I'm having trouble seeing how Cure Light Wounds is so distinctive that another game having a healing spell under a different name would be an infringement. Every fantasy RPG I've ever played on a table or a computer had healing spells.Didn't Gygax get sued because Dangerous Journeys "copied" D&D basically literally, like, having a First Aid skill, clearly based on the Cure Light Wounds spell? /s
There’s more to it than not copying it word for word. Copyright doesn’t just protect against duplication, if also protects against derivative works. And no one is really clear on how that applies to RPG mechanics.I get that you don't understand the difference, but its pretty clear to most lawyers what the difference is.
The dragon stat blocks are copyright, you can't copy it word for word.
How very prescient of Dancey to set up that trick, 15 years before DMsG was even a glint in WotC’s eye.
Of course it wasn’t.
This. It hasn't been tested yet.There’s more to it than not copying it word for word. Copyright doesn’t just protect against duplication, if also protects against derivative works. And no one is really clear on how that applies to RPG mechanics.
Thats far from any truth, it is hard to know where to begin. They certainly didn't want books running around that saidDidn't Gygax get sued because Dangerous Journeys "copied" D&D basically literally, like, having a First Aid skill, clearly based on the Cure Light Wounds spell? /s
You're missing the point. The OGL was created in 2000. Dungeon Masters Guild was launched in 2016. It would be chronologically impossible for the OGL to be a trick devised by WOTC to force people to share profits on their game content creations with DM Guild.
My statement or theirs? I got it from here:Thats far from any truth, it is hard to know where to begin.
Fair enough, lets call DMSGuild a cranked up version of OGL 1.1 where thousands of products give up 50% of their profits, even though they don't use any product identity. But I agree, that is on them.You're missing the point. The OGL was created in 2000. Dungeon Masters Guild was launched in 2016. It would be chronologically impossible for the OGL to be a trick devised by WOTC to force people to share profits on their game content creations with DM Guild.
The value might be entirely in not getting sued and finding out that way that the license was not needed in the first placeThe OP is straddling the line between bad take and misinformation. If a working share-a-like license held no value, there would be no controversy about the OGL changes. Either the totality of the TTRPG publishing world is entirely wrong about how they conduct business, or the OP is wrong.
Look, sure, back in 1853, when a Philadelphia publisher translated Uncle Tom's Cabin into German, it didn't violate Harriet Beecher Stowe's copyright, because all translation is paraphrase, and paraphrase is automatically not a "word for word" copy. The legislative reaction to that sort of thing happening was the creation of the category of "derivative works", and it accordingly has been more than a century since you could avoid copyright claims by avoiding making a "word for word" copy.The dragon stat blocks are copyright, you can't copy it word for word.
I don’t know if I would go that far. While there are still some questions, there was at least one case (DaVinci vs Ziko) that involved copyright infringement of a game with role playing mechanics. And it was found that copying those mechanics was not infringement.There’s more to it than not copying it word for word. Copyright doesn’t just protect against duplication, if also protects against derivative works. And no one is really clear on how that applies to RPG mechanics.
Wut? The whole point of using the DMs guild instead of the OGL was to use WotC IP.Fair enough, lets call DMSGuild a cranked up version of OGL 1.1 where thousands of products give up 50% of their profits, even though they don't use any product identity. But I agree, that is on them.
I was there on the OGF-L and OGF-d20-L mailing lists where the OGL was born in 2000. I wouldn't call it a trick when Ryan Dancey came right out and said that the OGL and the SRD were being offered because of WOTC's strong belief that it would bring more players to D&D and sell more copies of the PHB, DMG and MM. Even if the OGL was used on non-SRD games, Dancey said it would help D&D because the overall growth and financial health of the gaming community would benefit the market leader.The OGL wasn't a trick to create the DM's Guild years later...but it was a trick to try to A) make the D&D rules the de facto OS for a huge swathe of RPGs, and B) make folks worry that WotC had more ownership of those rules than they actually did, or do.
Yeah, Dancy was NEVER coy about the purpose.I was there on the OGF-L and OGF-d20-L mailing lists where the OGL was born in 2000. I wouldn't call it a trick when Ryan Dancey came right out and said that the OGL and the SRD were being offered because of WOTC's strong belief that it would bring more players to D&D and sell more copies of the PHB, DMG and MM. Even if the OGL was used on non-SRD games, Dancey said it would help D&D because the overall growth and financial health of the gaming community would benefit the market leader.
I was there on the OGF-L and OGF-d20-L mailing lists where the OGL was born in 2000. I wouldn't call it a trick when Ryan Dancey came right out and said that the OGL and the SRD were being offered because of WOTC's strong belief that it would bring more players to D&D and sell more copies of the PHB, DMG and MM. Even if the OGL was used on non-SRD games, Dancey said it would help D&D because the overall growth and financial health of the gaming community would benefit the market leader.
You can't sell it on the Drivethru section either? That is rough. You should try it on itch.io ?Still the Dungeon Master's Guild is where I'd normally sell it, and they aren't accepting 3PP D&D products until this OGL thing is resolved. So even if I don't need the OGL, I still cannot sell it at the DMs Guild, so I have to wait for this to resolve only due to DM's Guild's current policy.