Excerpt: City of Brass

[DandD]

Planescape was killed the moment they made it clear they wanted to create a new cosmology. Heck, the Forgotten Realms 3rd edition had a totally separated cosmology from the Great Wheel, and there was no god-exploding catastroy.

 

[Scribble]

Sure. But we were comparing both cities using facts from the books... my bet is Wotc top guys at moment doesn't like Planescape and mention Sigil as they mention other places and settings, just for the sake of expanding their multiverse for playing, which is good...

...but not that good for long therm Planescapes fans...

I was commenting on what you said about "in your games."

It's an imaginary city, so if you would rather imagine sigil as being the hub of all interplannar trade, then so be it... it's just as true as the next idea.

Whether or not anything is true about a fake city just seems like a strange argument to me.

Do whatever works best in your game.

 

[Kobold Avenger]

Sigil for one thing, has no natural resources. But it does have a lot of factories. So trade will be completely different in that regard.

The criminal underworld of Sigil, is far bigger than that of the City of Brass.

There's the fact that a lot of those who live in Sigil are immigrants, and there's a huge gap between the really rich and the completely impoverished.

 

[gizmo33]

Their owners of it like they are owners of "demons" or "efreeti" or "the Abyss".

Your analogy is oversimplified I think. The City of Brass from the Arabian Nights and the DnD City of Brass share a name and that's about it. It's the difference between creating a character based on the Thor of Norse mythology, and one that resembles Marvel comics Thor (except those two resemble each other in many more details than the CoB). I don't know how close you can get to these derivatives and how much they are protected by IP laws, but it is mysterious as to why previous companies really haven't touched this stuff in the past. A "City of Brass" set in a dimension of fire and inhabited by fire creatures spelled "efreeti" wandering the streets like people would be transparently a DnD concept to anyone familiar with the subject.

Think of Mayfair Game's Demons supplements - they created their own dimension for the demons and created their own demons without a single bit of overlap as I recall. No Demogorgon, Orcus, or any of that even though those names, at least, were not inventions of TSR. And the motivation would have been there to base something on the DnD Abyss/demons since their stated reason for creating the supplements in the first place was to fill the gap created when TSR decided that demons were too unChristian for an RPG.

I vaguely recall that the City of Brass was licensed out to Rob Kuntz and/or Necromancer, but that Rob and Necromancer parted ways, then Rob did the supplement under the Hackmaster rules, and Necromancer created it's own City of Brass supplement. I don't know if pre-existing contracts have anything to do with Necromancer's CoB, but I think the situation might be more complicated than you are implying with your analogy.

 

[MrMyth]

Sure. But we were comparing both cities using facts from the books... my bet is Wotc top guys at moment doesn't like Planescape and mention Sigil as they mention other places and settings, just for the sake of expanding their multiverse for playing, which is good...

...but not that good for long therm Planescapes fans...

...or, perhaps, they want there to be other iconic planar locations other than Sigil?

I mean, let's look at this clearly - Sigil has about a billion things that make it unique and interesting. Does it need to also be the oldest city in the cosmos, or the greatest trading hub in existence? Does losing those things change the core of what it is in any way?

Honestly, I would find Sigil less interesting if it had a clearly defined origin (as, say, the oldest city in existence). If merchants constantly were moving merchandise in and out of the city in a standard, routine schedule (the sort needed to represent the greatest marketplace in the planes), I think it would actually make it more mundane - the randomness and difficulty of reliably using Sigil's portals is one of the things that makes it fascinating, rather than just another planar port.

So let the City of Brass have a claim to fame, and stand out as a unique location. Honestly, the more places like that, with something to make them unique and distinct, the better a Planescape came will be - it shouldn't be about chilling in Sigil the entire time, but about visiting the most interesting locales in the planes. The more of those there are, the better!

 

[Psion]

I don't know how close you can get to these derivatives and how much they are protected by IP laws, but it is mysterious as to why previous companies really haven't touched this stuff in the past.

Well, Clark's a lawyer. I trust his grasp of the issues involved more than some random guy on the internet.

 

[gizmo33]

Well, Clark's a lawyer. I trust his grasp of the issues involved more than some random guy on the internet.

What random guy are you talking about and why did you italicize this? And what grasp, exactly, are you talking about that's relevant to this? My question (not a grasp, in case that's not clear) is why non-WotC/TSR companies haven't done more with the Outer Planes in the style of DnD, since in most cases the names of the planes and gods and stuff are mythological. The question is relevant because someone earlier (perhaps you) questioned why I thought WotC was in the best position to develop these ideas.

EDIT: Now that I dust off some old threads, it appears that RJK's City of Brass was a convention adventure, not offered by TSR. If NG's claim of the concept not being unique is questionable, then so is TSR/WotC's.

EDIT2: And RJK released his module to the public domain.

Necromancer claims that the concept of the City of Brass tied to the elemental plane of fire and fire creatures called Efreeti is that it's based on folklore? You don't have to be a lawyer to read the Arabian Nights. I'm assuming when you say Clark you mean one of the owners of the company, but otherwise I'm not aware of what statements he's made that shed light on this.

RJK's adventure that you're referring to did not deal directly with the City of Brass - it was a lead up to it. I don't see how TSRs claim relates to NGs claim (not that I was aware of a claim by NG that this idea was unique) and why one would validate the other. TSRs "claim" would be based on showing that there is no such concept/envisioning of the City of Brass that existed prior to DnD. NG would have a harder time making that claim. Gygax and/or RJK I'm pretty sure were the originators of the City of Brass as it exists in DnD. Why you think this would have any bearing on TSRs claim I'm not sure, IIRC TSR/WoTC owns most of the IP that the two created in those days.

In any case, my hazy understanding of this as a random guy on the internet, is that most of the IP issues have to be challenged in court by the interested parties, they don't police themselves. That means it's possible, from what I've seen, that a hobbyist person releasing a text document to the public domain can fly under the radar, while a larger company making a more significant investment cannot count on doing this. My general feeling is that if you published a module with some farm-boy with a glowing sword and a pair of robots following him around on a desert planet, you'd get sued - even if you could show that the individual elements were not unique. My guess (admittedly a guess, but not completely unsubstantiated) was that a TSR-style treatment of the Nine Hells, for example, was not done by prior companies because of the IP issues. If you have any statements to support or refute this, or even reasoning that connects some of these dots (other than naming people that own RPG companies) I'd be interested to hear it.

EDIT: BTW - RJKs CIty of Brass is a Kenzer product published under their Hackmaster line. The history of the development of this product, as I understand, involved Necromancer at one point before RJK went seperate ways. AFAICT this product and the convention module you mention have very little to do with each other.

 

[Psion]

What random guy are you talking about and why did you italicize this?

You, or anyone else whose credentials and legal understanding are not known to me.

And what grasp, exactly, are you talking about that's relevant to this? My question (not a grasp, in case that's not clear) is why non-WotC/TSR companies haven't done more with the Outer Planes in the style of DnD, since in most cases the names of the planes and gods and stuff are mythological. The question is relevant because someone earlier (perhaps you) questioned why I thought WotC was in the best position to develop these ideas.

Nope, not me. I thought you were implying they didn't do it because they were afraid of legal repercussions. If not, nevermind.

At any rate, my whole line of reasoning about the public domain module was assuming it was in the OD&D era. It appears it was not, so disregard that line of thought.

In any case, my hazy understanding of this as a random guy on the internet, is that most of the IP issues have to be challenged in court by the interested parties, they don't police themselves.

This is true. It's my belief that a competent lawyer of good character (both of which I believe Clark to be) even thought it would be questionable, they wouldn't entertain the risk.

EDIT: BTW - RJKs CIty of Brass is a Kenzer product published under their Hackmaster line. The history of the development of this product, as I understand, involved Necromancer at one point before RJK went seperate ways. AFAICT this product and the convention module you mention have very little to do with each other.

I know they don't. In fact, Clark said he took care to make sure that NG's did not too closely resemble RJK's work. They are completely separate adventures that plug into the same general idea, but having seen all of them, the relative resemblances are about on the order of, oh, Lord of the Rings vs. Sword of Shanarra. To wit, similar enough you can see many shared ideas as underpinnings, but the works are distinct in a copyright sense.

 

[gizmo33]

You, or anyone else whose credentials and legal understanding are not known to me.

I'm not asking you to accept anything I say outside of the plain facts, which come with their own "credentials" and I think are subject to some discussion without the permissions of an authority figure. I don't know enough about these companies decision making processes (where the actual law is often of only passing relevance) to have an educated opinion on the basic question of why the outer planes as defined by DnD haven't been published by other companies. I know that for a time Mayfair was being sued for publishing DnD-ish products. And so I was posing a theory, that I think has some substance, that the answer may in part involve legal issues/concerns (which clearly NG has dealt with in some way).

NG's City of Brass could be an exception because of it's history. I haven't seen anything to rule out that NG laid some groundwork with WotC before/during it's deal with RJK. Otherwise it's somewhat interesting that the original author (RJK) yanks his work from them and they somehow still decide to contract with new authors and create the product. Other than the legal groundwork being lain, the only other explanation I can think of is that there was a substantial amount of maps/artwork or whatever (though I wonder if such things ever constitute a major fraction of the cost of production).

And again, there is AFAIK an absence of any other product from the milieu in question being published by the company with the "Old School feel". If legal issues weren't involved (and I haven't seen anything where you have directly said that anyway) then why else would it be? Why would a company with "Old School" inclinations pass up the chance to create a Nine Hells boxed set? Or a Gehenna module? Especially when they can so quickly turn around and create a City of Brass with what appears to be short notice (and the probability of facing a competing product from RJK).

the relative resemblances are about on the order of, oh, Lord of the Rings vs. Sword of Shanarra. To wit, similar enough you can see many shared ideas as underpinnings, but the works are distinct in a copyright sense.

I don't think the LotR/SoS is a good analogy. The analogy would be as if some author wrote a story about a place called "Camelot", but the castle was made of cheese and inhabited by horse-headed humanoids. And then another author came along and wrote a different story where a castle named Camelot were made of cheese and inhabited by horse-headed humanoids.

I haven't seen NGs CoB, but I'm assuming that it's a city situated on something like an elemental plane of fire and inhabited by efreeti/ifriti/whatever that resemble the DnD monsters of that name far more than the ifrit of legend. This bears virtual no resemblance to the CoB of the Arabian Nights. No more of a resemblance than the above "Camelot" does to the legendary one.

Now the details of what the actual law is, and what agreements existed between the various parties I have little sense of. Nor do I have an opinion on anyone's character involved in this. But I do have a feeling, as I've said, that if I published a comic book named "Thor" where the main character had a biography that strongly resembled that created by Marvel, that I would be sued. And protests about the existence of Thor as a Norse mythological figure would not be guarranteed save me.

 

[Treebore]

I'm not asking you to accept anything I say outside of the plain facts, which come with their own "credentials" and I think are subject to some discussion without the permissions of an authority figure. I don't know enough about these companies decision making processes (where the actual law is often of only passing relevance) to have an educated opinion on the basic question of why the outer planes as defined by DnD haven't been published by other companies. I know that for a time Mayfair was being sued for publishing DnD-ish products. And so I was posing a theory, that I think has some substance, that the answer may in part involve legal issues/concerns (which clearly NG has dealt with in some way).

NG's City of Brass could be an exception because of it's history. I haven't seen anything to rule out that NG laid some groundwork with WotC before/during it's deal with RJK. Otherwise it's somewhat interesting that the original author (RJK) yanks his work from them and they somehow still decide to contract with new authors and create the product. Other than the legal groundwork being lain, the only other explanation I can think of is that there was a substantial amount of maps/artwork or whatever (though I wonder if such things ever constitute a major fraction of the cost of production).

And again, there is AFAIK an absence of any other product from the milieu in question being published by the company with the "Old School feel". If legal issues weren't involved (and I haven't seen anything where you have directly said that anyway) then why else would it be? Why would a company with "Old School" inclinations pass up the chance to create a Nine Hells boxed set? Or a Gehenna module? Especially when they can so quickly turn around and create a City of Brass with what appears to be short notice (and the probability of facing a competing product from RJK).



I don't think the LotR/SoS is a good analogy. The analogy would be as if some author wrote a story about a place called "Camelot", but the castle was made of cheese and inhabited by horse-headed humanoids. And then another author came along and wrote a different story where a castle named Camelot were made of cheese and inhabited by horse-headed humanoids.

I haven't seen NGs CoB, but I'm assuming that it's a city situated on something like an elemental plane of fire and inhabited by efreeti/ifriti/whatever that resemble the DnD monsters of that name far more than the ifrit of legend. This bears virtual no resemblance to the CoB of the Arabian Nights. No more of a resemblance than the above "Camelot" does to the legendary one.

Now the details of what the actual law is, and what agreements existed between the various parties I have little sense of. Nor do I have an opinion on anyone's character involved in this. But I do have a feeling, as I've said, that if I published a comic book named "Thor" where the main character had a biography that strongly resembled that created by Marvel, that I would be sued. And protests about the existence of Thor as a Norse mythological figure would not be guarranteed save me.

You do realize many people have written stories about Camelot, King Author, etc... even using the same names of characters and locations, but did not copyright each other.

Copyright infringement only occurs when you use the work of someone else. IE you copy them word for word. You can use the common ideas, but as long as you wrote the story yourself and didn't copy anything from the other authors work, you did not commit copyright violation.

Now world settings, like Dragonlance, are Trademarked. So you could not write a story using anything that recognizably defines the Dragonlance setting, but you could write a story of a bipedal race developed from dragons. However there better be a lot of originality to it, or a infringement lawsuit could occur.

Copyright law is not this strangling straightjacket that so many seem to think it is. However, if you have read a lot of books, you have already seen a lot of similarity. Heck, the romance genre is written to follow a general formula, but they aren't copyright infringements.

So just because Necromancer and Rob Kuntz both did a City of Brass write up there is no copyright infringement unless one directly copied the work of the other, word for word, or Art wise. Even for Art you have to copy the work to a degree where you would be able to pass one off as the other. Or prove the drawings are the same, just colored differently. Otherwise its still an individual interpretation of the same subject matter. IE the same as two artists painting pictures of the same scene, object, or subject. IE they both painted the same thing, but did so with their own work, skill, and interpretation.

So don't worry about it, if you are.