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Enchanted Trinkets Complete--a hardcover book containing over 500 magic items for your D&D games!

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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Rasyr" data-source="post: 2232486" data-attributes="member: 2855">Thinking of money is the only way to think about it. 3.5 was spurred into action 2 years ahead of schedule because of money concerns, as pushed by Hasbro...Speaking of which......The one thing that really scares me is the thought that when 4e does come out (whenever that might be), that Hasbro will want to find some way to shut down and prevent folks from using the SRD and OGL.Now before you get up in arms and say "they can't do that", there are a couple of things to consider. First off, the OGL has never been tested in court, and while it may prevail there, what company has the money for a prolonged lawsuit over it if Hasbro pursues that course?Hasbro already has a major reputation as a company willing to sue others at the drop of the hat (their success ratio is for squat IIRC, but that is beside the point). They sued a guy for doing a parody of the "Get out of jail free" card, a single card. They have recently sued a guy for his idea of making a board-within-a-board add-on for the monopoly game. They have sued others for even more spurious reasons.The point is, IF Hasbro starts suing rpg companies that are using the OGL, they can pretty much shut down most, if not all of the companies using it just from eating up their revenue and resources. Hasbro would not care if they were in the right or not, their thoughts would be on shutting down the competition for a 4th edition of D&D.Now, I am NOT saying that this will happen, only that it is a possibility that must be considered by those companies using the OGL.And yes, of course this would kill a lot of their online fan-base, but only if they found out about it. It is quite conceivable that they would threaten to sue, and then settle out of court, a settlement that includes a gag order about the settlement, and poof, you have a bunch of small companies quietly shutting down.And yes, I am slightly paranoid about it. I don't trust large companies to do what is "right", only to do what they consider profitable.Why do I care if I work for a non-d20 company? Simple. D&D serves a purpose to me. It brings in tons of new gamers. Some of those gamers will eventually move on to other systems, including the ones I support and work on. Thus, it is in my interest to see D&D continue, but as a roleplaying game, not as a miniatures game.</blockquote>

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