Any word on the GSL?

[Umbran]

But still, that doesn't change the fact that most of the 3pp RPG market owes me serious money.

 

[Roman]

It is too late - the damage has been done. The GSL fiasco has had a liquidating effect on the third party market - even if it comes later today third party companies have already been forgotten by many consumers in the interim. I am not generally one to attribute malice where incopetence can be an explanatory factor, but I am beginning to suspect that dragging out the GSL promises has been the deliberate attempt of WotC to liquidate 3PP in a manner that would not generate as much outrage as an overt policy (after all, the revised GSL is still coming...). I am not yet certain that was the case, the thought certainly seems more and more probable to me.

 

[CapnZapp]

Of course Wizards want to kill off the 3PP market.

If they actually wanted the GSL to succeed, don't you think they'd assign more than a single over-worked employee on the job?

 

[Dausuul]

Of course Wizards want to kill off the 3PP market.

If they actually wanted the GSL to succeed, don't you think they'd assign more than a single over-worked employee on the job?

If they wanted to kill off the 3PP market, they wouldn't still be working on the GSL. Lawyers cost money. They'd either have released the last version of the GSL and told everyone "Take it or leave it," or not released a GSL at all.

My guess is that WotC sees the GSL as a potential positive for the company, but only a small one; hence it is given very low priority.

 

[kenmarable]

If they wanted to kill off the 3PP market, they wouldn't still be working on the GSL. Lawyers cost money. They'd either have released the last version of the GSL and told everyone "Take it or leave it," or not released a GSL at all.

My guess is that WotC sees the GSL as a potential positive for the company, but only a small one; hence it is given very low priority.

How dare you bring reason into an internet messageboard debate? That makes it so much harder to presume mean things about faceless corporations!

In all fairness to the various posts above, it's human nature when faced with ambiguity to make a theory and try to interpret the evidence in light of that theory. Spent a couple years in PhD-level philosophy courses looking at exactly that - unfortunately, there is no view from nowhere. If you believe WotC is trying to kill the 3PP market, their actions could be construed to fit that.

However, Occam's Razor really does seem to agree with Dausuul. There are far easier - and more effective - ways of eliminating the 3PP market. Besides what's worse for PR - one big outcry over a year ago announcing 4e would be closed - or an entire year of constant outcries over all of the delays? Personally, I think ripping the band-aid off all at once feels better than slowly peeling it away.

 

[xechnao]

If they wanted to kill off the 3PP market, they wouldn't still be working on the GSL. Lawyers cost money. They'd either have released the last version of the GSL and told everyone "Take it or leave it," or not released a GSL at all.

My guess is that WotC sees the GSL as a potential positive for the company, but only a small one; hence it is given very low priority.

Its my impression by Scott's posts here that Wotc employs a legal advisor. Furthermore changes have the potential to alienate people. It is very possible they have decided that a more drastic and "in your face" aproach would have bad results especially regarding the line's momentum.

What is certain is that Wotc wanted to distance d&d from OGL. My initial impression was that so they did due to market reasons (and let me say that I agree something needed to be done to avoid another cycle of D20 bloat) but now I am thinking it was also due to strategic brand value reasons. D&D IP rights will have more value if its popularity is not associated with anything else that may not make part of such rights. Furthermore they open the possibility to be able to exploit their own IPs indipendently, such as Forgotten Realms while still maintaining the rest of their brand name values. If D&D was under OGL and they selled Forgotten Realms, the buyer could develop a line under the same system of D&D and thus D&D could lose of its value due to direct competition from FR. OTOH, if the independent line of FR had to come with a different system, D&D could still maintain much of its identity.

 

[joethelawyer]

Its my impression by Scott's posts here that Wotc employs a legal advisor. Furthermore changes have the potential to alienate people. It is very possible they have decided that a more drastic and "in your face" aproach would have bad results especially regarding the line's momentum.

What is certain is that Wotc wanted to distance d&d from OGL. My initial impression was that so they did due to market reasons (and let me say that I agree something needed to be done to avoid another cycle of D20 bloat) but now I am thinking it was also due to strategic brand value reasons. D&D IP rights will have more value if its popularity is not associated with anything else that may not make part of such rights. Furthermore they open the possibility to be able to exploit their own IPs indipendently, such as Forgotten Realms while still maintaining the rest of their brand name values. If D&D was under OGL and they selled Forgotten Realms, the buyer could develop a line under the same system of D&D and thus D&D could lose of its value due to direct competition from FR. OTOH, if the independent line of FR had to come with a different system, D&D could still maintain much of its identity.

I agree with this post. Not only would the in your face approach in the form of a definitive "screw you" last year to the 3pp's have been bad PR in general, it would have hurt the launch of 4e because of the bad feelings it would engender amongst the 3pp fans. They definitely don't want the 3pp's to have as much of an ability to play in their sandbox with 4e as they did with the OGL.

Also, I am of the opinion that there was a directive from on high that the design of 4e should be substantively different enough from what is covered under the OGL that no one could ever make a competing product line off of 4e, as has happened with C&C, Pathfinder, True20, etc with 3e. I think that why we have such a different approach to the game taken in 4e. It wasn't as much designer choice, as it was a decision from on high to be very different.

Hasbro is not WOTC from the old days. There is no way a big company like Hasbro would have done anything like the OGL. I think at this point they are trying to do everything they can to recover from it.

 

[Umbran]

Also, I am of the opinion that there was a directive from on high that the design of 4e should be substantively different enough from what is covered under the OGL that no one could ever make a competing product line off of 4e, as has happened with C&C, Pathfinder, True20, etc with 3e.

I would credit this, if I'd ever seen evidence suggesting that the sale of those games ever posed any credible competition to D&D. "On high" has shown decades worth of decent business sense, and I don't see them having a knee-jerk protectionist reaction if none were called for.

 

[Ydars]

I think it is unwise to assume that business is somehow conducted scientifically, and that all decisions are based on data or are rational.

Whilst many business' may think this about themselves, I think the truth is that this is rarely the case (Fanny Mae and Freddie Mac, etc are some recent examples of how good business is at convincing itself that their business plan fits some kind of scientific model, when in fact it is based on greed and sometimes, fear).

Hasbro is no different to any other large company; it is run by people, and people are capable of emotional and irrational decisions. As indeed are their customers!

It doesn't matter if C&C etc posed a credible threat to D&D; what matters is what the guys running Hasbro felt about it. I suspect they saw all the combined 3PP sales and starting saying to themselves, "Hey, that's money we should have had".

I am not saying they want to KILL 3PPs, but the GSL is certainly not designed to spread goodwill and love either.

 

[Roman]

I would credit this, if I'd ever seen evidence suggesting that the sale of those games ever posed any credible competition to D&D. "On high" has shown decades worth of decent business sense, and I don't see them having a knee-jerk protectionist reaction if none were called for.

There is certainly evidence that the "on high" sees those other games as either posing a credible competition to D&D or at least potential credible competition to D&D. If that weren't the case, we would have seen the OGL extend to the 4th edition.