Another Cease and Desist Letter: 4E Powercards

[Azgulor]

While there has certainly been some excellent material produced under the OGL my impression is that it was outweighed by large quantities of low quality, poorly written rubbish which glutted the market. It made picking out the useful from the dross pretty damn difficult.

I know certain parties have argued that the Bad-OGL outweitghed the Good-OGL but my own experience doesn't bear that out. And with the number of reviews available on the web, I never felt I was an uninformed consumer when purchasing a 3rd-party product.

For every Book of Erotic Fantasy (which I think was d20 license, not OGL), I can site multiples that were top notch products, such as Mutants & Masterminds, Conan OGL, True 20, Game of Thrones, etc. Also none of those products diminished my WotC purchases - it increased them due to the fact that I could plug-n-play so much of it.

I think the volume/glut of available product can't be disputed. I think the "most of it was bad" argument is demonstrably false. YMMV.



Tangent #1: I also find the volume/glut as justification for moving away from the OGL particularly funny given that many people trumpeted 4e as being a smart move b/c WotC had "printed every viable subject they could for 3.x" (I'm paraphrasing , obviously).

It still cracks me up that people can make a case that something is bad for the hobby when a 3PP does it but the exact same reason/statement is good for the hobby when WotC does it. It's even funnier to me when the argument for both cases is made within the same post.


Tangent #2: I also love the "WotC is right to go with the GSL b/c OGL sales compete with core rulebook sales" and the "3PPs sales are barely blips on WotC's/D&D's radar". Again, often argued by the same person in a single post. Either the 3PPs sales were strong enough that WotC felt the GSL was necessary to defend against it, or the 3PPs sales were small enough that there was little business justification for going with the GSL just because the could - i.e. the "Might Makes Right" issue. It's unlikely (but not impossible) that both are true.

As a wise man once told me, "Never underestimate the stupidity of a corporation." For grins, he also said, "the only thing that can exceed the stupidity of a corporation is the stupidity of government" and "the only thing that can exceed that is the stupidity of academia".

 

[xechnao]

It's not an "advertisement" when someone steals your work and makes it available for free to anyone. Let's say you spend two years writing a novel, and you finally get it published. I take it, scan it and make the text available for free - with an identical font and cover image - on the iphone app store. Is this an advertisement for your book?

Of course it isn't.

I thought the 4e power card site was cool too, but the guys running it were knowingly breaking the law. No one should be upset that this isn't okay.

The power cards were not the PHs. They could be in the future but you need to successfully convince your customer base for the transition to happen. That site was an advertisement for this kind of transition. Perhaps even the taking down of it and all the fuss this creates because it makes customers think of the value and utility of power cards.

 

[mudbunny]

I think this support of WOTC on these moves are a wee bit too trusting.

So far, we only know about WotC taking action (via C&D letters) against two websites. Both used large portions of the D&D IP *without permission*. Anyone thinking that WotC wouldn't do something about it is being fairly naive.

There is a *very* large difference between those sites and a kid somewhere putting up his character on his web page.

 

[Jack99]

Which is copyright infringement. It is neither theft or piracy.

Theft requires tangible property.

Piracy requires a boat or ship and violence or the threat of violence.

Fair enough. English isn't my native language, and in my native language, copying something illegally is called "making a pirate-copy": I am sure you can see now why I would use it as I have, considering the large amount of people who use it exacly like that.

 

[Piratecat]

The power cards were not the PHs. They could be in the future but you need to successfully convince your customer base for the transition to happen. That site was an advertisement for this kind of transition. Perhaps even the taking down of it and all the fuss this creates because it makes customers think of the value and utility of power cards.

So, are you claiming that it's okay to break the law because you're acting as an "advertisement" for the people you're stealing from?

 

[the Jester]

The power cards were not the PHs.

If there was no PH, you couldn't make power cards. The text was straight up cut and pasted from the PH. Come on, people- it's not that hard to figure out. WotC has a legal need to protect their trademarks, and they have every legal right to demand that everyone with d&d stuff online take it down. They don't and they haven't; they've only approached the most egregious examples that they could find.

:shakes head: Surely you don't think that WotC is obligated to let people give away their work for free??

 

[ExploderWizard]

Well you have Ed Greenwood signing on, Elaine Cunningham doing work for them. MANY of the old designers from 3rd edition (Sean K reynolds to na,e a few) working on Paizo...

Pathfinder is going to be MORE like D&D in everything but name.

WOTC at this point might as well stamp Dungeons and Dragons on Chutes and ladders. To them it is just a brand.. the integrity is gone.

I am not very happy with the 4E product line and the direction that the D&D brand has taken. Having said that I don't think its fair to say that the WOTC designers have no integrity.

WOTC has produced a game they thought a lot of gamers would enjoy. I don't believe these designers would work on something if they didn't believe that.

I prefer Coke over Pepsi. Does this mean that Pepsico has no integrity and produced cola they knew to be inferior to the competition for the sole purpose of pissing me off?

There are other considerations that might have an impact on the current products. Hasbro beancounters wanting more revenue from thier IP than the normal rpg medium typically producers is certainly a possibility but thats far and away a different bag of rats from a lack of integrity by the designers.

 

[Alzrius]

For every Book of Erotic Fantasy (which I think was d20 license, not OGL), I can site multiples that were top notch products, such as Mutants & Masterminds, Conan OGL, True 20, Game of Thrones, etc.

It was OGL, not d20 STL. Also, it wasn't that bad of a book; most people just overreact to the subject material and the fact that it had pictures of people in various states of undress (admittedly, the fact that it was photoshopped images of real people turned out to be very unpopular). The mechanics, writing, layout, etc. were all at least par, if not better, for a professionally-produced third-party product.

 

[bobthehappyzombie]

So, are you claiming that it's okay to break the law because you're acting as an "advertisement" for the people you're stealing from?

Can I just take this opportunity to mention De Beers...

find a way to plasticize them.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Card_sleeve would be the method of choice.

 

[xechnao]

If there was no PH, you couldn't make power cards. The text was straight up cut and pasted from the PH. Come on, people- it's not that hard to figure out. WotC has a legal need to protect their trademarks, and they have every legal right to demand that everyone with d&d stuff online take it down. They don't and they haven't; they've only approached the most egregious examples that they could find.

:shakes head: Surely you don't think that WotC is obligated to let people give away their work for free??

So, are you claiming that it's okay to break the law because you're acting as an "advertisement" for the people you're stealing from?

Fair enough. I disagree, and that's okay, too.

If you're trying to protect your copyright, as you're obligated to do, you look for low-hanging fruit; gross violations are what you target. A site that uses the D&D trade dress and has almost 2000 copy-n-pasted powers? Heck, yes. A fan posting his character? Absolutely not.

In case my point above is not clear enough. I do not exclude the possibility that Wotc could have been behind the operating and closing down of these sites for marketing reasons. Yes, this is a conspiracy theory but if you think about it, it could also be some very efficient marketing -why? because the promotion comes from a fan, rather than the seller. Besides if I really wanted to use power cards I would buy some solid ones than having to print my own and find a way to plasticize them.