Erik Mona said:
This strikes me as a particularly 20th century way of looking at open systems. I can certainly understand the impulse that might inspire WotC to feel like they were being cheated out of something by a company that simply reprinted their core system, but the fact of the matter is that Mongoose sold, at best, 10,000 copies of that book. Vs. the "Real" Player's Handbook, which probably moved something like 350,000 units. Sure, that easily seen as cutting into WotC's pie, but it's really not that significant a chunk of their expected profits for the book, and surely most of Mongoose's audience owned the real Player's Handbook anyway.
You're right, of course. Mongoose was never a threat to WotC. That doesn't mean the PPH wasn't still in bad taste. But it wasn't a business threat enough to shut down the OGL.
As I've indicated elsewhere, I'm not fond of the draconian IP laws that exist, currently. I really, really like the OGL in principle and think it was the right thing to do. On the other hand, the IP laws are what they are and I think WotC has been getting an inordinate amount of BS hurled at them for tightening things up, but still playing looser than most companies in the industry.
So, yeah, I'd like to see the OGL applied to 4e. But, I'd also like to see the people with their hair on fire about the GSL shoved in a lake (no cement blocks).
I can appreciate the 3rd parties who have staked their livelihood on D&D's open content feeling threatened. The thing is, you've all been pretty professional about it and I haven't seen any professionals go beyond justifiably frustrated.
In fact, for a customer to have such an exotic D&D fetish as to A) know about and B) purchase the Pocket Player's Handbook the chances are very high that the buyer owns not just the Player's Handbook, but probably the entire core rules and a brace of expensive hardcover support volumes direct from Wizards of the Coast.
Again, quite true. But...
My first encounter with the PPH was meeting up with an old college buddy who was quite proud of the fact that his extended gaming group of 10-12 people all used only the PPH and wouldn't buy any product from WotC because they were "too corporate", whatever that means. I've also seen several people on these boards and others trumpet the fact that they only use the HTML SRD and intended on doing the same with 4e.
A business threat to WotC? I doubt it. But both are pretty rude.
A certain amount of my irritation in my prior post was due to sleep deprivation (I don't know why I surf the boards when I'm tired and cranky), but my experience says there are some people being twits about the whole OGL issue.