New GSL Announcement

[Piratecat]

Yup. We'll plan to lock this and start a new one once it approaches 1000 posts -- or before the interview is posted.

 

[Wulf Ratbane]

Did you have to sit on your hands?

Nah. I'm not extraordinarily creepy, so it's never been very strictly enforced.

Does your wife know about that?

Everything my wife knows about that sort of thing she learned from network TV. Ignorance is bliss, I think.

 

[GMSkarka]

It's not the fact that people are in different locations, it's the fact that those people are all involved working on projects that have to be completed at those locations.

Fine.

I'll leave it as an exercise for the reader to try to figure out why, then, WotC chose NOT to send the Licensing Manager for the biggest issue surrounding the industry to the ONLY trade show for that industry --- a show where the majority of publishers are in attendance, and where major retailers and distributors are waiting for clear answers on what those publishers will be releasing.

I'm not at the trade show this year, mostly because my company has been in a holding pattern since the conference call in January, and I couldn't justify the expense of exhibiting without a clear release plan to talk to distributors about. But the reports that I'm hearing from people in Vegas is that everybody is asking what the next 6-9 months are going to look like -- and because this issue wasn't resolved in time, nobody knows.

 

[Orcus]

Wow, just when this whole GSL thing couldn't get any more bizarre, it has.

Check out the link below, apparently Jack Chick has finally decided to weigh-in on 4th edition Dungeons & Dragons:

http://www.chick.com/reading/tracts/4DnD/0082.asp

Oh!!!!!

A Rick Roll! Very nicely done.

 

[boerngrim]

Wow, just when this whole GSL thing couldn't get any more bizarre, it has.

Check out the link below, apparently Jack Chick has finally decided to weigh-in on 4th edition Dungeons & Dragons:

http://www.chick.com/reading/tracts/4DnD/0082.asp









[sblock] That was your moment of levity for the day. Enjoy.[/sblock]

DOH! You got me!

 

[Orcus]

Hey,

Just want to let you know I have not forgotten about this. It's almost midnight here at GAMA and I just got back from eating diner.

Today was a little nuts. Got up at 6am, drove to SeaTac airport for a 9am flight to Vegas. Talked to a couple people at the office about the GSL before the flight, worked on my 4e presentation on the plane. Landed at 11:30, cabs line at the airport and check-in lines at the hotel (no your room is not ready yet) and it is now 12:30. Grab lunch and then head up to the Skyview room to set up the WotC meet and greet. Meet and greet with retailers from 3-5:30. Talk with Linae around 5:30 about the GSL then break down the room. 6pm down to the lobby, got my room! Up to my room, track down Jesse Decker to get my bag from his room. 6:30 have my bags and my room, call the family and say goodnight to the kids. Change into jeans and a clean shirt, in the lobby at 7:30 o go to dinner. 12 am back at the room holy crap where did my day go?

Needless to say my day was busy, I don't have anything new to add. Aside from being here (and 8 hours of meetings tomorrow) this is my number 1 priority. As soon as I have something I'll let you know.

Hang in there!

Scott,

Thanks for considering all of this. I know you will get to it as soon as you can.

Have fun at GAMA. I miss it. I havent been in a while. It is such a cool show and it is so much easier to navigate than GenCon. It lacks the surging insanity of GenCon, which is both a plus and a minus. I still remember the first "d20 GAMA" when the d20 publishers came on the scene. Hyrum Savage and I got together for beers. A little shout out to Hyrum.

Oh, and if you run into trouble in Vegas, give me a call. I know people.

Clark

 

[Greg K]

Wow, Ray Winninger is now posting. There is a name I haven't seen online in ages (since the old DC Hero mailing list to be exact! Or, I maybe, did at RPG.net. Regardless, it's been a while).

Hi Ray. Nice to have you on board!

The document that most people are familiar with (someone linked to it upthread) is a judge's ruling on various pre-trial motions in the second lawsuit. It was basically a mixed bag with a couple of rulings in favor of TSR and a couple of rulings in favor of Mayfair. In essence, the judge found that Mayfair did technically violate the earlier licensing agreement with TSR in a couple of instances but that these breeches were too minor to render the earlier agreement null and void (which TSR asked for). The critical question of whether or not TSR actually suffered any damages from the minor contract violations was left for trial, though the judge himself expressed doubts in his ruling.

This second case wasn't about whether or not Mayfair violated TSR's trademark rights (as the initial poster suggested). It was about whether or not Mayfair materially violated its licensing agreement with TSR.

 

[Ghostwind]

Oh, and if you run into trouble in Vegas, give me a call. I know people.

Clark

Boy, does he know people...

 

[Klaus]

I was just playing that song on my new bass last night, funny enough. I was waxing nostalgic.

We have to jam someday. I call lead vocals. "Born to Run", maybe?

 

[Failed Saving Throw]

I'm not sure how this is a "judo throw" to our announcement of the Pathfinder RPG. We weren't planning on supporting 4th edition with Pathfinder anyway... the whole POINT of Pathfinder RPG is to give us something of our own to build on. It looks like that means we won't be able to support 4th Edition at all, which is very disappointing, but it's certainly not anything like a death blow to Paizo. We're doing quite well as it is right now without any 4th edition support.

I also disagree about the "somethign's gonna die" part of this statement. I'll be the first to point out that the tabletop RPG industry is really really small... but it's not THAT small. It's been going for decades, and there's been plenty of games that have survived for those decades. I strongly suspect that there's room in the industry for OGL products like Pathfinder and M&M and Spycraft and the rest AND for D&D. Will D&D make the most money? Sure, but it HAS to make more money. Wizards of the Coast is larger than the next largest RPG company by ten times at least; their overhead requires a huge success, and I think that they've got a great R&D team over there and that 4th edition will absolutely give them that success.

A smaller company like Paizo doesn't need to be #1 in the industry to survive. Pathfinder's doing VERY well for us right now, and I'm really excited to see what we've got coming up for the next few years. I'm pretty sure that Paizo will make it through with Pathfinder into the next decade, as long as we can keep up with the frantic pace we've set for ourselves.

I wish WotC the best of luck with 4th edition. I'll certainly be buying the game when it comes out to try it out. I'm also confident that Paizo'll be okay as well. The only part of this whole thing that really depresses and disappoints me is that a lot of our customers who were looking forward to Paizo 4th edition support are probably going to have to make some pretty tough decisions. I wish they didn't have to be put into that position.

James, I think I speak for a lot of people when I say that I'm bummed that, as things stand now, Paizo won't be able to put out any 4E material. I look forward to the full release of the Pathfinder rules, but I was really looking forward to seeing what the company would put out for 4E. It's a crappy turn of events.