If Hasbro Pulls the Plug....

[Dannyalcatraz]

Which can be overcome with semantics.. behold, the Gazer

There's still the problem of the iconic visuals of the behold...errr...gazer...there. You can't just change the name if the unique, copyrighted D&D visuals remain the same.

 

[Pour]

I think that would take an Act of Congress and a quiescent Supreme Court. Or a Constitutional Amendment.

Hehe, fair enough, but taking the improbability out of the equation, I really do wonder what would happen. That said, it's completely off topic...

 

[wingsandsword]

Uhm, those are clearly Beholders.

I'm not sure where this "just change the name" meme comes from? Maybe Trade Mark law? Or WoTC's contractual term "Product Identity"? It doesn't bear any resemblance to how copyright functions, anyway. The names of things aren't copyright protectable. For non-literal copying it's the expression of the detailed concept that is protected. Changing the label has no effect.

While Beholders are WotC IP, obviously derived floating-eye-monsters using other names are very common in fantasy gaming and have been for decades now.

The Ultima series of computer games had "Gazers" and "Wandering Eyes", in the Final Fantasy series they were called "Death Eye" and "Bloody Eye", EverQuest had "Evil Eyes", and Reaper Miniatures has sold a metal mini called "eyebeast" for many years which is pretty dang distinctively a beholder.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

Not enforcing your copyright by choice or inaction and not being able to enforce your copyright are 2 different things.

Do you really want to test Hasbro's trigger finger?

 

[William Ronald]

Does anyone else feel sad when copyright laws are the bugle heralding the potential success (or survival) of our hobby?




FOR THE LAWYERS, HEYWWWWH!!!!!!!!

It reminds me of what Ryan Dancey wrote about his visit to TSR in the winter of 1997. ( At the time, I had not known TSR had shut down and was relieved to hear that WotC was coming to the rescue. I have read this article several times, and thought that it should be taught in business courses to show how an industry leader can end up in trouble.) I am going to skip part of it and highlight part of it.

Ryan Dancey on the Acquisition of TSR

In the winter of 1997, I traveled to Lake Geneva Wisconsin on a secret mission. In the late fall, rumors of TSR's impending bankruptcy had created an opportunity to made a bold gamble that the business could be saved by an infusion of capital or an acquisition with a larger partner. After a hasty series of phone calls and late night strategy sessions, I found myself standing in the snow outside of 201 Sheridan Springs Road staring at a building bearing a sign that said "TSR, Incorporated".

Inside the building, I found a dead company.

In the halls that had produced the stuff of my childhood fantasies, and had fired my imagination and become unalterably intertwined with my own sense of self, I found echoes, empty desks, and the terrible depression of lost purpose.

The life story of a tree can be read by a careful examination of its rings. The life story of a corporation can be read by a careful examination of its financial records and corporate minutes.

.......
We heard some things that are very, very hard for a company to hear. We heard that our customers felt like we didn't trust them. We heard that we produced material they felt was substandard, irrelevant, and broken. We heard that our stories were boring or out of date, or simply uninteresting. We heard the people felt that >we< were irrelevant.

I know now what killed TSR. It wasn't trading card games. It wasn't Dragon Dice. It wasn't the success of other companies. It was a near total inability to listen to its customers, hear what they were saying, and make changes to make those customers happy. TSR died because it was deaf.

Amazingly, despite all those problems, and despite years of neglect, the D&D game itself remained, at the core, a viable business. Damaged; certainly. Ailing; certainly. But savable? Absolutely.

 

[William Ronald]

D&D is NOT the "gateway" to playing RPG's. We are.

Yes, we are. Products like the Beginner's Box from Paizo or a Basic Set can help bring people into the game. So can organized play groups, as well as having active gaming groups in your local community.

I mentioned this elsewhere on the boards, but a few weeks ago at a local gaming shop, a teenager who had played online games showed up for a Pathfinder Society game. The GM, the other players and myself helped him play a pregenerated character and play in an adventure with the rest of us -- one of whom (myself) has been playing RPGs for over 30 years. I thought that if he was interested, he would get the Beginner's Box. I found out last week that he picked up the Pathfinder Core Rulebook -- thus leaping over the entry product.

If we make our gaming groups welcoming to people, regardless of age or background, it will help our hobby. While I would be sad to see the Dungeons and Dragons name put on the shelf, as it would hurt some gamers and people in the industry, I think that our hobby would survive. So, in this new year, let's try to make our hobby more welcoming to others.

 

[wingsandsword]

Not enforcing your copyright by choice or inaction and not being able to enforce your copyright are 2 different things.

Do you really want to test Hasbro's trigger finger?

I've got no dog in that fight. I'm not a publisher.

I'm just saying that fans are going to think you can do it, because they see professionally produced gaming products (CRPG's and miniatures) that have what are clearly Beholders with just the name changed and perhaps some superficial changes to the creature.

In EverQuest, they were literally giant eyeballs that floated around (no mouth or skin, just a giant floating eyeball), with the optic nerve trailing behind them like a tail. The Reaper eyebeast miniature had it's lower eyestalks drape the ground and act like legs for it to walk on (which also helped its presentation as a miniature).

So, you're saying that any creature that consists of a large roughly spherical monocular floating body with any number of tendrils/stalks/appendages that has as defining characteristics a very strong defense against magic and multiple powerful magical attacks that can instantly incapacitate or kill is WotC copyright?

 

[Treebore]

Then we are a fractured and feuding "gateway," which hardly bodes well either.

As long as each fracture is an RPG, we're good.

 

[GreyLord]

The GSL and 4E were designed in tandem with particular naming conventions and IP to specifically avoid replication, even under the OGL, without leaving so many holes and requiring so many pseudonyms as to make a clone of 4E virtually impractical. OSRIC and other retro/clone games utilize naming conventions and IP that carried over to 3.XE and the era-d20 SRD so that pre-3.XE materials are more easily replicated under the OGL.

A 4e clone would be easy to create under OGL, different powers may need to be made, but overall because the base mechanics of 4e and 3.X are almost the same, it wouldn't be hard at all.

Personally I'd probably prefer more of a 3.X/4e hybrid (so lower HP, etc), but simple.

In fact, if anyone wants to jump in maybe I'll start a homebrew thread with a 4e type clone from the OGL.

 

[Mark CMG]

A 4e clone would be easy to create under OGL, (. . .)

In fact, if anyone wants to jump in maybe I'll start a homebrew thread with a 4e type clone from the OGL.

Drop me a PM when you do.