Embracing AI in TTRPGs - Enhancing, Not Replacing, Creativity

[overgeeked]

What AI applications would you find useful in your games?

None.

Any concerns?

Yes, it's unethical and illegal. The law just hasn't caught up with the IP thieves who've stolen text and images to train these generative programs.

The worst takes are clearly conrolling the discussion space, at least online.

Yep. All these pro-"AI" takes are the worst and they're dominating the discussion. It's really too bad.

 

[Staffan]

There are a number of different LLMs built around these concepts right now. The majors aren't one of them of course, but there's a good discussion happening around this that's worth participating in.

Also, you can't copyright anything produced with LLMs. Courts have ruled on this already.

Just curious, are there any court rulings on transformative works based on LLM-produced stuff?

For example, Grimm's Fairy Tales have been in the public domain forever. But Disney can still make a Snow White movie and get a copyright on that, covering the actual movie itself as well as any story elements added to the original (e.g. the dwarfs getting names). So Neil Gaiman can write "Snow, Glass, Apples" recasting Snow White as a vampire and the queen as a woman trying to protect her kingdom from the predations of the creature, but he can't have one of the dwarves being named "Doc."

Could you do something similar with LLM-produced stuff? Like import an AI-generated image into Photoshop, mess around a bit, and get something clearly based on the AI-generated image but with some additional touches that make it "yours"?

 

[OptionalRule]

Just curious, are there any court rulings on transformative works based on LLM-produced stuff?

For example, Grimm's Fairy Tales have been in the public domain forever. But Disney can still make a Snow White movie and get a copyright on that, covering the actual movie itself as well as any story elements added to the original (e.g. the dwarfs getting names). So Neil Gaiman can write "Snow, Glass, Apples" recasting Snow White as a vampire and the queen as a woman trying to protect her kingdom from the predations of the creature, but he can't have one of the dwarves being named "Doc."

Could you do something similar with LLM-produced stuff? Like import an AI-generated image into Photoshop, mess around a bit, and get something clearly based on the AI-generated image but with some additional touches that make it "yours"?

You can't copyright AI generated works. I don't understnad the question. You are free to transform any public domain work. For most work under copyright youc an claim fair use if it's transformative enough, but they'll sue you into oblivion so good luck with that. Regardless though, you can't claim ownership of any work produced by generative AI.

Just one story

Federal Court Rules Work Generated by Artificial Intelligence Alone Is Not Eligible for Copyright Protection

This summary describes the August 18 ruling in Thayler v. Permutter holding AI-generated artwork is not entitled to copyright protection.

www.klgates.com

 

[mamba]

I'm reminded of when my son was able to Google his Math homework. His scores improved, did he actually learn anything?

how to properly use Google?

 

[Theory of Games]

Just skimming the web, it looks like there are several major lawsuits against the use of "AI Art". Is using it worth the risk of potential litigation? That's a lot of ham sammiches.

Mid-Year Review: AI Lawsuit Developments in 2024

The development and launch of new generative artificial intelligence (AI) technologies over the last two years has been revolutionary. But these advancements have been accompanied by significant concerns from copyright owner and creator communities about

copyrightalliance.org

 

[OptionalRule]

Just skimming the web, it looks like there are several major lawsuits against the use of "AI Art". Is using it worth the risk of potential litigation? That's a lot of ham sammiches.

Mid-Year Review: AI Lawsuit Developments in 2024

The development and launch of new generative artificial intelligence (AI) technologies over the last two years has been revolutionary. But these advancements have been accompanied by significant concerns from copyright owner and creator communities about

copyrightalliance.org

I'm not sure where AI art was mentioned in any of this except by you. I think I agree though. I think it's foolish to make this your business plan. You're going to spend a lot of time in court rooms. In fact, the entire commercial prospect of AI is unproven. Right now, NVIDIA is the only one making money off of it.

Other than DnDBeyond search, most scenarios presented aren't commercial scenarios and don't involve selling art, though I do think WotC could implement some good uses along those lines (they wont). The main idea is how AI can be used, langflow, streamlit on your own pdf library, pinecone is free, there are a million ways this is emerging on a personal scale that don't involve commercializing it for gaming. Then again, I think the whole movement to commecialize every interaction about TTRPGs is terrible in general, this pre-dates AI.

EDIT: Added bit about agreement and NVIDIA

 

[Staffan]

You can't copyright AI generated works. I don't understnad the question. You are free to transform any public domain work.

I might not have been clear. Can you take a work generated by AI, polish it a bit, and end up with a work you can copyright? And how much of "a bit" do you need to polish it to reach that threshold?

 

[OptionalRule]

I might not have been clear. Can you take a work generated by AI, polish it a bit, and end up with a work you can copyright? And how much of "a bit" do you need to polish it to reach that threshold?

You're essentially asking if you can create a copyrightable work from an AI-generated source by transforming it sufficiently. The honest answer is: nobody knows for certain. Here's what we do know:

1. AI-created works alone cannot be copyrighted.
2. You can claim ownership over a work if you've transformed it enough.
3. Whether courts will consider AI-sourced, human-transformed works as copyrightable is currently untested. Nobody knows if that chocolate goes with that peanutbutter.

Simple polishing likely wouldn't be enough. You'd need to significantly transform the work. This concept is similar to the argument behind "reaction" videos on YouTube, which claim fair use as transformative works.

It's important to distinguish between copyright and trademark. Trademark law is less clear-cut. For example, while the Steamboat Willie version of Mickey Mouse is now in the public domain, Disney still holds trademarks and copyrights on later iterations of Mickey.

From my experience co-owning a publishing company, there's a saying: "there is no copyright, only legal rulings." This is somewhat accurate. In practice, most copyright issues are ignored unless money is involved, at which point lawsuits often follow.

The threshold for "transformative enough" in this context is unclear and would likely require significant legal precedent to establish. Until then, it remains a gray area in copyright law.

 

[Squared]

I have attempted to use image generation on three occasions. I am not a fan of the use of the term "AI" as it could mean anything and is largely used as a hype word in sales pitches.

The first time was just as a test to see what all the hype was about I tried to get it to make a character portrait but I quickly realized that the model had been trained on an awful lot of bad cheese cake art. It generated models that made characters look like they were from one of the bad Skyrim porno mods. After several attempts I gave up.

The next time I tried something significantly easier, I tried to generate a handout picture of a ring, a symbol of a secret organization. Generating this image took over 20 attempts and nearly an hour, though I was not counting. I was pretty frustrated with the whole process by the end. Constantly having to revise my prompts until I had a rather long paragraph of text. I could have drawn what I wanted in about the same time, though with less fidelity.

Just recently I decided to try again, mostly because I was not able to find a creepy picture of a bunch of manakins sitting in a theater on the internet. So I asked the image generator to create a picture, after only 8 or 9 attempts (4 images each time) it spat out something that I decided was good enough, if only because it is supposed to look creepy.

We have had other people in our group use image generators to create images because we have a game table with a TV inset into it. Each time this happens the game stops while everyone stops to gawk at the squiggly fingers or other obvious errors or we play a little game of find the image errors.

At the same time I cannot think of any reason to ever use a LLM in a TTRPG for anything that could not be better served by a random table.

Machine learning and related technologies offer a lot of promise to a variety of fields, I was just reading an article about using it for a significant improvement in plasma control in a fusion reactor. I don't think image and text generation software really has much to offer, in most cases it is actually cheaper to just pay someone to do that work rather than have the software do it. The software is just too inaccurate and nobody has managed to get past 80% accuracy with any one model. This is all before getting into ethical and legal questions.

The fact that WotC is jumping into this after the hype train has already left the station I think is just laughable. They are spending an awful lot of somebodies money, $1 billion with a B, and I suspect that it will crash and burn leaving behind a lot of debt.

^2

 

[dragoner]

I'd love to hear your thoughts. What AI applications would you find useful in your games?

I don't use AI and just the other day a couple of people said Solis People of the Sun is fantastic, and has phenomenal world building. If you would like to see it, and contribute to a good cause, it is part of Owen K.C. Stephens "The Beacons Are Lit" bundle to help him offset the medical costs of cancer. I think most writers are like 'why mess with the magic' I know from checking it out it just either plagarized some posts from quora, or returned some space fantasy about people living underground and wearing robes. Maybe I am just a little too hard science, and that's ok, it is just where I want to be. Plus everything I have done is designed to be able to be done with pencil, and paper, no need for computers at all. We just kick back at the table, laugh, have some pizza, and chuck dice.