D&D 5E Will you continue to give WotC D&D your $$$

[Faolyn]

Is your book for sale still? Link please!

Yeah, I haven't taken it down or anything. You can find it here. And thanks, even if you don't buy it!

 

[Maxperson]

So for example, I make a setting book which has some monsters, feats, and classes in it. Let's call the setting Ruinaria.

That's actually not a bad name for a post-apocalyptic campaign setting.

 

[Oofta]

I think WotC will try to do what they said in OGL 1.1, which is effectively shut down their “competition“. If so, I think it will be settled in court, probably King County, WA court as that’s where WotC and Paizo are both based, though I bet Hasbro tries to change venue to Rhode Island, so there are fewer people aware of RPG’s in the jury pool.

Meanwhile I see no indication that they are trying to shut down competition with the 2.0. They've stated that anything previously released will not be affected. Unless they open the door to another PF because they radically change the nature game, the stuff being published now isn't really competition.

Anyhow, the protest is actually trying to save D&D and by extension WotC, from a boneheaded miscalculation. Don’t blame the protestors. WotC should be thanking us for caring so much about their business. And in the case of most people here, I suspect like me they’re DMs who’ve bought thousands worth of their stuff and brought dozens or scores of people into the game. But fat chance of that.


The best we can hope for is them is walking it back and being snarky about it. “We both win” only if they truly walk it back.

When have I blamed the protesters? I agree that OGL 1.1 was a boneheaded move but it's water under the bridge now. We don't know yet what 2.0 will look like and can only base speculation on what they've said.

All just my personal perspective on why I don't have any current plans to change my purchasing decisions a the moment, of course.

 

[Parmandur]

Ahhh that takes me back.

This is the sort of ludicrous hyperbolic partisan sneering that was such a feature of the early '90s discussion of RPGs. You could literally just replace Free League with, say White Wolf, R. Talsorian, even FASA, and just drop this into a forum from 1994 and it'd have fit right in.

People who post this stuff never seem to consider for even one second the optics of doing so.

I agree with you about that nonsense, actually, but I will say that Free League is doing some cool stuff that is very different from what's coming out of the American scene right now.

The only Free League book I own is all about fairy tales and is full of twee and dark stuff intertwined, I don't think I'd peg it above PG-13, so I wouldn't say it is "for adults who are TOTALLY GROWN UP."

 

[Malmuria]

They've stated that anything previously released will not be affected.

That was a very vague part of their statement (and at odds with the leaked 1.1). If they revoke OGL 1.0, then everyone currently publishing under it will have to switch licenses going forward, either to OGL 2.0 or something else. And all the major publishers have said the terms offered by wotc for the next OGL are unpalatable, hence why they are creating and moving to other licenses. Perhaps wotc's intention was not to force all these publishers away from dnd, but that seems to be the effect. It's a huge disruption to the ttrpg industry and quite the rug pull for people who built their business, however small, around the OGL.

 

[Oofta]

That was a very vague part of their statement (and at odds with the leaked 1.1). If they revoke OGL 1.0, then everyone currently publishing under it will have to switch licenses going forward, either to OGL 2.0 or something else. And all the major publishers have said the terms offered by wotc for the next OGL are unpalatable, hence why they are creating and moving to other licenses. Perhaps wotc's intention was not to force all these publishers away from dnd, but that seems to be the effect. It's a huge disruption to the ttrpg industry and quite the rug pull for people who built their business, however small, around the OGL.

My assumption based on what they have said is that anything published under 1.0a will be unaffected. Anything published after a grace period would in theory have to follow OGL 2.0, if of course that revoking 1.0a is not thrown out in court.

Which leaves us with: what would the impact of 2.0 be on newly produced content actually be? We don't know for certain, but to me it seems incredibly minimal. I see no reason to believe it's a "rug pull" of any sort and I have yet to see concrete reasons why it would be so other than vague assertions of evil corporate types.

As far as I can tell it only has a negative if you assume worst case scenario blundering by WOTC that would actively harm it's business interests by shutting down 3PP across the board. I don't assume that which is why I have no plans to change my purchasing decisions until my assumption is proven otherwise. I would make the same recommendation to anyone publishing or planning to publish. You have every right to be concerned but I don't see a reason to overreact or panic because it would make no sense for WOTC to shut down all 3PP.

 

[Malmuria]

My assumption based on what they have said is that anything published under 1.0a will be unaffected. Anything published after a grace period would in theory have to follow OGL 2.0, if of course that revoking 1.0a is not thrown out in court.

Which leaves us with: what would the impact of 2.0 be on newly produced content actually be? We don't know for certain, but to me it seems incredibly minimal. I see no reason to believe it's a "rug pull" of any sort and I have yet to see concrete reasons why it would be so other than vague assertions of evil corporate types.

As far as I can tell it only has a negative if you assume worst case scenario blundering by WOTC that would actively harm it's business interests by shutting down 3PP across the board. I don't assume that which is why I have no plans to change my purchasing decisions until my assumption is proven otherwise. I would make the same recommendation to anyone publishing or planning to publish. You have every right to be concerned but I don't see a reason to overreact or panic because it would make no sense for WOTC to shut down all 3PP.

It's already a rug pull in the sense that 3pp (enworld included) are scrambling to scrub their content of SRD material, create or sign onto new licenses where appropriate, and figure out how to proceed with currently fulfilling and planned kickstarters for 2023. And they still don't know for sure what the terms of the OGL 2.0 are. All of this confusion was directly caused by wotc trying to shift licenses very quickly and without much transparency. Evil is hyperbole, but it is a dick move to treat one's business partners that way.

Regardless of their intent, the effect so far is that 3pp are less trusting of wotc as a business partner and are moving their products away from the OGL and the SRD. Even if their intent was very innocent (and not bullying, which I personally think is more likely), they've made it so it makes sense for 3pp to have little confidence in the OGL moving forward.

 

[Oofta]

It's already a rug pull in the sense that 3pp (enworld included) are scrambling to scrub their content of SRD material, create or sign onto new licenses where appropriate, and figure out how to proceed with currently fulfilling and planned kickstarters for 2023. And they still don't know for sure what the terms of the OGL 2.0 are. All of this confusion was directly caused by wotc trying to shift licenses very quickly and without much transparency. Evil is hyperbole, but it is a dick move to treat one's business partners that way.

Regardless of their intent, the effect so far is that 3pp are less trusting of wotc as a business partner and are moving their products away from the OGL and the SRD. Even if their intent was very innocent (and not bullying, which I personally think is more likely), they've made it so it makes sense for 3pp to have little confidence in the OGL moving forward.

WOTC has made no official changes yet. If people want to stop supporting D&D, that's up to them. Just like it's up to me to choose to continue to buy products I find interesting.

 

[Ayeffkay]

No. The OGL is the final straw, but the last year of garbage releases (naval setting with no ship to ship rules, mass combat setting with no mass combat rules, etc) had already soured me on D&D products.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

Winter blahs.

Hey at least it's getting lighter every day not darker! Well get there. Bloody cold though!