Forking the OGL

[JohnRTroy]

Out of curiosity...

What is the motivation to "reverse engineer" 4e?

Wizards is having a 4e, and in 2009 everybody can create content if they follow the rules. That seems pretty straightforward.

4e is so different from 3e it is very doubtful people will want to take stuff from 4e to incorporate in 3e. So you're either in the 4e camp or the 3e camp.

The only real reason to reverse engineer 4e, since it has its own license, is I guess more or less to "stick it to the man"--screw you guys, I'm gonna steal your content and make it my own. "How DARE you use a different license for the new D&D. I'll show you!" At least with OSRIC it's to support a "dead game" that's no longer supported by the publisher...

I really can't see any altruistic method for doing so. Necromancer and other professional companies are doing this--or choosing not to support 4e, stay with 3e or (gosh) develop their own games. :\

 

[Reynard]

Out of curiosity...

What is the motivation to "reverse engineer" 4e?

Outside of "sticking it to the man", there's the possibility of wanting to work around restrictions in the 4E OGL. We don't know what those restrictions are, and can't know because it is going to be under NDA until the SRD goes live. That mere fact has some people thinking that the restrictions aren't just going to be "community stndards" but also restrictions that protect WotC's interests in things like getting the new monk, druid, gnome, etc... out first, or to keep 3rd party publishers from muddying the waters by trying to re-create older editions feel (when it is obvious that WotC wants to leave the older editions, and their feel, in the past).

That's the tin-foil hat answer, anyway, one to which I don't quite subscribe but am willing to entertain because WotC has pretty much either lied or blown smoke so far in regards to all things 4E. Somewhere along the line, their corporate culture turned to one of hyperbole, misdirection and outright bashing the current edition. They haven't given much reason to trust that they won't be doing something underhanded with the new OGL.

 

[Nellisir]

Wizards is having a 4e, and in 2009 everybody can create content if they follow the rules. That seems pretty straightforward.

That's your reading. Mine is different. I wouldn't be surprised if it's not true that "everybody" can create content, or that the nature of that content is closely delineated and outlined. WotC, for instance, has said they're going to spell out how to do stat blocks. Have an idea for a different type of stat block? Tough, out of luck. Not allowed. No point in WotC laying out the "official" method if people can just go and change it whenever they want.

 

[3catcircus]

Out of curiosity...

What is the motivation to "reverse engineer" 4e?

Wizards is having a 4e, and in 2009 everybody can create content if they follow the rules. That seems pretty straightforward.

4e is so different from 3e it is very doubtful people will want to take stuff from 4e to incorporate in 3e. So you're either in the 4e camp or the 3e camp.

The only real reason to reverse engineer 4e, since it has its own license, is I guess more or less to "stick it to the man"--screw you guys, I'm gonna steal your content and make it my own. "How DARE you use a different license for the new D&D. I'll show you!" At least with OSRIC it's to support a "dead game" that's no longer supported by the publisher...

I really can't see any altruistic method for doing so. Necromancer and other professional companies are doing this--or choosing not to support 4e, stay with 3e or (gosh) develop their own games. :\

I don't think that is the case at all. Perfect example - Spycraft. The 3e mechanics were used to publish a game that has more in common with James Bond films than D&D.

Suppose someone wanted to update Spycraft to version 3.0? Or publish a WWII game using 4e mechanics? As of right now, it isn't clear whether or not they can do that. (Well, technically, they can, because the game mechanics themselves are not copyrightable).

 

[Cergorach]

Six months of speculation... That's how long we'll have to wait until we see the new license and the new rules (a year until one can publish without paying $5k). As you can see the folks that handle the new OGL (or whatever it's called) clearly monitor this thread (and probably many more). I suspect that between now and six months the License can still be changed before it's release (but no one who knows can tell us because they are all under NDA), so giving the Licensing Manager of WotC clear indications of how their new license might be broken (and be fixed), might not be the best move. Please remember that when 3E was released some publishers had access to the material before hand and they released under a gentleman's agreement, later the license was changed a bit (or at least what was closed and what was not).

 

[Raven Crowking]

WotC has pretty much either lied or blown smoke so far in regards to all things 4E. Somewhere along the line, their corporate culture turned to one of hyperbole, misdirection and outright bashing the current edition. They haven't given much reason to trust that they won't be doing something underhanded with the new OGL.

But that is their right, and they have sound business reasons for doing so.


RC

 

[PapersAndPaychecks]

WotC has pretty much either lied or blown smoke so far in regards to all things 4E. Somewhere along the line, their corporate culture turned to one of hyperbole, misdirection and outright bashing the current edition. They haven't given much reason to trust that they won't be doing something underhanded with the new OGL.

It's not "underhanded" to protect your intellectual property. But I agree that WOTC are no longer proceeding in the way Ryan Dancey intended; in fact, I get the sense that Ryan's legacy is an inconvenient obstacle to their new corporate direction.

I think this community has influence over WOTC, its interests and its policy, and I think there's an argument to say that we should organise to use that influence.

The fact is that WOTC do seem to be repudiating the previous editions of D&D. And that doesn't make any business sense to me.

Fact: Not everyone will choose to switch to 4e.

I expect WOTC to try to convince us that 4e will be better. Whatever our financial investment in previous editions, WOTC will want us to drop that now and start buying again from scratch; and many people will comply. But not all.

RPGs don't have a shelf-life. There are still plenty of people playing thirty-year-old editions of the game who see no benefit in switching. And with each new edition, the community fragments further, because previous editions are still played, even if relatively unsupported.

In the meantime WOTC are sitting on a pile of potentially revenue-raising intellectual property, and refusing to use it, in case that material has a negative impact on sales of the new flagship product 4e.

That's nuts. A fiction author wouldn't suppress copies of his previous novels in the hope of boosting sales of the new one, would they? No--a fiction author carries on trying to sell everything that's his intellectual property for as long as a market remains for that product.

What I'd really like to see now, is for WOTC to put OSRIC out of the picture and make some money in the process. Why not?

Declare a new initiative: Vintage D&D. Make SRD-equivalents for all of the previous editions (1e, 2e, 3e, 3.5e) and release them free. Then start selling print copies of the rulebooks and modules--with little intial investment, this could be done via print-on-demand technology--under the Vintage D&D label.

Those old evocative rulebook covers with the 1980's amateur art and the microscopic fonts have huge nostalgia value for a generation of thirty-somethings who're turned off by the idea of learning a new and complex ruleset, but might remember the days of orc-bashing and falling into 10' pits with fondness. Ease them back into the hobby and make some money from doing so. And gain goodwill and trust from three major groups: The open gaming enthusiasts, the 1e/2e enthusiasts, and the small publishers who'd like to continue supporting previous editions rather than dropping $5k or going without a substantial proportion of sales for the next year.

Bingo--with such an initiative, OSRIC has no further purpose. I'd withdraw it at once and start writing 1e material as open gaming content, thereby enhancing WOTC's bottom line instead of damaging it. WOTC expands and diversifies its product range using assets it already owns. And fans who're concerned about 4e and feel trapped have an escape route, because 3.x or whatever their preferred edition might be, is still in print and supported by publishers.

Can we organise to persuade WOTC to try something like this?

 

[JamesM]

Can we organise to persuade WOTC to try something like this?

Would that this were possible, but so far as I can gather there are two very serious problems with this. Even assuming such a plan was of interest to a lot of D&D fans -- and I'm not convinced that it is -- WotC has neither the interest nor the institutional wherewithal to do this. They struggled as it was to update the 3E-derived SRD. I cannot begin to imagine the logistical nightmare of their trying to extract OGC from 1e or 2e.

Furthermore, the novelist analogy isn't quite right or rather it's not right from WotC's perspective. Whereas a novelist's sales are increased, both backwards and forwards, by having his entire oeuvre available for sale, I'm sure WotC would see vintage editions of D&D as a threat to 4e's bottom line. One of "truths" that seems to have been retained from WotC's early days is its (partially mistaken IMO) analysis of TSR's fall, according to which TSR failed because it "competed against itself" with too many campaign settings and too many variant rules sets. WotC still espouses this, whether out of conviction or convenience I don't know, but it nevertheless informs their corporate culture powerfully. I simply can't see their endorsement of such a plan.

None of this is to say I don't think the idea has merit -- far from it! But the reality is that WotC will likely never go down this road or, if they do, it's more evidence that the current edition of D&D (whatever it happens to be) is faring poorly sales-wise and they're willing to try anything to shore up "the brand." We're not yet at that point and my guess is we never will be. More's the pity.

 

[Wulf Ratbane]

So, how long before someone reverse-engineers the 4e improvements using the SRD, effectively creating 3.75?

For a 3.75 project, the most useful parts of 4e are the math.

 

[PapersAndPaychecks]

Would that this were possible, but so far as I can gather there are two very serious problems with this. Even assuming such a plan was of interest to a lot of D&D fans -- and I'm not convinced that it is

Well, Dragonsfoot is still growing in popularity and site traffic even after all these years. I'm certain the folks there would describe themselves as "D&D fans", if somewhat cut off from the part of the hobby that makes anyone any cash.

They struggled as it was to update the 3E-derived SRD. I cannot begin to imagine the logistical nightmare of their trying to extract OGC from 1e or 2e.

They could easily farm out that piece of work to the fans. Or they could just cut and paste it out of the OSRIC Open Game Content--I couldn't stop them doing that even if I wanted to.

WotC still espouses this, whether out of conviction or convenience I don't know, but it nevertheless informs their corporate culture powerfully. I simply can't see their endorsement of such a plan.

WOTC's position changes over time, though. Remember how a few years back, their "corporate culture" was informed by Ryan Dancey's vision of Open Gaming?

Clearly, views WOTC expressed a few years back have been re-evaluated in the light of experience. Isn't it time to ask WOTC to cash in on their whole bank of intellectual property?