OGL 1.1... quote the lawyers (and link)

[S'mon]

I can see that WotC may not want to actually proceed to judgement.

But my feeling is that they can make life more painful for a defendant if the matter is being argued on the terrain of copyright (complex, very uncertain) compared to contract (comparatively straightforward).

Absolutely, yes.

On whether they'd proceed to judgement. Anecdotally, until very recently my impression of WoTC-Hasbro and their in-house law department over the past 20 years or so was that unlike Games Workshop they were not arrogant and stupid. When I saw them take legal action, it was on well founded claims. This seemed to be part of a general 'good guy' persona that helped foster the D&D community, to their great benefit. Things have clearly changed. They appear to have put on the black hat. Does 'going evil' mean they will now combine GW's malevolence with GW's arrogance and stupidity? Or will they be evil-but-clever? It seems too early to tell.

 

[Staffan]

Does 'going evil' mean they will now combine GW's malevolence with GW's arrogance and stupidity?

 

[pemerton]

Anecdotally, until very recently my impression of WoTC-Hasbro and their in-house law department over the past 20 years or so was that unlike Games Workshop they were not arrogant and stupid. When I saw them take legal action, it was on well founded claims. This seemed to be part of a general 'good guy' persona that helped foster the D&D community, to their great benefit. Things have clearly changed. They appear to have put on the black hat. Does 'going evil' mean they will now combine GW's malevolence with GW's arrogance and stupidity? Or will they be evil-but-clever? It seems too early to tell.

I'm tentatively inclining towards evil-but-clever.

They seem to be getting some way towards achieving their goal of killing, in a practical sense, their licences of their SRD. Assuming that there is no sudden surge in market demand for D&D-knock-off-fantasy-heartbreakers, they are clearing the pool as seemed to be their goal.

If they couple this with copyright litigation - as per the rumour you posted a few days ago - then if they're clever they won't proceed to judgement, but rather will grind other parties down with discovery claims (as per our discussion about that in the other thread, a copyright claim does seem to give the plaintiff avenues for brutal discovery, like demanding the notes from every meeting where design was discussed and drafts were circulated etc).