My heroes: Ryan Dancey and Peter Adkison

[Wyrmshadows]

Along with Gary Gygax without whom D&D (and its OGL offspring) would not exist, Ryan Dancy and Peter Adkison IMO represent revolutionary forces in gaming history. They represent the beginning of the RP gaming hobby as well as the guarantee of its perpetuity outside the grasping hands of non-gaming corporate interests.

The OGL has given D&D and its offshoots too all of us and for that I am very grateful.

I think that the GSL is a nasty, poison pill designed to ultimately undermine the OGL...but the genie is out of the bottle and there are now too many good OGL, high profile OGL games by successful companies. OGL is here to stay and will continue to do so if folks continue to use it as the foundation of their games, supplements, etc. and to create new and innovative mechanics as open content to cross fertilize and allow for a sharing of ideas and creative concepts.

D&D is dead, long live D&D.


Wyrmshadows

 

[naturaltwenty]

The OGL was a great thing for the gaming consumer but not necessarily as great for WotC. Companies started making "D&D" better than WotC made "D&D". I use quotes only to emphasize that D&D is no longer a singular entity - to some people it's become like Kleenex being used as the term for a facial tissue even if it's not the actual Kleenex brand facial tissue.*

Brand dilution was the greatest impact of the OGL to WotC making the GSL a necessity (in some executives mind). WotC still makes it's biggest bucks on the core rules and if the GSL allowed others to make an alternative core rulebook, i.e. Mongoose's Pocket Guides, True20, Castles & Crusades, BESM d20, d20srd.org, then WotC loses out.

In the end - the OGL is a thing of beauty that allowed other companies to flourish and bring us some really good gaming material. The djinni was let out of the bottle and with Pathfinder, True20 and many other companies still producing material for it I don't think it will fade out very soon.

*This is purely anecdotal but it's my opinion and my perception as a share holder of Hasbro.