Paizo Announces New Irrevocable Open RPG License To Replace the OGL

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Paizo, the maker of Pathfinder, has just announced a new open license for use with RPGs. The license will not be owned by Paizo - or by any TTRPG company, and will be stewarded by Azora Law, a company which represents several tabletop gaming companies, until it finds its home with an independent non-profit. This new license is designed to be irrevocable.

We believe, as we always have, that open gaming makes games better, improves profitability for all involved, and enriches the community of gamers who participate in this amazing hobby. And so we invite gamers from around the world to join us as we begin the next great chapter of open gaming with the release of a new open, perpetual, and irrevocable Open RPG Creative License (ORC).

The new Open RPG Creative License will be built system agnostic for independent game publishers under the legal guidance of Azora Law, an intellectual property law firm that represents Paizo and several other game publishers. Paizo will pay for this legal work. We invite game publishers worldwide to join us in support of this system-agnostic license that allows all games to provide their own unique open rules reference documents that open up their individual game systems to the world. To join the effort and provide feedback on the drafts of this license, please sign up by using this form.

In addition to Paizo, Kobold Press, Chaosium, Green Ronin, Legendary Games, Rogue Genius Games, and a growing list of publishers have already agreed to participate in the Open RPG Creative License, and in the coming days we hope and expect to add substantially to this group.

The ORC will not be owned by Paizo, nor will it be owned by any company who makes money publishing RPGs. Azora Law’s ownership of the process and stewardship should provide a safe harbor against any company being bought, sold, or changing management in the future and attempting to rescind rights or nullify sections of the license. Ultimately, we plan to find a nonprofit with a history of open source values to own this license (such as the Linux Foundation).

Read more on Paizo's blog.

 

[Vaalingrade]

If they lose customers over "agility," I'm not sure how much brand loyalty they had to begin with.

The deeply, deeply depressing thing about the fandom is that they 100% absolutely WILL lose customers over something so petty.

 

[Remathilis]

If they lose customers over "agility," I'm not sure how much brand loyalty they had to begin with.

I will assume you never looked at a single discussion on racial err, species ability score modifiers?

People will lose their minds on nearly every little change. Some will absolutely rage over Muscle, Agility, Stamina, Knowledge, Intuition and Presence, Wound Points, Defense Rating, and Force Dart, the first circle dweomer.

 

[MockingBird]

I will assume you never looked at a single discussion on racial err, species ability score modifiers?

People will lose their minds on nearly every little change. Some will absolutely rage over Muscle, Agility, Stamina, Knowledge, Intuition and Presence, Wound Points, Defense Rating, and Force Dart, the first circle dweomer.

That's the thing isn't it? It won't "feel" like D&D.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

I will assume you never looked at a single discussion on racial err, species ability score modifiers?

People will lose their minds on nearly every little change. Some will absolutely rage over Muscle, Agility, Stamina, Knowledge, Intuition and Presence, Wound Points, Defense Rating, and Force Dart, the first circle dweomer.

Pathfinder fans tend to be partisans. They have made changes before for the sake of resisting WotC's corporate will. I don't think changing "dexterity" to "agility" (assuming that theoretical actually happens) would be a bridge too far for most of them.

 

[Branduil]

Wizards is not going to sue over ability score names, unless they plan on fielding lawsuits from the entire video game industry.

 

[Haplo781]

Gotta love Paizo.

"You wanna do this again WotC? sigh Okay then, here we go."

How many times must we teach you this lesson, old man?

 

[mamba]

How many times must we teach you this lesson, old man?

old dogs...

 

[Hex08]

At this point it seems like what companies shouldn't be doing is getting together to release a Pathfiver (or whatever other name you want to give it). Because isn't that just acknowledging that all people really want is to just play D&D? They want to play "D&D" without playing actual D&D. Seems to me that is giving a whole bunch of advertising to the game and company that everyone is trying to break away from, isn't it?

At some point shouldn't people just make a clean break, rather than try and hang on to a vestigial limb of a game they now hate?

I think you are making some really general statements about a pretty large community. I want to play D&D and really enjoy D&D but haven't technically played it since Pathfinder 1E was in beta. There were a lot of reasons behind that, the least of which was not caring for what it looked like 4E was going to be. I got to continue playing a game myself and my friends enjoyed with Pathfinder and when I grew tired of running that I moved to Savage Worlds with the occasional Castles & Crusades game and turned the DM duties over to one of my players for Pathfinder. During my decades of gaming I have played many other games that are not even D&D-like and sometimes those games even became the primary game for my group. When Vampire the Masquerade was at its height that was my groups main game and since shortly Pathfinder 2E was announced it has been, as I mentioned earlier, Savage Worlds, in addition to plenty of time playing other games like Call of Cthulhu and tons of others.

Most of the gaming community still probably isn't too aware or invested in the current controversy and those who are probably don't hate D&D because of it. Those who are aware of it may be upset with Hasbro/WotC and some of them may no longer be willing to support the company but that doesn't mean they need to stop playing D&D-like games, whether they are released under some new open license or are something unrelated but still a sword and sorcery game. There are tons of options out there that will allow people to find a game the like, whether it's D&D, D&D-like or something totally different.

 

[payn]

That image on the back does NOT make me think it would be a good idea to try to get into that van....

It’s DCC you absolutely shouldn’t get in the van, but you’re gonna anyway.

 

[Reynard]

It’s DCC you absolutely shouldn’t get in the van, but you’re gonna anyway.

Well, four of you are going to get in the van, but only one is getting out.