C&Ds for Online D&D 5E Character Generators

Ed Friedlander reports that WotC has asked him to remove his D&D character generators. Ed ran the generators at his site, Pathguy.com, including a D&D 5E character generator. His Pathfinder RPG character generator is still running. Thanks to Slayyne for the scoop (who also reports that at least one other site has also closed). [Update: while the actual request has not been shared, others have reported that these are very amicable requests].

You can see his closing note here.

"After almost two decades, Wizards of the Coast has asked me to remove my online character generators. I appreciate the many people who have written and thanked me for my work, and I hope you will continue to enjoy the hobby.

As a physician and gamer, I've supported and defended the hobby, and helped concerned families understand its value.

The "Dungeons and Dragons" phenomenon has encouraged young people to study other cultures. It is a game in which people work together to accomplish a meaningful goal. Characters even define themselves in terms of their good morals and their ethics. On one level, it simulates the spiritual warfare described in the Christian scriptures and in the Arthurian legends on which the game is based. I am proud that I was able to make a contribution.

My generator for Pathfinder will of course remain online. Click here for more information about this role-playing game.

May your dice come up 20s.

Ed Friedlander MD"

Back in November, the D&D Tools website suffered a similar fate, as have a couple of spellcard websites. While WotC appears to be largely easygoing as far as fan creations are concerned, they do take action when content from their products is copied or distributed.

Ed's character generator created characters by selecting a number of options, and output a character sheet similar to below. I'm not all that familiar with it, so I don't know what text, if any, it may have borrowed from the official rules.

As yet, there's no license (Open Gaming or otherwise) for D&D 5th Edition (although WotC does intend to do so), although a number of publishers have published books anyway using the older Open Gaming License for D&D 3E and 3.5.

What is interesting to hear is that some people who have received such requests describe them as very amicable. Toxic Rat says "Speaking from personal experience, I received a very nice email asking that I take down particular content owned by WotC. No threats, no warnings of legal action, just a request to honor their copyright." That's great to hear.

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[Dire Bare]

The problem with crushing fan created tools that this big gaming company has failed to provide us is that it causes us no longer to be fans. I'm upset with the firing of employees and now I'm upset about this big gaming company asking fans to remove these wonderful character creation tools. So what I'm going to do is stop supporting this big game company and go over to Pathfinder. I'm going to take the best of Pathfinder and 13th Age and I'm going to design a better game myself and promote it.

Blending Pathfinder and 13th Age sounds very cool, more power to you there. But swearing off a game you like (if you indeed like 5E) over business decisions where you only have partial information, and in all likelihood, are very reasonable decisions, is a bit silly. And I don't think WotC is worried about droves of folks following you.

 

[Dire Bare]

am I on your ignore list?

No. We're not agreeing on much here, but I only smack the "ignore" button on folks who are excessively negative or rude.

But it isn't "fun" trying to guess your country when you are making it part of the discussion in the first place. Either don't bring it up or just tell us where you're from.

 

[Ranes]

But it is the internet, we also need to decide whether the most strict or the softest law apply. Because if it is the strongest then Mexico's law on copyright applies...

I was talking about trademarks but whatever. When countries differ on points of law, we don't all default to the harshest. Is that how you think the world works?

oh and the OGL just doesn't work -we oughta tell Paizo that one-.

Oh good grief. As has been pointed out several times, it looks as though the generators weren't protected by that licence, either by the terms of the licence or the use of it by the generator's author.

 

[Grazzt]

His Pathfinder generators are back.

 

[Nylanfs]

Still not OGL compliant...

 

[pemerton]

note that you can reference trademarks as part of fair use

But you can't use them to promote your own work. The same wikipedia page you linked has a link to the page on "passing off", which in common law countries is one of the main causes of action whereby trademark infringement is challenged (the other being statutory actions for infringement of registered marks).

 

[Blue Phoenix RPG]

So, record sales, and a product you like a whole lot, but they're failing at each step?



This sentence, to me, looks like it's written in a bizzaro world. This was the largest playtest ever, for any RPG game, in the history of RPGs. It's the MOST fan feedback any company has ever had on an RPG. But in your view, you think this is the first edition with no sense of being heard?

I can't tell if this is normal internet exaggeration for effect, or if you really have an alien viewpoint relative to my own. I mean, I understand either way - you're either really frustrated and so figured exaggeration will bring attention to the thing you're frustrated about, or else you have a perspective totally different than mine. But...I am not really understanding your view right now. If I were WOTC and I saw your view, as you wrote it, I would dismiss you as someone impossible to satisfy - they can't spend that much time and money on a playtest that large and then do anything meaningful with comments like that which claim it's the first edition where there is no sense of the fans being heard.

Wow, you obviously didn't read the whole post and just made sound-bite quotes out of what I said. You completely did not obviously understand anything I posted. The basic point I was trying to make is that sure it's a great product, sure it was play-tested to death, etc. I get it, you'll get no argument from me about quality. My point was that they need to change with the times and have similar tools and roll-outs of products like they did for 3.5 and 4.0. When 4.0 was rolled out all the main books were done and they had free digital tools for DMs. BUT nothing for 5E AT ALL! The product took way too long to roll out a DM guide and then after the main books were done it just feels like they're just going to let players hang dry in wait for further Monster Manuals, realm books, and digital tools. Re read my original post and you'll see that's the point I'm trying to make. I'm not impossible to please I just want my customer service levels to equal the days of 3.5 and 4.0 releases.

 

[delericho]

My point was that they need to change with the times and have similar tools and roll-outs of products like they did for 3.5 and 4.0.

I'm confused. They have to change with the times by doing the same thing they did twelve and eight years ago?

When 4.0 was rolled out all the main books were done and they had free digital tools for DMs.

No, they didn't. They had the promise of such tools, but the DDI was delayed by a very long time. And when it was released it wasn't free. It was 3.0e that had the free tool, in the form of the character creator program, but that wasn't terribly well regarded.

The product took way too long to roll out a DM guide

4e is actually the only "full" edition where the three books were released at the same time: with 1st Ed they came out a year apart, 2nd Ed had them a couple of months apart, and 3.0e was a month apart. (3.5e released all three at once, hence my "full" edition qualifier.)

 

[Mistwell]

Wow, you obviously didn't read the whole post and just made sound-bite quotes out of what I said. You completely did not obviously understand anything I posted.

Yes I know, that's why I said I am not understanding your viewpoint.

The basic point I was trying to make is that sure it's a great product, sure it was play-tested to death, etc. I get it, you'll get no argument from me about quality. My point was that they need to change with the times and have similar tools and roll-outs of products like they did for 3.5 and 4.0. When 4.0 was rolled out all the main books were done and they had free digital tools for DMs.

No, they did not. At this point in the 4e roll-out we had zero digital tools for it. It took quite some time to get those up and running.

BUT nothing for 5E AT ALL! The product took way too long to roll out a DM guide

It was quick in my opinion. 4e is the ONLY popular RPG I know of that rolled out all three simultaneously, and the errors were so bad from doing it so fast that they created nearly a book of errata rather quickly. Everything else takes at least a month or two to roll-out, like 3e did, 2e, 1e, and even PF. Regardless, your point was that they are not listening to the fans, and yet the overwhelming response to their roll-out schedule for the core three was "that's fine". Where are they not listening to the fans on the roll-out schedule? Sounds like your preference was a minority one but you are complaining they didn't go with yours? Going with a minority opinion instead of the majority WOULD be ignoring the fans, right?

and then after the main books were done it just feels like they're just going to let players hang dry in wait for further Monster Manuals, realm books, and digital tools.

They're working on other stuff, they've announced some other stuff as well, but all their survey's showed an overwhelming view that people wanted less bloat and fewer overall products. That's them listening to fans.

As for digital tools - they are listening, they simply lost their initial 3rd party programming company and are working on a replacement. It's not like they didn't tell us that.

Re read my original post and you'll see that's the point I'm trying to make. I'm not impossible to please I just want my customer service levels to equal the days of 3.5 and 4.0 releases.

Except most people DON'T want what you want. They DON'T want a lot more books. They're fine with the initial release schedule. Listening to fans means listening to all of them, not just you.

 

[Mark CMG]

I'm confused. They have to change with the times by doing the same thing they did twelve and eight years ago?

No, they didn't. They had the promise of such tools, but the DDI was delayed by a very long time. And when it was released it wasn't free. It was 3.0e that had the free tool, in the form of the character creator program, but that wasn't terribly well regarded.

4e is actually the only "full" edition where the three books were released at the same time: with 1st Ed they came out a year apart, 2nd Ed had them a couple of months apart, and 3.0e was a month apart. (3.5e released all three at once, hence my "full" edition qualifier.)

I think I see what he's driving at. Essentially, he feels they need to change with the times insofar as they need to release all three books at once (like the last two times they released three core books with 4E and 3.5E) and they need to have digital tools ready on release (digital tools like they had for 3.5E and 4E, even if those were late for those editions and not ready for the release). He seems to be saying that in this day an age, the leader of the RPG market needs that sort of thing on release as a minimum. Kinda like with how new cars used to have just radios, then tape players as options, then tape players or CD players as options . . . But how many don't have a regular sound system with CD player as standard these days? Of course those are going bye-bye soon enough as a new standard is approaching but you get the idea.