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Now both sides make their arguments and the case goes ahead and a decision is, hopefully, eventually reached. This is where WotC would argue you are using copyrighted material, you would hold up your OGL 1.0a license and say "this says I can", and they would have to argue why that is not the case.

That is something we'd need a legal expert to explain :) I've seen it mentioned, but don't really know the details other than it's three tests the Judge will apply to see if an injunction is reasonable.

In order to make you stop before the trial comes to a decision, they would have to obtain a temporary injunction. (If the court case eventually rules in their favor, I believe you get issued a permanent one). Violation of an injunction does indeed seem to get charged with contempt of court...

I'd also add that it's more likely any de-OGL-ified version might have to change some terminology, making it slightly more work to use with existing 5e material, another reason to get the current version while you can.

I would say that the general population reading news headlines (and indeed, the people writing them) most likely wouldn't even understand the difference between a D&D supplement and one for Vampire: The Masquerade. So the OGL shouldn't even factor into it, for many people "D&D" = "RPG", not...

I absolutely love both Kingmaker and Jade Regent. The only downside for me is that they're written for Pathfinder ;) (or possibly even 3.5e, it's that long ago I can't remember!) I can say that the non-rules content is still more than enough for me to feel that they were worth getting.

I have no idea about how you can actually legally respond to a C&D that says the sender has rights they don't actually have, so I've put it as a possibility rather than a certainty ;) I would imagine there must be some legal backlash to a C&D that has no weight, or we'd all be sending them to...

Me neither, but I'm fairly confident on the timeline. The only possible alternative I can imagine is that Publisher initiates the proceedings themselves, after receiving what they feel is an illegal C&D notice for something covered by their license with WotC - which still ends up with WotC...

So just because things have gotten a little confused and crossed over, lets summarise the points so far. We have a hypothetical timeline in which the following happens in sequence: WotC announces they are deauthorizing OGL 1.0a A publisher publishes something new under OGL 1.0a anyway WotC...

On the latter - Ryan Dancey said the day before Paizo's announcement that pushing that WotC risked losing everything if they pushed too hard with trying to deauthorize 1.0a. I have a feeling he may have had a hint or two from his Paizo contacts, but it appears he's right.

My guess is they got confused with the old d20 System Trademark License, which they could (and did) revoke from products they had issues with.

My opinion is they should be free to release any future content on any terms they wish, and not be beholden to doing so under the OGL 1.0a. However, their past content is released under specific terms in that license, terms both sides agreed to at the time. The biggest issue for creators here...

On the other hand, the other week I asked an AI to write me an interactive Doctor Who adventure, and it gave me a scarily accurate one. Note, I did give it some parameters for the opening scene, but it worked out stuff like the fact that I'd be carrying a sonic screwdriver all by itself. It...

I agree "forgive" isn't the best term to use here. In my case it's "can I ever trust them not to try and pull the OGL in the future" - and until the license text includes the word "irrevocable", that's just not ever going to be true, there will always be threat of that Sword of Damocles...

As another side note - If you had posted that two years ago I would have laughed. Now, it's kinda scary to realize that is a very real possibility.

The thing is, the OGL does not give us the right to anything they ever produce. We have the right, outside of the OGL, to replicate (with care not to infringe on IP) any game system we wish. The OGL gives us the right to the specific copyrighted text of the open gaming material released under...

Well, their right to de-authorize/revoke (either generally or specifically) is a very big question in all of this. Legal minds that agree they can are doing so on the basis that a simple licence with no termination date can be revoked at will by the licensor. Legal minds that say they cannot are...

Its even worse than that. In this case they came right out and said they were fine with you starting a business with that puppy, and any offspring that puppy may ever have - and now they're angry they didn't make a better deal at the time and want a share of your profits, and to take back any...

As someone whose livelihood and financial well-being is on the line over this, thank you <3

Indeed, given that this was a two-way deal, I would require WotC give back all the things we have given them via the OGL over the past 20 years if they wish to retroactively cancel the work we've done under it and our rights to continue building on the things we've made over that time. That...