3e SRDs, Paizo, Planescape, Cleric class, OSR, curious thoughts

[Yaarel]

So, the 5.1 SRD is now in the CC-BY 4.0, open license.

All of the 5e SRD is now unequivocally Open Content belonging to the gaming communities in the wild, beyond the reach of any corporation. It is an auspicious time.



So, why not the 3e SRDs? (3.0, 3.5, and Modern d20) What is the angle?

Also, why not a new 4e SRD to access Warlord, Swordmage, and other popular aspects of 4e?



Part of "keeping control" of the 3e SRDs might be to deter Paizo Pathfinder, and encourage the Open Gaming creators to switch to the 5e mechanics as much as possible. This indirectly perpetuates Hasbro-WotC products − probably including future 2024 edition products.



Is there more to it? There is much more content in the 3e SRDs than in the 5e SRD. What is missing from the 5e SRD?

Of the top of my head, Psionics is missing from the 5e, at least any developed implementation of Psionics.

3e has much more info about the "Outer Planes" or as prefer the characterization of them, the "Astral Dominions". Hasbro-WotC announced they are coming out with a new Planescape setting. Much of the Planescape setting is distinctive enough to be copyrightable. Gary Gygax invented the "Wheel" (or rather the Rectangle in his day), as a way to visualize the Alignment compass, and its diverse factions. The Alignments remain a recognizable feature of the D&D brand within popculture memes, and the Wheel remains popular. Moreover, 3e, maybe especially 4e, and now 5e, have increasingly emphasized fictional deities (like Pelor and Lolth) instead of reallife deities (like Zeus and Isis). Granted, the 5e SRD mentions reallife religions, but it is more a bait-and-switch. Players might choose their Cleric to worship a reallife polytheistic god, but the 5e settings and other products dont support them. Even the Greekesque Theros avoids reallife Greek gods, and instead supports the copyrightable and brandable Magic the Gathering cosmology. The 3e SRDs themselves protect fictional deities as Product Identity. They probably will feature in any future Planescape product.

Possibly, the future Planescape setting is a fullon, widescale push, for Astral Dominions and their denizens. Possibly, these emphases will feature in 6e too.



Heh, for me personally, all of this is a bit dismaying. Because I hate the way D&D handles "religions" generally. I hate the way, D&D misrepresents the religions of reallife cultures. (And I dont want future fictional versions of misrepresented Norse nature beings, either!) Mostly, I hate the way the Cleric class forces a specific setting with a specific cosmology and a specific way of doing religion. I dont want any of it.

I appreciate how the Theros setting includes the "Iconoclast" options. (That is also a nod to reallife ancient Greece, because many Greeks disliked, disrespected, and even disbelieved their deities.) I also appreciate the Xanathars setting sidebar that emphasizes a "cosmic power", including an abstract fundamental principle of a worldview. From the perspective of reallife religions, the "cosmic power" is the best way to be more inclusive of more reallife cultures. Thus the "cosmic power" approach can welcome more players from more reallife cultures, and help the feel more comfortable, and relate better to the Cleric class.

Relatedly, the Cleric class is a core class, and must be as setting neutral as possible, for the many worldbuilder DMs who play D&D. The class must be welcoming to different kinds of Cleric concepts for different kinds of sacred assumptions, for so many important reasons.



That said. The fictional D&D gods are "brandable" and marketable. They are popular enough among many D&D players. An "inclusive" Cleric class includes these players too. In general, the Cleric class can give specific examples from one or more official D&D settings, but cannot give specific requirements to participate in these settings. The Cleric class needs to be as setting neutral as possible, and explicitly mention other kinds of sacred worldviews besides the D&D-style polytheism. Indeed, the official settings themselves do well to be more inclusive of other reallife approaches to the sacred.

It will be tempting to Hasbro-WotC for 6e to try railroad the Cleric class into the monetizable 6e Planescape. But avoid the reallife tragedy of coercing any kind of religion in any kind of way. The Cleric class can leave a door open to the official Planescape setting. But dont force players thru that door.



Any, I suspect Hasbro-WotC plans to go big with Planescape. Even tho they clearly own the Product Identity of the fictional D&D deities, I suspect they wanted to control every aspect of the Planescape setting and its Astral Wheel of Dominions. Possibly, this plan is part of why Hasbro-WotC refuses to release the 3e SRDs to the CC. At least in their deluded minds, Hasbro-WotC still think they can de-authorize access to 3e SRD content.



By the way, to the old schoolers of the OSR, who still play variations of 1e and 2e (and Basic and Original). Do these communities really need the 3e SRDs. Much of the OSR content seems to have evolved beyond 1e and 2e, such as better versions of rules, while still keeping some of the principles of early D&D. If needing an SRD at all, is it possible to use the 5e SRD to anchor the rights of D&D usage? Is there something in the 3e SRDs that OSR must have and genuinely relies on?



Finally, Hasbro-WotC seems to intentionally withhold the 3e SRDs. They even insist as if they have the power to deauthorize access to the 3e SRDs. What is in these 3e SRDs that Hasbro-WotC hoards, like a dragon atop a treasure. Speculate about the various motives that might be in play.

 

[J.Quondam]

TO be fair, it's been less than 24 hours since they backtracked-- and this is the weekend, too. Maybe give the people over there a little time to recover from the circus?

Honestly, I don't think there's anything nefarious going on. Releasing 3.x SRD is just not a high priority for WotC because they're in the 5e business. After this past couple weeks, I am reasonably confident that they won't try to "de-authorize" OGL1.0 anytime soon. So I think 3.x SRD is safe for the time being. They've suggested they'll do it eventually, so personally I'll give them some time before I start worrying too much about it.

 

[Dausuul]

So, the 5.1 SRD is now in the CC-BY 4.0, open license.

All of the 5e SRD is now unequivocally Open Content belonging to the gaming communities in the wild, beyond the reach of any corporation. It is an auspicious time.

So, why not the 3e SRDs? (3.0, 3.5, and Modern d20) What is the angle?

Let's keep in mind that Friday's announcement was clearly an emergency fix. They stopped the survey early, and they didn't just say "We are going to put the 5E SRD under Creative Commons" -- they actually went ahead and did it right then and there. Clearly, the goal was to stop the bleeding before even one more day's worth of damage was done. (And I suspect the pro-OGL faction within Wizards was seizing the chance to lock in their victory.)

Big corporations do not like moving this fast. They had to get the 5E SRD out there, because otherwise the firestorm would have continued. But they felt they could take their time and think about the other SRDs, so they're doing that.

I don't think we need to look for any "angle" beyond that... although if you must have one, it does occur to me that they could maximize the PR benefit from their gesture by waiting a week or two, or even a couple months, before putting out the 3E and Modern SRDs. Spread out the positive announcements so they drive multiple news cycles*.

Will they in fact put out the old edition SRDs under Creative Commons? I'd guess the answer is yes -- with 5E already out there, it seems like there is minimal downside and substantial goodwill to be earned -- but you never know. They could change their minds again.

*Well, tabletop-gaming-news cycles, at least. The mainstream media will no doubt move on after covering Friday's announcement. Nobody outside the hobby is going to care about the old edition SRDs.

Also, why not a new 4e SRD to access Warlord, Swordmage, and other popular aspects of 4e?

That would be awesome. It would also be quite a bit of work, though. Someone would have to go through the 4E rulebooks and decide what was in and what was out. Then someone with a law degree and an expensive hourly rate would have to review and sign off on it.

I wouldn't rule out the possibility, but it certainly won't happen in the immediate future. (I also would not bet on the Swordmage being included, since that was from a supplement. If there is a 4E SRD, it is unlikely to contain anything that wasn't in the original PHB, MM, or DMG, or maaaaaaaybe Essentials.)

 

[Yaarel]

Rereading the 5.1 SRD, specifically the one they released in the CC.

I notice, its Appendix for deities only mentions the names of reallife deities and other sacred archetypes (and the misrepresentations of them). It avoids describing the Product Identity fictional D&D gods, except to mention that Clerics and other options can worship them. In other words, precisely the content that is obviously public domain is the only part released in full.

Meanwhile the description of the "Outer Planes" is minimalist, such as to merely mention that Good Outer Planets are called "Upper Planes" and "Celestial creatures" dwell there.

There seems a longstanding effort to keep control of the Planescape setting − specifically for brand recognition.

The threat to deauthorize can practically relate to this effort to control this content.

 

[Alzrius]

So, why not the 3e SRDs? (3.0, 3.5, and Modern d20) What is the angle?

Also, why not a new 4e SRD to access Warlord, Swordmage, and other popular aspects of 4e?

To be completely honest, I'm a little concerned about the unintended consequences of placing SRDs under CC.

I don't know the CC license very well, but my understanding (as per some excellent posts by others on here) is that it doesn't allow for making easy distinctions between Product Identity and Open Game Content which publishers have come to rely on, and that reusing derivative content (i.e. altering and republishing content which is itself altered from the 5.1 SRD) seems tricky to the point of being troublesome.

The best part of the OGL, at least to me, was that it allowed for everyone – publishers, fans, and everyone else – to all freely reuse everyone else's OGC. I have products which are derivatives of derivatives of derivatives of the 3.5 SRD, and I like that. It allows for good ideas to be polished, tweaked, expanded, and improved upon down the metaphorical line. It's the greatest strength of the license.

But I'm worried that, thanks to the uncertainty WotC has kicked up, we'll see that tossed aside as people rush toward what they perceive as a "safer" license (which might not actually be safer at all). I worry that we as a community will lose that "remix spirit" which has long been a central part of our hobby. Sure, people will still do what they want for their home games, and we'll probably still see blog posts and fan sites, but I'd like to allow for more than that.

So yeah, I'm not exactly in a rush to have the other SRDs added to CC if it means a return to balkanization as no one wants to make their IP freely reusable along side their game mechanics, as well as people not being sure to what extent they can reuse each other's content at all.

 

[Yaarel]

they actually went ahead and did it right then and there.

Yeah, whoever made that decision, to release the 5.1 "right then and there", made the wise decision.

That decisiveness is the only way I could continue to support the − innocent − 5e designers.

I still dont trust the Hasbro-WotC execs, but I do value the artists, including designers.

With 5.1 in the CC, it is a done deal. I can go back to appreciating the 5e gaming community.

(And Luke Gygax came out with a 5e product, that I am extremely excited to read!)

... although if you must have one, it does occur to me that they could maximize the PR benefit from their gesture by waiting a week or two, or even a couple months, before putting out the 3E and Modern SRDs. Spread out the positive announcements so they drive multiple news cycles*.

Interesting tactic. Even if the execs didnt think of this, they might now.

That would be awesome. It would also be quite a bit of work, though. Someone would have to go through the 4E rulebooks and decide what was in and what was out. Then someone with a law degree and an expensive hourly rate would have to review and sign off on it.

I wouldn't rule out the possibility, but it certainly won't happen in the immediate future.

Hasbro-WotC might not need to release all of 4e.

For example, they might release the Warlord class only. This would grant legal access for creatives to create 5e versions of them (for Hasbro-WotC). Any popular version would inspire an "official" one from Hasbro-WotC.

Personally, I want the Swordmage as a melee-range full-caster, whose every sword attack is actually a spell. I also want the Swordmage to use any weapon, especially be an unarmed combatant wrestler, which the 4e couldnt be.

 

[Yaarel]

To be completely honest, I'm a little concerned about the unintended consequences of placing SRDs under CC.

I don't know the CC license very well, but my understanding (as per some excellent posts by others on here) is that it doesn't allow for making easy distinctions between Product Identity and Open Game Content which publishers have come to rely on, and that reusing derivative content (i.e. altering and republishing content which is itself altered from the 5.1 SRD) seems tricky to the point of being troublesome.

The best part of the OGL, at least to me, was that it allowed for everyone – publishers, fans, and everyone else – to all freely reuse everyone else's OGC. I have products which are derivatives of derivatives of derivatives of the 3.5 SRD, and I like that. It allows for good ideas to be polished, tweaked, expanded, and improved upon down the metaphorical line. It's the greatest strength of the license.

But I'm worried that, thanks to the uncertainty WotC has kicked up, we'll see that tossed aside as people rush toward what they perceive as a "safer" license (which might not actually be safer at all). I worry that we as a community will lose that "remix spirit" which has long been a central part of our hobby. Sure, people will still do what they want for their home games, and we'll probably still see blog posts and fan sites, but I'd like to allow for more than that.

So yeah, I'm not exactly in a rush to have the other SRDs added to CC if it means a return to balkanization as no one wants to make their IP freely reusable along side their game mechanics, as well as people not being sure to what extent they can reuse each other's content at all.

Yeah. It occurs me, the cynical decision to use the CC (rather than the ORC) precisely because the CC is so unwieldly for a business to use, because a business needs product recognizability that other businesses cant duplicate.

But the important part is, D&D 5e is beyond the control of any corporation, and truly belongs to the D&D community.

 

[Henadic Theologian]

So, the 5.1 SRD is now in the CC-BY 4.0, open license.

All of the 5e SRD is now unequivocally Open Content belonging to the gaming communities in the wild, beyond the reach of any corporation. It is an auspicious time.



So, why not the 3e SRDs? (3.0, 3.5, and Modern d20) What is the angle?

Also, why not a new 4e SRD to access Warlord, Swordmage, and other popular aspects of 4e?



Part of "keeping control" of the 3e SRDs might be to deter Paizo Pathfinder, and encourage the Open Gaming creators to switch to the 5e mechanics as much as possible. This indirectly perpetuates Hasbro-WotC products − probably including future 2024 edition products.



Is there more to it? There is much more content in the 3e SRDs than in the 5e SRD. What is missing from the 5e SRD?

Of the top of my head, Psionics is missing from the 5e, at least any developed implementation of Psionics.

3e has much more info about the "Outer Planes" or as prefer the characterization of them, the "Astral Dominions". Hasbro-WotC announced they are coming out with a new Planescape setting. Much of the Planescape setting is distinctive enough to be copyrightable. Gary Gygax invented the "Wheel" (or rather the Rectangle in his day), as a way to visualize the Alignment compass, and its diverse factions. The Alignments remain a recognizable feature of the D&D brand within popculture memes, and the Wheel remains popular. Moreover, 3e, maybe especially 4e, and now 5e, have increasingly emphasized fictional deities (like Pelor and Lolth) instead of reallife deities (like Zeus and Isis). Granted, the 5e SRD mentions reallife religions, but it is more a bait-and-switch. Players might choose their Cleric to worship a reallife polytheistic god, but the 5e settings and other products dont support them. Even the Greekesque Theros avoids reallife Greek gods, and instead supports the copyrightable and brandable Magic the Gathering cosmology. The 3e SRDs themselves protect fictional deities as Product Identity. They probably will feature in any future Planescape product.

Possibly, the future Planescape setting is a fullon, widescale push, for Astral Dominions and their denizens. Possibly, these emphases will feature in 6e too.



Heh, for me personally, all of this is a bit dismaying. Because I hate the way D&D handles "religions" generally. I hate the way, D&D misrepresents the religions of reallife cultures. (And I dont want future fictional versions of misrepresented Norse nature beings, either!) Mostly, I hate the way the Cleric class forces a specific setting with a specific cosmology and a specific way of doing religion. I dont want any of it.

I appreciate how the Theros setting includes the "Iconoclast" options. (That is also a nod to reallife ancient Greece, because many Greeks disliked, disrespected, and even disbelieved their deities.) I also appreciate the Xanathars setting sidebar that emphasizes a "cosmic power", including an abstract fundamental principle of a worldview. From the perspective of reallife religions, the "cosmic power" is the best way to be more inclusive of more reallife cultures. Thus the "cosmic power" approach can welcome more players from more reallife cultures, and help the feel more comfortable, and relate better to the Cleric class.

Relatedly, the Cleric class is a core class, and must be as setting neutral as possible, for the many worldbuilder DMs who play D&D. The class must be welcoming to different kinds of Cleric concepts for different kinds of sacred assumptions, for so many important reasons.



That said. The fictional D&D gods are "brandable" and marketable. They are popular enough among many D&D players. An "inclusive" Cleric class includes these players too. In general, the Cleric class can give specific examples from one or more official D&D settings, but cannot give specific requirements to participate in these settings. The Cleric class needs to be as setting neutral as possible, and explicitly mention other kinds of sacred worldviews besides the D&D-style polytheism. Indeed, the official settings themselves do well to be more inclusive of other reallife approaches to the sacred.

It will be tempting to Hasbro-WotC for 6e to try railroad the Cleric class into the monetizable 6e Planescape. But avoid the reallife tragedy of coercing any kind of religion in any kind of way. The Cleric class can leave a door open to the official Planescape setting. But dont force players thru that door.



Any, I suspect Hasbro-WotC plans to go big with Planescape. Even tho they clearly own the Product Identity of the fictional D&D deities, I suspect they wanted to control every aspect of the Planescape setting and its Astral Wheel of Dominions. Possibly, this plan is part of why Hasbro-WotC refuses to release the 3e SRDs to the CC. At least in their deluded minds, Hasbro-WotC still think they can de-authorize access to 3e SRD content.



By the way, to the old schoolers of the OSR, who still play variations of 1e and 2e (and Basic and Original). Do these communities really need the 3e SRDs. Much of the OSR content seems to have evolved beyond 1e and 2e, such as better versions of rules, while still keeping some of the principles of early D&D. If needing an SRD at all, is it possible to use the 5e SRD to anchor the rights of D&D usage? Is there something in the 3e SRDs that OSR must have and genuinely relies on?



Finally, Hasbro-WotC seems to intentionally withhold the 3e SRDs. They even insist as if they have the power to deauthorize access to the 3e SRDs. What is in these 3e SRDs that Hasbro-WotC hoards, like a dragon atop a treasure. Speculate about the various motives that might be in play.

Your confusing Outer Planes and Astral Dominions, an understandable mistake, but they are seperate things in 5e.

 

[Yaarel]

Your confusing Outer Planes and Astral Dominions, an understandable mistake, but they are seperate things in 5e.

They are indeed the same thing.

The Outer Planes − like Elysium and Mechanus − are Astral Dominions. You can come across them while flying thru the Astral Sea.

Of course, there are very many other Astral Dominions besides the Alignment ones, and that is the beauty of the Astral Sea, any concept can manifest.

But the Outer Planes are Astral Dominions.

 

[Umbran]

So, why not the 3e SRDs? (3.0, 3.5, and Modern d20) What is the angle?

I don't think there's an "angle". I think this was probably a tumultuous time within WotC. They managed to get their ducks in a row to release the 5.1 SRD. Expecting more INSTANTLY is unrealistic.

Also, why not a new 4e SRD to access Warlord, Swordmage, and other popular aspects of 4e?

Unfortunately, 4e's SRD wasn't collected in a single document like 3e nd 5e were. So, putting together a useful 4e SRD is real work. That would be extra work with little payoff, so I don't expect them to do it.