OGC/Legal question

[silvermane]

In the Netbook of Feats (ver. 11.2) there is a feat called Extra Rage. A feat by the same name appears in Complete Warrior. My question is: why is the NoF not in violation of OGC/PI rules, since all of the "Complete" series is closed content (as were the class splatbooks for 3.0)?

Both feats have similar function (WotC version grants 2 extra rages per day and NoF grants 1).

Would there be a violation if NoF's version also granted 2 extra rages?

 

[DanMcS]

In the Netbook of Feats (ver. 11.2) there is a feat called Extra Rage. A feat by the same name appears in Complete Warrior. My question is: why is the NoF not in violation of OGC/PI rules, since all of the "Complete" series is closed content (as were the class splatbooks for 3.0)?

Both feats have similar function (WotC version grants 2 extra rages per day and NoF grants 1).

Would there be a violation if NoF's version also granted 2 extra rages?

It's a coincidental use of the same (very obvious) name for a very obvious feat. You wouldn't need to have read Complete Warrior to come up with that.

 

[HellHound]

The netbook of feats version was released prior to WotCs version. If an infringement occured, it would be the other way around.

However, this is definitely a case of parallel design evolution. A lot of extended, extra, and improved feats are pretty obvious in design and nomenclature.

 

[Warden]

That, and there are only 2000+ feats kicking around, I'm sure, so it's bound to happen.

 

[jmucchiello]

There is also an extra rage type* feat in my Character Customization PDF from 2 years ago. Who designed it first? It doesn't matter. They are obvious constructions.

* It is a feat template allowing extra uses of limited per day abilities. Extra Rage is one of the samples of the template. I first proposed feat templates in my Enchantment book (+2 to two skills) 3 years ago. (Has it been that long...?)

 

[kingpaul]

It's a coincidental use of the same (very obvious) name for a very obvious feat. You wouldn't need to have read Complete Warrior to come up with that.

I agree. Take a look at the open feat, Extra Turning. This gives you more turning attempts/day. It isn't that large of a stretch to come up with Extra Rage, Extra Bardic Music, Extra Smite, etc, from that.

 

[Sigfried Trent]

Yep

We have had that feat kicking around for a while.

It happens a lot. One of the challenges at the Netbook of Feats is trying to filter out duplicate mechanics and names, as we recieve many submissions that are almost the same as one another or as feats in the SRD.

We never conciously take ideas from other books and re-work them, although we don't nessesarily know how our authors come up with their ideas. We do insist that they submit them as thier own original work.

Generaly speaking most feats are hard not to copy if you are trying to simulate a similar action in a given game system.

Recently we ran into some feats with similar mechanics, but radicaly different prerequisites and are trying to decide if they constitute duplicate feats or not. While the do the same sorts of things, they are aquired by different kinds of characters for different reasons.

Sigfried Trent,
Team Leader NBOF
www.datadeco.com/nbofeats