Legal Eagle has entered the chat, about OGL 1.1

[GMforPowergamers]

The edible* ones are always the monsters.

EDIT for clarity: but not like actual edibles.

back in HS we used M&Ms and Recites Pieces for monsters, and who ever got the kill got to eat them...

 

[Bill Zebub]

Was hoping this was LegalEagle. Guessing the latter is more reputable...

That's a mighty high bar.

 

[Remathilis]

Interesting take he has.

 

[Reynard]

Interesting take he has.

The stuff on copyright versus trademark isinteresting, but it is clear that he doesn't really understand the culture of 3PP products and how they interact with D&D. Sure, technically, maybe you don't need the OGL. But for the things that people made with it, having it made is SAFE, which was its real value.

 

[Hex08]

The stuff on copyright versus trademark isinteresting, but it is clear that he doesn't really understand the culture of 3PP products and how they interact with D&D. Sure, technically, maybe you don't need the OGL. But for the things that people made with it, having it made is SAFE, which was its real value.

I get what you are saying about the culture but, in the end, all that matters is how the courts decide to interpret this and who can afford the legal battles, if any are fought.

 

[Vaalingrade]

The stuff on copyright versus trademark isinteresting, but it is clear that he doesn't really understand the culture of 3PP products and how they interact with D&D. Sure, technically, maybe you don't need the OGL. But for the things that people made with it, having it made is SAFE, which was its real value.

He makes that clear though and points out the better person for the job.

Amusingly, I think he might not know WotC makes M:tG and screwed that up recently too.

 

[Justice and Rule]

So why is dynamic lighting a thing to spend time futzing with? Why does it matter if the door opens with a click or if you have to fiddle with layers, etc?

I mean, I find it pretty easy to do in Foundry, but why do I do it? Well, it's something really cool and can transmit mood in a way that words make clumsy. Flickering lights, glowing red orbs, allowing a player to naturally scout and relay what they see without having to completely explain it to them... it is just really cool and useful. They can use their own words rather than repeat mine back to other players. Same with dynamic sound if you get to use it. It takes time and effort, but I find them to be really experience-changing things.

 

[mhd]

Obscure the whole thing and only reveal what the PCs see by room. Drawing is easy enough on Roll20 but it's time consuming.

So why is dynamic lighting a thing to spend time futzing with? Why does it matter if the door opens with a click or if you have to fiddle with layers, etc?

I played for a long time with Roll20, free version, as I preferred to reveal whole blocks instead of seeing those aesthetically unpleasing blobs of light and shadow. (And that tier didn't even get you scripting access)

But when I bought Foundry, I played around a bit with it, as it was pretty much the standard there. I even installed a mod ("SimpleFog") to get back to my manual reveal.
What I found out is that the dynamic lighting is simply faster during play. I don't have to mess with the mouse while selecting several rectangles to reveal more complex rooms, don't have to think about the vision and light ranges of the party.
If this would result in too much prep work, I'd probably still don't do it, but with Foundry, I found that quite okay. If I do my work with DungeonDraft, the walls are automatically imported. The same for Watabou's Dungeon Generator. Heck, now there's even a plugin that allows me to draw whole dungeons (albeit rather rectangular ones) on the fly and the walls/doors are done properly. (I've also gotten rather quick at doing walls myself)

I'm surprised at how well that works. The only online reveal thing that I liked even better was the owlbear.rodeo implementation where you can prepare your room cut-outs and then just reveal and hide them with one click. (Sadly their new version is going all out second system effect.

 

[Bolares]

The stuff on copyright versus trademark isinteresting, but it is clear that he doesn't really understand the culture of 3PP products and how they interact with D&D. Sure, technically, maybe you don't need the OGL. But for the things that people made with it, having it made is SAFE, which was its real value.

Well, he is a Lawyer, with a channel focused in the legal aspect of issues. The psicological effects of the OGL are not really on the scope of his brand. Legally speaking, for most of the content creators the OGL was and is useless, even if it does make them feel safe.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

I really, really just want a VTT white board so I can run the game just like I do at the table with tactiles. If they can give me tokens that look like dice and M&Ms, even better.

Right? Like, if I just had a nice virtual whiteboard (with a grid, like the dry-erase grid I use IRL) I could quickly draw on and easily erase on, and where there were tokens that could be moved around (doesn't even matter by who - I'd be fine with anyone being able to move anything, especially if the DM had an "undo" button), I feel like I'd be vastly better off than with any VTT I've ever used.