules). Wizards really dislikes the OGL and seems to want to not ever let their newer property ever come under that umbrella, so I suspect they did this to help defend themselves, saying that the new D&D is a completely new work-for-hire creation by staff members.

Protection from Copyright Termination: Right now there's a big legal battle over Superman from it's original creators. Because Copyright terms were extended in 1976, a provision of the law states that if you created something before transferring the copyright to a company, and the time the original copyright would have expired before the extension, you can make a claim to terminate the transfer and get the rights back. Technically, Gary's heirs and Dave's heirs might be able to get the copyrights back to original D&D--and possibly derivative works. This wouldn't happen for another 20-25 years. But maybe distancing themselves from it could add protection. Of course, I am guessing and I'm sure Gary signed several legal deals from the TSR days onward that might void any claims.

As far as removing Greyhawk--I dunno, that campaign setting has been really cursed since Gary was outsted from TSR. I know others have tried but I would like Greyhawk to be preserved in amber and not "reimagined" by anyone, especially for 4e. It's his Gravestone (so to speak, pardon the Gord pun).

 

[LeaderDesslok]

I dunno. Gary said he never got royalties from D&D once he left, but Monte Cook said Gary was being paid something in his obituary, and Peter Atkinson might have done something for both Gary and Dave. But I doubt it.

IIRC, Peter Adkinson stated several years ago that before the release of 3rd Edition, he met with Dave Arneson and came to a contractual agreement with him. Basically, Dave gave up all future rights and royalties to the name "Dungeons & Dragons" for some undisclosed amount of money. I'm guessing it was a little more than I make in a year , so Dave was happy and WotC was happy. Thus the end of AD&D and the return of D&D.

 

[LeaderDesslok]

As far as removing Greyhawk--I dunno, that campaign setting has been really cursed since Gary was outsted from TSR. I know others have tried but I would like Greyhawk to be preserved in amber and not "reimagined" by anyone, especially for 4e. It's his Gravestone (so to speak, pardon the Gord pun).

Although I'm a die-hard Midnight fan, Greyhawk is still my favorite (and first) campaign setting. I think it would be a nice gesture if Wizards either licensed or outright sold the rights to the IP to someone else, who could then continue the legacy. But hey, life is not fair and things do change with time. There's still a lot of Greyhawk fans and resources out there to play with.

 

[Fifth Element]

I remember reading (I think it was in the 30th anniversary book) that Gygax got a lump-sum payment from WotC when Adkinson took over to settle up with him.

 

[cthulhu_duck]

* 4E has completely eliminated any references to the world of Greyhawk. Not only is it not listed as an early campaign setting, but all IP that used to appear in the core rules (i.e., Mordenkainen, Bigby, etc.) has been eliminated. Gary Gygax is known as the creator of the world of Greyhawk.

I'd heard that Tenser's floating disk was still in 4E?

 

[Mouseferatu]

Greyhawk/Gygaxian names that I know appear in the 4E core books, just off the top of my head:

Tenser, Mordenkainen, Vecna, Bigby, Pelor, Gruumsh, Kord, Yeenoghu.

That's just from memory, without opening the books sitting next to me.

 

[LeaderDesslok]

Greyhawk/Gygaxian names that I know appear in the 4E core books, just off the top of my head:

Tenser, Mordenkainen, Vecna, Bigby, Pelor, Gruumsh, Kord, Yeenoghu.

That's just from memory, without opening the books sitting next to me.

Dammit Ari, you're destroying my web of lies and deceit!

Seriously though, I hope that is true. As I said I don't have the rulebooks yet, so I'm going by what I saw in the SRD. It is entirely possible that WotC pulled the IP parts of spell names from that resource, as I would expect them to.

 

[The_Fan]

Yep. A lot of spells still have the old names. Mordenkeinen's Mansion, for example.

So I think that puts this theory to rest.