4e D&D GSL Live

[Lizard]

I never said all opinions are equal. My opinion is obviously superior to yours, for example. However, dismissing someone's opinion as not being legitimate because it doesn't coincide with your own is just arrogant.

This, again, is based on the idea that "opinion" is a synonym for "arbitrary".

This is BS. No one is saying 2+2=5. You basically call people that don't agree with your opinion on the GSL cowards. That's the sign of an arrogant jerk.

No, actually, I said "The people who WROTE the GSL were afraid of open source." That's not the same as saying people who approve of it of are. In any event, "coward" is not a proper term. A coward is someone who has baseless fears. As we both seem to agree, if one desires complete control, fear of opening up IP is perfectly valid.

Their opinion is VALID because they correctly understand that they will lose control of their IP if it is open.

Their opinion is ILLEGITIMATE (or, rather, not worth considering in an objective debate about whether or not the GSL is good for publishers) because it is driven by that fear.

In short, I don't consider the fear of loss of control of IP to be a legitimate motivation for behavior. Given that motivation, however, their decisions have been rational.

Logical action from a faulty premise. It's extremely common human behavior. If you believe you're going to win the the lottery (false premise) you should spend a lot of money on buying tickets (correct, logical, conclusion).

In the case of WOTC, or whoever is actually behind the GSL, we see the primary goal is to "put the genie back in the bottle", hence the perpetual termination clauses. The problem is, the fear that opening 4e in perpetuity will harm a presumed 5e is wrong; the sales of 4e, despite the huge amounts of competitive material out there, prove that. The prescence of True 20, Spycraft, and so on have had little to no obvious impact on 4e sales, which are higher than expected -- and there were high expectations. So the belief that a fully open 4e would lead to long term harm is objectively invalid, as a fully open *3e* did not -- and, indeed, by keeping the D&D market alive and active, probably *increased* 4e sales by reducing people drifting out of the D&D space.

So they are making a perfectly rational decision to shoot themselves in the foot. A mostly-closed 4e will lead to attrition and contraction, and when 5e comes around, this will mean lower overall sales, as players will have left D&D entirely and won't be enticed to come back -- if they're gaming at all. Ryan Dancey was incorrect in predicting that opening D&D would lead to good ideas becoming part of the "source code", but he was correct in that it kept gamers playing D&D instead of moving on, and that's helped WOTC directly.

And, please, stop conflating "Lizard's opinion of the people who wrote the GSL" with "Lizard's opinion of uninvolved third parties who support the GSL". The drives of both groups are quite different. Actually, I can't figure out the latter at all. Do you think the GSL will produce better supplements than the OGL/STL did? If so, why? There's still no quality control, no approval process. If you think the "Defined terms" will lead to more consistency and quality...read the STL. It was very similar, and the D20 logo didn't mean a damn thing for quality purposes. It seems that there's nothing the GSL does *better* than the OGL from the perspective of consumers, and it does many things worse, so the only motives I can come up with for lauding it are...well, I can't come up with any that are rational, to my mind. "Better than nothing" is about it, and that's damning with faint praise.

 

[Orcus]

I'm not a fan of the GSL, but the fact is, it's only restrictive when you put it up against the OGL. If, 8 years ago, WotC had put out the GSL instead of the OGL, we'd all be cheering.

I'm not saying we should be cheering now - we do have the OGL to compare it against, after all -- but it has its place.

And I dunno, maybe I'm just cynical, but with airlines charging you for snacks and checked luggage, and $4/gallon gas, and contaminated tomatoes -- the GSL seems like it's just in line with the times.

I agree with the first part of your thread in general, since at that time were were going from nothing to the whole thing. I'm not sure I would be cheering not being able to use my namesake demon at any point in time But I do agree, that the GSL seems more restrictive than it is because the OGL is there for us to compare it against.

 

[Voadam]

I'm not a fan of the GSL, but the fact is, it's only restrictive when you put it up against the OGL. If, 8 years ago, WotC had put out the GSL instead of the OGL, we'd all be cheering.

I'm not saying we should be cheering now - we do have the OGL to compare it against, after all -- but it has its place.

And I dunno, maybe I'm just cynical, but with airlines charging you for snacks and checked luggage, and $4/gallon gas, and contaminated tomatoes -- the GSL seems like it's just in line with the times.

I think we'd still say the revocable and changeable at will clauses, pulping of product upon termination clause, and limited uses clauses make it a poor business proposition for licensees and it could be a lot better but we might get some licensed 3rd party directly D&D products out of it despite the poor terms of the license which would be better than nothing.

 

[JohnRTroy]

In the case of WOTC, or whoever is actually behind the GSL, we see the primary goal is to "put the genie back in the bottle", hence the perpetual termination clauses. The problem is, the fear that opening 4e in perpetuity will harm a presumed 5e is wrong; the sales of 4e, despite the huge amounts of competitive material out there, prove that. The prescence of True 20, Spycraft, and so on have had little to no obvious impact on 4e sales, which are higher than expected -- and there were high expectations. So the belief that a fully open 4e would lead to long term harm is objectively invalid, as a fully open *3e* did not -- and, indeed, by keeping the D&D market alive and active, probably *increased* 4e sales by reducing people drifting out of the D&D space.

So they are making a perfectly rational decision to shoot themselves in the foot. A mostly-closed 4e will lead to attrition and contraction, and when 5e comes around, this will mean lower overall sales, as players will have left D&D entirely and won't be enticed to come back -- if they're gaming at all. Ryan Dancey was incorrect in predicting that opening D&D would lead to good ideas becoming part of the "source code", but he was correct in that it kept gamers playing D&D instead of moving on, and that's helped WOTC directly.

First of all, "harm" is relative. It could be that WoTC have decided that letting people that an open system will eventually lead to attrition--maybe they are using long-term thinking. If you have a strong brand, you enforce the brand. I think the OGL lead to weakening of the brand, honestly, and I think this is Wizards attempt to correct it. Ironically, Ryan was wrong about the fans of the game ending up rebelling and forcing D&D to remain the same--this radical rule change ended up with high sales.

Part of D&D 4e success seems to be re-establishing the brand indentity. D&D is D&D. No "OGL", "d20", or other attributions. As soon as Wizards announced 4e, sales of other d20 product fell. You call that "putting the Genie back in the bottle"...but people seem very willing to replace their free Genie with the bottled Efreet.

Your opinion which you say is "objective fact" has a few flaws. I don't believe you can prove that people who play games like M&M and Spycraft are "kept in the D&D space". Those games were rather different. Also, the fact more people jumped on the d20 bandwagon lead to less competing games that were more different. I see no empirical evidence the D&D game line was increased by the existence of d20 games.

Saying 4e's closed nature will lead to attrition doesn't make much sense. If sales are higher on 4e, why would they go down because the game isn't open? Apparently more people care about the regular D&D brand than the OGL games, so I think the more restrictive GSL, which by no means is a "closed game", will not affect things that much. (And if 4e sales do go down, I believe it will be more because the game actually changed, rather than a lower number of third-party publishers).

I mean I don't really like 4e, and I would like to see an OGL game get a lot of popularity--but that doesn't change that your logic seems a little flawed.

I actually think the GSL has some advantages. Making the "viral" part optional rather than mandatory is more appealing to publishers--let them have the control. Using the D&D logo is a big plus. And the fact that the GSL is more restrictive will force some publishers to work on more unique unlicensed products, which will help gaming overall and prevent a D&D monoculture.

I'm not blind to the GSL being restrictive. But I don't see how the use of it will hurt D&D in the long run or that it's a "bad" license.

 

[Lizard]

Saying 4e's closed nature will lead to attrition doesn't make much sense. If sales are higher on 4e, why would they go down because the game isn't open?

Sales were high on 4e because, IMO, the openness of 3e kept people in the "D&D space", even if they drifted to other D20 games -- because they could then easily drift back to D&D. In 1998, if you played D&D but wanted to do a spy game, you were likely to move to GURPS or some other non-TSR system (Top Secret was never very popular, and it used different rules anyway). Then, when you were ready to switch again, you were already "out of" D&D, so there was no real incentive to pick D&D over, say, Fantasy Hero or Runequest. With D20, however, you could switch genres without switching systems, so that you stayed close to D&D.

Thus, after eight years, the total attrition of the D&D market was much less than it had been in 2000, when D&D was pretty much at its nadir. The OGL kept people close to WOTC, even if they weren't actually playing D&D -- and primed them for the upgrade.

Now, how they'll react to 4e once they've seen and digested it..that's anyone's guess. A lot of people don't like it when they read it, but actually playing it is a very different experience.

But, like it or not, they will eventually look for some other game. In 2000->2008, it would be likely that other game would be something using the same D20 engine. In 2008+...it will more than likely be a competitors game, perhaps one based on the D20 SRD, perhaps a totally new system. And when they're done with THAT, D&D is no longer an easy pick to switch back to. And that's where the problem will lie.

If your group does nothing but run D&D campaigns back to back, then, this may not resonate with you. If your group cycles through campaigns every 2 years or so, it might.

 

[dmccoy1693]

I agree with the first part of your thread in general, since at that time were were going from nothing to the whole thing. I'm not sure I would be cheering not being able to use my namesake demon at any point in time But I do agree, that the GSL seems more restrictive than it is because the OGL is there for us to compare it against.

The most restrictive part of the GSL is, IMO, the fact that there is now only one license. BoEF is a prime example. They weren't allowed to publish it under the d20STL so they published it OGL. Now, if you write something and WotC says no-no, you're screwed.

Had Wizards made the EXACT SAME restrictions in the form of OGL 2.0A and D&DSTL and put a stipulation in the D&DSTL that you had to use OGL 2.0A in order to publish under the D&DSTL, I would be all for this license. But considering that Wizards has final say over any products I write as to whether or not they will ever be published, I cannot in good faith work under this license.

 

[Gilwen]

I'm not a fan of the GSL, but the fact is, it's only restrictive when you put it up against the OGL. If, 8 years ago, WotC had put out the GSL instead of the OGL, we'd all be cheering.

I agree too, but to me the GSL seems like a step that is being presented out of order. Like if 8 years ago WOTC had released the GSL and then the OGL the flow would seem unbroken and we'd be cheering WOTC's vision. But the putting the genie back in the bottle is just chopping up the wake and the water won't be smooth again for a bit.

Gil

 

[pemerton]

Well, I've seen it suggested, if one is restricted by the GSL regarding a product, one arguably doesn't have "authority to contribute" under section 5 of the OGL. So if you published it under the OGL, you'd be in violation of the OGL, and the OGL would terminate for breach. If you used the 3.5 SRD for your work, at that point you'd possibly be in simple violation of Wizards copyright (for using the SRD without a valid copyright license). Which would suggest you'd now face remedies for copyright violation, which are generally more robust than a no-damages contract violation.

How well that holds together, well, is a matter for a lawyer to advise on. I have no idea.

But clause 5 of the OGL states "If You are contributing original material as Open Game Content, You represent that Your Contributions are Your original creation and/or You have sufficient rights to grant the rights conveyed by this License." In the hypothetical situation in which someone tried to backwards convert a GSL product to the OGL, it would be "fluff" content that was being reproduced in the OGL product, in breach of clause 6.2 of the GSL, but the new d20 "crunch" would be OGC that the publisher did have authority to contribute, wouldn't it? All the publisher would have to do would be to make sure that the offending fluff was not labelled as OGC.

Or am I missing something?

 

[ruemere]

I'd like to argue two paraphs here, hence the cuts.

[...]
I see no empirical evidence the D&D game line was increased by the existence of d20 games. [...]

Competition keeps the market from stagnating. And volume of sales is irrelevant to competition of ideas.

4E mechanics contain certain similiarities to other games previously published - one could argue that the experiences of various OGL games may have allowed 4E designers to introduce or avoid certain developments.

[...]If sales are higher on 4e, why would they go down because the game isn't open?[...]

Two possible causes:

Lack of third party support for long term campaigns.
It's highly unlikely that third party publishers will stake their precious, well developed worlds on GSL. And, as history proves, adventures and standalone add-ons offer smallest profits.

Lack of inventive derivatives.
There is a reason that M&M, Arcana Evolved, Spycraft and other games became classics - they offered stuff people found to be lacking in base game. I doubt there will be any such game released under GSL.

Actually, official game expansions from WotC can be summarized as:
- basic manuals adding to core books (Manual of the Planes, Open Grave, PHB II)
- basic campaign setting revivals (1-3 books per setting)
- adventure series (one)

Anyone looking for well supported setting (with several books released each year) is unlilkely to find such. At the same time, 3.xE brought us Iron Kingdoms, Midnight, Scarred Lands, Freeport.

That's why, while I loved Black Company by Green Ronin (their whole line of Mystic Vistas is heartily recommended), I was not surprised that it became merely a part of collection. It's a great book, but without support, well, it was not as appealing as it could have been.

4E may endure the trial of time, but as long as it's future is dominated by a single vision, it is unlikely to maintain its audience for more than 3-4 years.


Regards,
Ruemere

 

[JohnRTroy]

The problem with that logic is that it assumes that the OGL was the only thing driving competition.

It wasn't. Many RPGs existed. In fact, one could make the case that the OGL--specifically the d20 SRD version licensed under the OGL--hurt the gaming industry by providing too many competitors that weren't really different. It's like everybody went into the dog breeding business and ignored hamsters, cats, bunnies, etc. Or everybody's making soup products, instead of other things like pizza, rice, etc.

Heck, even TSR had Boot Hill, Star Frontiers, Gamma World, Marvel Super-Heroes, Amazing Engine, etc.

That's one reason I think the GSL is actually good because it forces some evolution on the gaming industry. Now that it has consequences and limits, we'll see more people creating truly innovative games instead of following the path of least resistance and feeding off of the D&D teat. Not everything can be handled by the d20 system, and having a monoculture I think stifles innovation.