D&D 5E Hope for an open GSL?

[hanez]

I would argue that 100% of the great adventures in 3e used the OGL (thats right all the official ones sucked), and many of the most interesting expansions were OGL.

I can see why it might not be the best business case to do it. But that era of D&D when every company on the planet and tons of freelancers were pouring cool content, was due to the OGL. And the gamer definetely benefitted from it.

I remember Alderac Entertainment made these 5 pg pamphlet adventures, I ran a whole campaign based on these simple themes with hobbled up maps, simply incredible. I also remember Paizos adventure paths, wow, Age of Worms anyone? Incredible. WOTC just hasn't made quality adventures like that for a while and if there not going to do it, and they arent going to allow others to do it, its going to effect the popularity.

 

[fivepopes]

My two cents regarding 5e and licensing: http://www.enworld.org/forum/new-ho...on-d-d/316434-show-me-you-license-please.html

 

[delericho]

I think you are right about all of this.
But what the 3e OGL shows is that it becomes much much harder to publish a new edition in a couple of years without enabling the competition to keep producing stuff under the OGL liscence.

Ryan Dancey actually addressed this while the OGL was being developed. The idea was that it would force WotC to be much more collaborative in advancing the game - they would put forward their ideas, the 3PP would put forward their ideas, and the market would decide. Over time, it would become clear that some ideas (WotC and 3PP) became widely accepted, and WotC would then use those as the basis for the new edition.

Unfortunately, I don't think the infrastructure required to really coordinate this existed (though some form of DDI could now do it), and most of the really big 3PP innovations seemed to come about in their own house systems (Mutants & Masterminds, etc).

Plus, WotC abandoned any notion of a collaborative approach pretty much right away, when "Sword and Fist" remained entirely closed content.

(In truth, it was also a mistake to structure the OGL to allow entirely new Core Rulebooks in the fantasy RPG space to exist. Though I don't think it would have worked without that. Oh well, no point fighting it now - that ship has well and truly sailed!)

 

[Dausuul]

I would argue that 100% of the great adventures in 3e used the OGL (thats right all the official ones sucked), and many of the most interesting expansions were OGL.

Got to disagree with you there. Red Hand of Doom was magnificent. Granted, WotC's overall track record with adventures has been... ah... less than stellar, but they have produced a few real gems amid the dreck.

 

[Jawsh]

(In truth, it was also a mistake to structure the OGL to allow entirely new Core Rulebooks in the fantasy RPG space to exist. Though I don't think it would have worked without that. Oh well, no point fighting it now - that ship has well and truly sailed!)

First, I don't think it was intended for Core Rulebooks to be allowed. They tried disallowing "rules for character advancement" among some other key tropes required for a set of core rules, if I recall correctly.

Second though, I will always stand by full openness as the right way to go. Even alternate core rulebooks will always lead back to support for the WotC core. It's 100% benefit for WotC, and at no cost of production, no risk of making a flop. The only cash WotC puts out is what they paid their legal team to draft the initial OGL.

There is a very small chance, but a real one, that some random start-up will create a core rulebook that fans receive better than WotC. Yes, WotC will look kind of dumb in not having thought of it. But it's still no skin off their back. They don't need to respond. However, with the OGL in place, they could easily respond. It would be easy for WotC to compete with that new startup in whatever new gaming space was created.

In short, the OGL is nothing but win for WotC, by any measure.

 

[TheFindus]

Ryan Dancey actually addressed this while the OGL was being developed. The idea was that it would force WotC to be much more collaborative in advancing the game - they would put forward their ideas, the 3PP would put forward their ideas, and the market would decide. Over time, it would become clear that some ideas (WotC and 3PP) became widely accepted, and WotC would then use those as the basis for the new edition.

I agree that it sounds so smooth when he writes and says this stuff. And this is how he must have convinced people back then. But the fact is that it did not work. What if a company wants to be really innovative? In a basically conservative game environment such as RPGs this is not going to happen for a major player with an OGL.
You see, I really think that 3e was such a success not because of the OGL but because it was a great game that came at the right time. With or without the OGL, it would have been a success story. 4E really is a great game, too, but it came at the wrong time.
And to unify the player base, legally you can do a less lenient version of the OGL and still have that effect.

 

[Knightfall]

From the GameInformer.com interview...

Can a new edition of Dungeons & Dragons succeed without a more open approach to licensing, like we saw with the OGL of 3rd edition?

[Mearls] I think that an open license speaks to how people think about D&D, and in some ways it is a big part of the game’s culture. We want people to feel like we’re making an effort to include everything that they love about the game, and we’re exploring options for third party publishers.

 

[Jawsh]

We want people to feel like we’re making an effort

Do. Or do not. There is no making an effort.

 

[SimBloodaxe]

I suppose the question is this: What do you need to own/sell in order to make a "universal game"? If the goal is to reunite the warring factions in the editions wars, they'll have to strive to make something that will draw people away from what they're currently playing, and yet allow them to continue to play what they want. It seems like a very paradoxical egg to crack.

Yeah, and that's the thing for me. They are going to have to make a better version of B/X to yank me away from Lamentations of the Flame Princess. I'm quite sure that others feel the same way about other editions. But the fact that they're trying to be inclusive makes me interested where I have not been before.

And it's not like I don't want to give official D&D tons of money. I do. I really do. But, like any commodity that isn't essential to my survival, they are going to have to work for it.

BTW, I didn't read any of the rest of the thread beyond this post, so sorry if my point has already been made.

 

[foolish_mortals]

WOTC and the Mervel-Money Cookie team has to have an open license. They need other companies to help make dnd come alive again. When we get the smaller more creative companies making content for the game is when people will really start to get something out of their core investment. The best stuff is not WOTC published. The coolest for 3rd came from elsewhere. I'm hoping the other companies come to build and entertain and its not going to be 1-2 modules every 6 months. We need like 10-20 of them in that time frame if dnd is going to catch fire again!

foolish_mortals