D&D Beyond Cancellations Changed WotCs Plans

Gizmodo has revealed that the partial OGL v1.1 walkback yesterday was in response to the fan campaign to cancel D&D Beyond subscriptions, with "five digits" worth of cancellations. However, the site also reveals that management at the company believed that fans were overreating and that it would all be forgotten in a few months.

In order to delete a D&D Beyond account entirely, users are funneled into a support system that asks them to submit tickets to be handled by customer service: Sources from inside Wizards of the Coast confirm that earlier this week there were “five digits” worth of complaining tickets in the system. Both moderation and internal management of the issues have been “a mess,” they said, partially due to the fact that WotC has recently downsized the D&D Beyond support team.

Yesterday's walkback removed the royalties from the license, but still 'de-authorized' the OGL v1.0a, something which may or may not be legally possible, depending on who you ask.

Cancelled D&D Beyond Subscriptions Forced Hasbro's Hand

Swift consumer action prompted Dungeons & Dragons publisher Wizards of the Coast to to scrap licensing updates. The players aren't done yet.

gizmodo.com

 

[I'm A Banana]

The OGL does not permit anyone to use the D&D brand or any other brand owned by Hasbro/WOTC. All of your hypothetical normie freakouts could happen because of anything published in any role-playing game. Singling out the OGL as something that could be modified to alleviate these concerns is bogus.

You are 100% right that this does not totally prohibit normie freak outs. And, I believe WotC is aware of that and still thinks that modifying the OGL is in their best interests. I'm thinking their logic is something like "Even if you lock your door, someone could break your windows; that doesn't mean you don't lock your door. So we'll lock our door. It will cut off one avenue of risk. We'll do other things to try to mitigate the risk of broken windows, but that doesn't mean we're not going to lock our door. You can never eliminate risk entirely, but you can mitigate it, and it'd be foolish of us to not mitigate it where we can."

I am not sure I follow. If the facts say no one can use D&D PI, then no one can. So what is WotC worried about, that other fantasy movies exist ?

No one can use D&D IP, but doesn't mean the brand is secure, job's done, problem solved. They see the OGL and they see, in part, a mechanism for further brand control and they are (apprently) going to take it.

 

[raniE]

You are 100% right that this does not totally prohibit normie freak outs. And, I believe WotC is aware of that and still thinks that modifying the OGL is in their best interests. I'm thinking their logic is something like "Even if you lock your door, someone could break your windows; that doesn't mean you don't lock your door. So we'll lock our door. It will cut off one avenue of risk. We'll do other things to try to mitigate the risk of broken windows, but that doesn't mean we're not going to lock our door. You can never eliminate risk entirely, but you can mitigate it, and it'd be foolish of us to not mitigate it where we can."


No one can use D&D IP, but doesn't mean the brand is secure, job's done, problem solved. They see the OGL and they see, in part, a mechanism for further brand control and they are (apprently) going to take it.

20 years of nudity, sex, gore and nude sex gore released under the OGL and no one associating it with WotC even when people get mad about it shows that this is a complete non-issue and any supposed concern about this by Hasbro is fake.

 

[Justice and Rule]

20 years of nudity, sex, gore and nude sex gore released under the OGL and no one associating it with WotC even when people get mad about it shows that this is a complete non-issue and any supposed concern about this by Hasbro is fake.

We live in a year where Nazis are pretty open about their affiliations and there are certainly a number of chuds in the community. And yet, somehow, they aren't doing big projects that blow back on the good name of Wizards of the Coast. The amount of pearl-clutching about this is utterly inane, especially given that the people who give Wizards the most PR problems about racist stuff is Wizards themselves. You don't need to change the OGL to stop Hasbro from getting a bunch of bad PR, you just need to maybe let the sensitivity editors get a few more passes at the draft.

 

[Scribe]

We live in a year where Nazis are pretty open about their affiliations and there are certainly a number of chuds in the community. And yet, somehow, they aren't doing big projects that blow back on the good name of Wizards of the Coast. The amount of pearl-clutching about this is utterly inane, especially given that the people who give Wizards the most PR problems about racist stuff is Wizards themselves. You don't need to change the OGL to stop Hasbro from getting a bunch of bad PR, you just need to maybe let the sensitivity editors get a few more passes at the draft.

The idea that any of these appeals to some version of morality is the central concern of Wizards of the Coast, is the most mind boggling "they got the wool of your eyes" moment of the last I dont know, 5 years.

They dont care folks, but you are buying it hook line and sinker.

 

[Voadam]

Also, I get the feeling while Hasbro & WotC are looking at this from a "brand perspective", they don't seem to realize most 3PPs probably aren't making enough money to think of branching out to using their settings for stuff like video games or TV shows.

As much as I would love the idea of say a Scarred Lands video game, for example, I doubt it'll ever happen.

There are pathfinder computer games. There was a Midnight setting movie. There was a vampire the masquerade tv show. I know VtM is not ogl but it was out there based on the game. Vox machina has a pathfinder gunslinger and a cleric of the pathfinder sun god slightly anonymized.

They are not common, but they are out there.

 

[heptat]

They dont care folks...

They care about money.

 

[mamba]

They care about money.

pretty selective quoting there...

 

[Scribe]

pretty selective quoting there...

Yeah, but he cuts to the (correct) point.

 

[darjr]

Yea. It is telling that the "apology" cuts the money angle. Like they think it's the most important issue. So of course that'll work.

maybe.

 

[Scribe]

Yea. It is telling that the "apology" cuts the money angle. Like they think it's the most important issue. So of course that'll work.

maybe.

Almost like it actually never mattered.