D&D 5E Legendary Games gets into the OGL-ized 5E too

[Darkfox190]

The scoop so far:

Both companies are likely riding that very thin line that exists between OGL and infringement; they really have access to 95% of the terms they need to do this thanks to OGL, and math expressions aren't copyrightable;

These are adventures, not new class guides, new feats, or anything that would require the components that are clearly outside OGL at the time;

Nobody has seen a C&D yet, and you can bet both companies have used their legal consultations to good effect to be sure they're staying on the legal side.


Having seen those preview monsters from Frog God's monster book kickstarter, it's a mishmash of 5e-appropriate stats and 3e stats (they got plenty of fan dismay at that finger of death spouting cannibal critter)


...so no it doesn't look like you're missing much.

Rules of a game aren't covered under copyright - In fact, if you check out government websites on copyright you can see that it explicitly says "Once a game has been made public, nothing in the copyright law prevents others from developing another game based on similar principles. Copyright protects only the particular manner of an author’s expression in literary, artistic, or musical form." This is why you see eight million different -opoly games covering subjects from popular to offensive (Sports teams, ghettoploy.) The OGL is a restricting license that allows you to use certain terms and logos while disallowing other things. However, you don't HAVE to use the OGL. As long as you don't use any actually copyrighted or trademarked material, you're fully within your rights to manhandle the rules of a game as much as you like - As least while whatever company publishes those rules doesn't drown you in frivolous lawsuits, that is. While they have no legal ground to sue you, they can probably afford a lot more lawyers than you and just waste time till you go out of business.

 

[Henry]

Rules of a game aren't covered under copyright - ...While they have no legal ground to sue you, they can probably afford a lot more lawyers than you and just waste time till you go out of business.

Emphasis on this last quote. To my knowledge, no court case has ever settled this as precedent in RPGs yet, so until someone is brave enough to do so and has deep enough pockets to "take a punch" proverbially speaking, people are happier with an open license.

And of course, disclaimer that I'm not a lawyer, this is not legal advice and is only my opinion from having watched the industry for the past 30 years.