OGL, d20 limitations

[DDK]

Is there any sort of group that is lobbying WotC for greater licensing freedoms?

As I understand it, I can't say in a product I want to sell that is 3rd ed. based anything like, "And this class uses the feat Spell Casting Prodigy from the Forgotten Realms Campaign Setting book..." because the FRCS is not OGL.

Seems a bit ridiculous to me, I mean my only alternative then is to create something similar and name it something different.

I mean, I'm all for copyright, but surely there are still bumps and kinks to be worked out of the setup. Is there anyone doing this or is this yet another case of GAMA being totally and utterly useless and nobody can be bothered being remotely organized enough to do something as coherent as this?

 

[HellHound]

Are you trolling once again?

"I mean, I'm all for copyright, but surely there are still bumps and kinks to be worked out of the setup. Is there anyone doing this or is this yet another case of GAMA being totally and utterly useless and nobody can be bothered being remotely organized enough to do something as coherent as this?'

How is GAMA -not- supporting people's attempts to break Wizards of the Coast's Product Identify and Intellectual Property restrictions a bad thing?

GAMA supports ALL members. It supports game publishing. Why should it support attempts to wrestle copyright controls from Wizards of the Coast?

Shouldn't GAMA also be trying to help us all be allowed to write material that uses the Star Wars copyrights? Or to break Steve Jackson Games' control over that whole GURPS line? After all, that seems pretty rediculous too, not being able to use all of Steve Jackson's copyright material in my books. After all, that material isn't OGL either, so they should be lobbied too!

---

Realistically, have you even TRIED talking to Wizards legal about licensing their material? Wizards of the Coast DOES sell d20 licenses for exactly this sort of thing. Do you REALLY hold it against Wizards that they want to maintain copyright control over some of their material?

What is so rediculous about forcing peopel to write their own material? After all, until the OGL happened, if you wanted to write ANYTHING for an RPG, you had to build the WHOLE system up from the ground, now those who want to publish material for d20 products only have to develop SOME of the material.

 

[DDK]

Wow... talk about the LAST person I expected this type of response from...

No, I'm not trolling. I have been, for a long time now, trying to determine some sort of writing project for D&D that I can get my teeth stuck into but at every turn and stage I come up against the brick wall of the OGL.

You especially would know this because I've talked to you about it at length and approached you with numerous ideas that you've told me flat out could not be done because of the licensing deal.

Quite frankly, I'm surprised you came at this post with this attitude seeing as I've always perceived you as wanting there to be as much OGL stuff out there as possible and after having heard your many gripes about the limitations.

Or do you wear two different faces?

 

[MEG Hal]

Wow... talk about the LAST person I expected this type of response from...

No, I'm not trolling. I have been, for a long time now, trying to determine some sort of writing project for D&D that I can get my teeth stuck into but at every turn and stage I come up against the brick wall of the OGL.

You especially would know this because I've talked to you about it at length and approached you with numerous ideas that you've told me flat out could not be done because of the licensing deal.

Quite frankly, I'm surprised you came at this post with this attitude seeing as I've always perceived you as wanting there to be as much OGL stuff out there as possible and after having heard your many gripes about the limitations.

Or do you wear two different faces?

I think he is just frustrated...as I am getting. You CAN NOT take anything that is not part of the SRD period, end of sentence. GAMA, ACLU or even Gary Gygax can not take IP from WotC unless it was an approved license. If you are serious about writing something take the core books, hide them and build from the SRD or any other OGC from independent d20 companies... you have such creative posts I am amazed that you can't spin that into making some good OGC without referring to any IP from another company.

 

[MEG Hal]

Or do you wear two different faces?

BTW if you want help it is best not to piss on publishers who you are also asking advice from...I like Jason, I work with Jason your insulting him does not gain you any respect from other publishers who may try and help you.

Hal

 

[HellHound]

You especially would know this because I've talked to you about it at length and approached you with numerous ideas that you've told me flat out could not be done because of the licensing deal.

Quite frankly, I'm surprised you came at this post with this attitude seeing as I've always perceived you as wanting there to be as much OGL stuff out there as possible and after having heard your many gripes about the limitations.

Or do you wear two different faces?

No. It's just that I thought you understood that we CAN'T violate other peoples' Copyrights when writing material.

I have no interest in violating other peoples' copyrights. I think that we are best off creating our own stuff instead of hitching up entirely to D&D. We are d20 publishers, not D&D publishers. No one but Kenzer & Co. have D&D licenses at this time (although if you expand the concept a bit, it could be argued that ArtHaus and Sovereign Press have licensed D&D material also), and if someone were to want to publsih material in a world such as GreyHawk, they would need such a license. If your ideas weren't all based on licensed products and copyrighted ideas, then there wouldn't have been the flat-out rejection.

The "BRICK WALL" of the OGL only exists if you are trying to hitch your products up to existing game worlds instead of trying to make products that can stand on their own.

I generally do not gripe about the limitations of the OGL. I am amazed that we have 10% of the freedom we currently have publishing under the auspices of said license. In fact, I think you are misreading my own posts to other forums regarding the limitations of the OGL as being gripes against it, when I actually support it - most of those posts were to remind people when they are over-stepping the bounds of the license. If nothing else, it FORCES us to imagine and create NEW material, new worlds, new systems. And that is a Good Thing.

It is in our best interest as third-party d20 publishers to have as much OGC as possible in our material. However, it is in WotC's best interest to have LESS OGC in their material. We are granted free access to use what they allow us to use. If we want to use more than that, then we should stop being d20 publishers and we should make our OWN system.

I honestly don't feel it is the place of GAMA to be trying to help BREAK someone's copyrights.

 

[HellHound]

You didn't answer my questions in your retort, instead you just questioned my integrity and my position on the matter.

Why do you feel that GAMA should be trying to lobby Wizards of the Coast into granting free access to their valuable Intellectual Property?

 

[DDK]

I think he is just frustrated...as I am getting. You CAN NOT take anything that is not part of the SRD period, end of sentence. GAMA, ACLU or even Gary Gygax can not take IP from WotC unless it was an approved license.

I'm not talking about TAKING, I'm talking about merely referencing, as I indicated in my first post by an example.

I mean, to me it seems silly that I can't merely REFERENCE something in another product. It's not stealing and, in fact, would only help to sell the other product if the person doesn't already have it.

To me, it's like posting a link to another website on your own website. I don't see the problem with it.

As for my snipes at GAMA... well, whatever, I'll leave that for some other time.

Originally posted by MEG Hal
If you are serious about writing something take the core books, hide them and build from the SRD or any other OGC from independent d20 companies... you have such creative posts I am amazed that you can't spin that into making some good OGC without referring to any IP from another company.

Like I said, I don't want to steal anything and, IMO, making something similar is much worse than simply referencing it.

I mean, if I were to make a feat called Magic in the Blood and give it pretty much the same breakdown as Spell Casting Prodigy, as I understand it, that would be essentially ok by the rules. But let's face it, that's basically plagiarism; however, if I were to simply give an NPC the Spell Casting Prodigy feat in any NPC write-up or even adventure, as I understand it, I'd be violating the OGL.

Am I wrong? To me, this seems silly. It's a 'I'm damned if I do and I'm damned if I don't' sortof scenario.

And as for the comment regarding other producers such as SJ Games, I think that's taking the issue to an extreme and is also wholly unrelated. They have opened up the doors; that doesn't mean I have to prostrate myself before them. I don't see the current situation as being entirely sensible and so I wish to rectify it... why I get roasted for that, I'll never understand.

Have I taken this to WotC? No... ok, that's a point... but so far, any dealings I've had with WotC staff has been... ugh, to say the least. The liklihood of me, an unpublished writer with no degrees or provable experience, no contacts in this industry that I can call on, no money for a licence (hell, no money for anything), no agent or knowledge of how or who to approach, getting any sort of legitimate response is unlikely at best. Or would you recommend that I simply send someone there an email going, "Hey, I'd really love to use the Spell Casting Prodigy feat in an NPC I'm writing up for a d20 book... is that cool, or, like, what... dude?"?

 

[MEG Hal]

Like I said, I don't want to steal anything and, IMO, making something similar is much worse than simply referencing it.

I mean, if I were to make a feat called Magic in the Blood and give it pretty much the same breakdown as Spell Casting Prodigy, as I understand it, that would be essentially ok by the rules. But let's face it, that's basically plagiarism; however, if I were to simply give an NPC the Spell Casting Prodigy feat in any NPC write-up or even adventure, as I understand it, I'd be violating the OGL.

Am I wrong? To me, this seems silly. It's a 'I'm damned if I do and I'm damned if I don't' sortof scenario.

No damning about it the FR book does not exist for our puproses so yes Magic in the Blood is the way to go. Unless you find another feat from other OGL that can do the same and refer to that feat. It may not be the easiest or the best but it is what needs to eb done legally.

 

[DDK]

Ok, I wasn't quite clear on something and I figure since yer all online now, editing the post isn't a good option.

Again, using Spell Casting Prodigy as an example, to me it's a pretty basic concept that, if there were no WotC products that had any feats in them whatsoever, would eventually have been thought of by someone.

With that in mind, what am I, as a writer, supposed to do if I want to write something for d20? If I make something similar, I'm plagiarising (at least in my eyes), but I can't reference what's already been done and isn't OGL. So there's a concept that is pretty basic that has now been taken out of consideration for me as a producer of material outside of WotC.

As I said before, damned if I do, damned if I don't.

Now... you might like to live with that sort of limitation but I'm the type of person that if I see a limitation, I look for a way to fix it, move it, break it, burn it, go around it. Again, I don't see why that's a problem...