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<blockquote data-quote="Mannahnin" data-source="post: 9062500" data-attributes="member: 7026594">Eh. They definitely alienated some folks, but for the most part, from what I saw, most of their legal efforts in the Williams era (as opposed to the ones against folks like Mayfair Games over Role-Aids, from earlier) were against Gygax and against folks publishing on the internet, which back in those days was a relatively small piece of the fanbase.&nbsp; I think market saturation and a ton of folks not bothering to update to 2E was a bigger issue.I think this is drawing a pretty dubious moral line between TSR and WotC.&nbsp; The Blumes and Gygax certainly lined their pockets, and those of their friends and family, overspending irresponsibly as a company in part because of that.&nbsp; We may have less sympathy for Hasbro-era WotC as a more faceless corporate entity, but if you've got a mansion called Dragonlands with a stable full of Arabians, clearly you're not exactly as ascetic as a monk. <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f609.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=";)" title="Wink&nbsp; &nbsp; ;)"&nbsp; data-smilie="2"data-shortname=";)" /> Especially if part of the way you got there was doing things like <a href="https://www.polygon.com/2021/10/12/22722602/dungeons-dragons-game-wizards-book-excerpt-jon-peterson-arneson-lawsuit" target="_blank">swapping out a module in the Basic set because one of your employees was making big royalties and you want that money for yourself</a>, <a href="https://www.polygon.com/2021/10/12/22722602/dungeons-dragons-game-wizards-book-excerpt-jon-peterson-arneson-lawsuit" target="_blank">despite the fact that you're already getting big royalties off all the other books</a>.&nbsp; Or the whole &quot;AD&amp;D is a totally different game, really, so we don't owe Dave Arneson squat on later books&quot; series of shenanigans.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="Mannahnin, post: 9062500, member: 7026594"] Eh. They definitely alienated some folks, but for the most part, from what I saw, most of their legal efforts in the Williams era (as opposed to the ones against folks like Mayfair Games over Role-Aids, from earlier) were against Gygax and against folks publishing on the internet, which back in those days was a relatively small piece of the fanbase. I think market saturation and a ton of folks not bothering to update to 2E was a bigger issue. I think this is drawing a pretty dubious moral line between TSR and WotC. The Blumes and Gygax certainly lined their pockets, and those of their friends and family, overspending irresponsibly as a company in part because of that. We may have less sympathy for Hasbro-era WotC as a more faceless corporate entity, but if you've got a mansion called Dragonlands with a stable full of Arabians, clearly you're not exactly as ascetic as a monk. ;) Especially if part of the way you got there was doing things like [URL='https://www.polygon.com/2021/10/12/22722602/dungeons-dragons-game-wizards-book-excerpt-jon-peterson-arneson-lawsuit']swapping out a module in the Basic set because one of your employees was making big royalties and you want that money for yourself[/URL], [URL='https://www.polygon.com/2021/10/12/22722602/dungeons-dragons-game-wizards-book-excerpt-jon-peterson-arneson-lawsuit']despite the fact that you're already getting big royalties off all the other books[/URL]. Or the whole "AD&D is a totally different game, really, so we don't owe Dave Arneson squat on later books" series of shenanigans. [/QUOTE]

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