OGC and what a RPG should be?

[AustEvergreen]

I've made use of PCGen to create and maintian characters in my campaign; which with as some of you may know poses a problem lately. WOTC recently started inforcing it's rights RE: Open Gaming License (OGL) upon the numerous programs available on line similar to PCGen. Content which was once available for gaming use is now gone and may never return (for free at least, I'm talking about all source material for Forgotten Realms and all of the supplements WOTC has published such as "Sword and Fist"). I hope I'm not the only one upset about this. Personally I wish I'd not laid out my cash for the supplements and FR books now as I can't make use of this material electronically without lots and lots of work done on my own time; In the computer age I'm reduced, effectively to pen and paper or the equivalent. While WOTC undisputedly owns the rights to this material it doesn't seem to be in their (or our) interest for them to be quite this stingy, especially since in my opinion they dropped the ball in a very big way on creating their own product for campaign maintainence. How does anyone else feel about this? My feelings at this point boil down to: "If it's not Open Gaming Content I'm not buying it!".

 

[CRGreathouse]

My feelings at this point boil down to: "If it's not Open Gaming Content I'm not buying it!".

Wow, that's a strong POV. Fortunatetly, I think it's workable, with all the d20 companies out there.

 

[Ranger REG]

I'm surprised that a lot of PnP gamers put electronic as the top priority for playing RPG. I mean are these PnP gamers the new generation that first learned of RPG via MMORPG and CRPG?

Are we suddenly spiraling down that path to make PnP paperless?

Guess I'm an old fogey. While I consider computer to be of great convenience and a great tool, I do not allow it to be my crutch when it comes to enjoying an old-fashioned role-playing game.

Weird. Software developers create user-friendly electronic tools, yet users do not want to do the job themselves whatever the excuses are, relying on said developer (who uses THEIR free times to develop the tools in the first place) to create expansions.

 

[AustEvergreen]

Fogness in general

I'm fairly fogey myself. Enough so that I'm reluctant to state my age here. I have to admit if I could go paperless with PnP games I would do so and see that as a major time saver. Not to mention the tree hugging aspect of the situation.

I Have to admit that WOTC stance and timing have me steamed up. WOTC could have objected to the use of non srd material as it was first used (and you can't tell me they weren't aware, I won't follow that line of thought far). Instead the objection comes after their etools hits the market; my thoughts are a bean counter type person said "We can't have this anymore, it cuts into our profits. Stop them!" and thus we have the "Wiz" throwing it's legal clout around. All I'm trying to say is that as consumers we should point out to them that we don't appreciate their attitude or their actions buy saying "OK OGC means convenience for me so if your material isn't open and you insist on making things difficult for me as a consumer of your products then I won't buy them". I have to say I'm shocked that no one has said this before me (that I've seen). The younger generation will put with a lot more, or so it seems. I am outraged by what WOTC is doing and has done. If they want to sell their software then they should make it better than everone else's and not crush the competition into non-existence / irrelevance by threatening legal action. I would buy etools if it were better or if it at least included all the source materials I wanted to use, but from what I've read it doesn't.

 

[Twin Rose]

I'm surprised that a lot of PnP gamers put electronic as the top priority for playing RPG. I mean are these PnP gamers the new generation that first learned of RPG via MMORPG and CRPG?

Are we suddenly spiraling down that path to make PnP paperless?

Guess I'm an old fogey. While I consider computer to be of great convenience and a great tool, I do not allow it to be my crutch when it comes to enjoying an old-fashioned role-playing game.

Weird. Software developers create user-friendly electronic tools, yet users do not want to do the job themselves whatever the excuses are, relying on said developer (who uses THEIR free times to develop the tools in the first place) to create expansions.

At least in the case of Twin Rose, we work directly with the orriginal author/developer of a book to make an expansion for the program. This works really well in that we can get orriginal files, etc, and reduce dev time to almost nothing, and can include the actual text of the books!

WOTC has said that the FRCS, Splatbooks, etc will one day make it to the SRD. In the mean time, though, there are lots of campaign and splatbooks out there from other publishers, and you can find a lot of 'similar' things anyway.

 

[DMFTodd]

the "Wiz" throwing it's legal clout around

.

crush the competition into non-existence / irrelevance by threatening legal action

While I agree that the timing of the WOTC compaint was, er....convenient, you're being a little unfair to WotC.

By all accounts, WotC bent over backwards helping PCGen get their software legal. They did not have to do that. And it's WotC who gave us the licenses so that software like DM's Familiar, Campaign Suite, etc. can even exist. They could have set things up so they would have no competition if they wanted to.

As someone who makes and sells gaming sofware, I'm glad WotC threw their weight around. It's not fair to those of working to be legal to let illegal software go unchecked (not saying PCGen was, talking in generalities here). And besides, it was their property. If WotC doesn't want someone distributing it, they have every right.

As for the second part of your comments, I agree with the theory 100% (I'm an old fogey as well, maybe that's why). If you value OGC, then, certainly, purchase only OGC material. There is lots of it out there.

crush the competition into non-existence / irrelevance by threatening legal action

 

[AustEvergreen]

I stand by my original statment

First of, I don't believe I'm being a bit unfair to WOTC. Granted if they hadn't put the basics of the game out as SRD and OGC there would be no legal 3rd party software out there.

1: WOTC should have put the so called 'splat books' into OGC from the start. I have to admit to a certain feeling of betrayal that they did not do this after the 'good start' they got with the basic of the game.

2: The way they handled the 'Let's everyone get in gear with the License' issue could have been much better and beyond any doubt in my mind they have cause some damage to the gaming communities trust in WOTC. I would have had no cause to complain at all if WOTC had taken a "Look, you are violating our copyright, BUT well let you keep that material in your product if you begin negotiations in good faith now; otherwise you need to remove all non-srd materials and get in line with the license" stance instead of doing what they did. I never disputed their right to their material just the handling of this event. "Bent over backward"....... by who's rekoning? Not mine. I believe I've outlined bent over backwards here.

3: Those that don't appreciate WOTC actions should let them know how they feel. I am.

 

[Ranger REG]

Are you saying this as a software developer or as a customer?

Honestly, I don't give that much of a crap. As long the program can accept data that I can manually input, I'd be glad to spend one whole night inputing the information from Sword and Fist for my own personal use.

 

[Klintus Fang]

Re: Fogness in general

I'm fairly fogey myself. Enough so that I'm reluctant to state my age here. I have to admit if I could go paperless with PnP games I would do so and see that as a major time saver. Not to mention the tree hugging aspect of the situation.

not so sure about the tree hugging aspect.... the chemicals in the back of your montor's cathode ray tube are pretty noxious and will likely prevent a fair number of plants from ever growing if not disposed of very carefully...

 

[Klintus Fang]

Re: I stand by my original statment

1: WOTC should have put the so called 'splat books' into OGC from the start. I have to admit to a certain feeling of betrayal that they did not do this after the 'good start' they got with the basic of the game.

I work for a large company that protects its intellectual property very obsessively (I think most do nowadays). I've seen how compicated it can be to release anything. If I were to write a short research paper for an obscure academic journal that even remotely had anything to do with the industry that my company works in, it would take 2-3 years before the legal department would eventually approve it. And in those 2-3 years, the legal department would probably rewrite my paper multiple times until it looked like complete gibberish, forcing me to keep re-re-writing it myself many times until we all eventually converged on something that the legal department was happy with. I'm not saying that's how things work behind the scenes at WoTC, but I am not surprised at all that WoTC/Hasbro is moving slowly on that front. It's frustrating as all heck, but I think its normal behavior for a large company.