OGL; Is it working?

[JoeGKushner]

One of the thing's that's interesting, is people still post like Green Ronin, Malhavoc, and AEG are doing a lot of d20 support.

Green Ronin still has some small support for general d20 in the pipelines.

Malhavoc has some if you count Ptlous and AE, but the first quarter has no general all purpose d20 books like Book of Eldritch Might.

AEG? They dropped Swashbuckling Adventurers and L5R is no longer d20.

Guardians of Order just released A Game of Thrones, but they come out very slowly in terms of books per quarter.

Most of the d20 support these days comes from PDF publishers.

If D&D 4th ed comes out and is closed, I anticipate Arcana Evolved, True d20, Castles & Crusades and a few other lines still going, but I don't anticipate 4th ed hurting at all.

 

[Rasyr]

Something to consider....

If, when 4e comes out, it does not get released under the OGL, there may be other repecussions as well as those already mentioned.

Several months ago, Dancey made a comment to the effect that the lawyers who currently work for WotC do not like the OGL.

What would happen if those lawyers decided that with a non-OGL 4th edition, that they want to reduce some of the competition from 3.5 publishers? They already have the mechanism in place to do so, the OGL itself.

A number of third party companies do not really use the OGL properly, and thus their products may contain OGL violations. I know of at least one company with violations in at least 2 major products. If WotC's lawyers wanted to, they could quite easily shut that company down through proper and legal channels because of this.

Then there is the situation that eyebeams pointed, using potential litigation (whether proper or not) to shut companies down as well. Then there is also the DMCA, which could be used to hurt those companies as well, or at least shut them down long enough for them to go under.

Of course, all of the above is nothing more than a worst-case scenerio, but it is one that companies do need to think about and plan for.

 

[Lonely Tylenol]

One of the thing's that's interesting, is people still post like Green Ronin, Malhavoc, and AEG are doing a lot of d20 support.

Green Ronin still has some small support for general d20 in the pipelines.

Malhavoc has some if you count Ptlous and AE, but the first quarter has no general all purpose d20 books like Book of Eldritch Might.

AEG? They dropped Swashbuckling Adventurers and L5R is no longer d20.

Guardians of Order just released A Game of Thrones, but they come out very slowly in terms of books per quarter.

Most of the d20 support these days comes from PDF publishers.

If D&D 4th ed comes out and is closed, I anticipate Arcana Evolved, True d20, Castles & Crusades and a few other lines still going, but I don't anticipate 4th ed hurting at all.

As far as I'm concerned, whether they're currently publishing new d20 material is irrelevent. The important thing is that their product supports d20 and that it's good product. If I moved on to 4th ed. I'd have to kiss my 3rd ed. books goodbye...and maybe have to buy them back in 4.0 format from WotC. I happen to like my Book of Eldritch Might. And I will probably stick with it if they change the system far enough that I can't use it with the new edition. As for AEG, I mentioned that I'm mostly interested in adventures these days. I seem to recall a largest dungeon, or something along those lines, which I don't yet own...

Also, Green Ronin is doing interesting things with the OGL lately. Thieves' World, to name one. If I decide I want to try something a bit different than bread-and-butter D&D, from what I've heard about it, that would be a great book to pick up.

If 4.0 dumps the OGL, I predict that these publishers will rush in to fill the void.

 

[DaveMage]

Yes, I think it succeeded.

The real beauty in it, though, is that no matter who "owns" the D&D brand, at any time, anyone can still use the game basics to create their own thing (minus the proper names, logos, and calling it D&D, of course).

 

[Nellisir]

hey guys,
I was just thinking about the OGL today, and I was wondering hat the original purpose for it was, along with Has it lived up to it and where do you think it will go in the future. Persoanlly, i think when 4e comes out in a few years, it will go bye bye. But if it does, does that mean 3rd party publishers could still put out stuff for 3.5?

IMO, the OGL worked in propelling sales of D&D core books, and probably the rest of the D&D line as well. I don't know if WotC would keep the OGL for a 4th edition, but I'd bet against it right now. They might make licensing the D&D brand a little more affordable however, or strike some other arrangement with a few of the prominent d20 pubs.

If 4e isn't OGL, I'll be handing out the SRD to every new player I meet for the next 20 years.

As far as the OGL improving the game system, I think it's running at about 50% efficiency. It's much better than anything pre-OGL, but there's still considerable room for improvement.

 

[GMSkarka]

As for people dropping 3.5 for a non-OGL 4.0, I think that there's enough 3rd-party support to prevent the same kind of mass migration as we saw from 2nd edition..

There was plenty of 3rd-party support for 3.0 that publishers ended up eating because of the mass migration to 3.5, so I don't quite have the optimism that you're displaying here.

 

[JoeGKushner]

There was plenty of 3rd-party support for 3.0 that publishers ended up eating because of the mass migration to 3.5, so I don't quite have the optimism that you're displaying here.

Atlas great monster book would be a good example of that. Poor old Fantasy Bestiary...

Lots of other books suffered backlog death at that moment too. Not a lot of people actually going out and buying the 3.0 stuff because it was now unsupported but rather some internet babble about how they would never upgrade to 3.5 and yet, someone was buying those books.

 

[Umbran]

1) No, it clearly did not fulfill its original purpose, which was to reduce the demand for other systems and maximize WotC profits by focusing them on the cores, leaving most supplements to the third party.

Do you have some evidence that the OGL was originally intended specifically to reduce demand for other systems?

While the OGL has not killed other systems or made producing supplements unnecessary for WotC, it has crippled the market for softcover print releases that are not modules.

What makes you think this is the fault of the OGL, as opposed to other forces in the market? Personally, I think the softcover market was thwapped by the economics of publishing, and the fact that folks simply prefer a more durable book with a more solid binding with better artwork...

What would happen if those lawyers decided that with a non-OGL 4th edition, that they want to reduce some of the competition from 3.5 publishers? They already have the mechanism in place to do so, the OGL itself.

Assumning they have functioning brains - I suspect they'd have to prove that there's actually enough competition to bother. Litigation has costs, and they aren't small. Unless they can show that the 3rd party publishers are really eating enough profits to more than cover the litigation cost (plus the cost of lost goodwill of the consumers), then they won't bother.

 

[Dolom]

Something to consider....

If, when 4e comes out, it does not get released under the OGL, there may be other repecussions as well as those already mentioned.

Several months ago, Dancey made a comment to the effect that the lawyers who currently work for WotC do not like the OGL.

What would happen if those lawyers decided that with a non-OGL 4th edition, that they want to reduce some of the competition from 3.5 publishers? They already have the mechanism in place to do so, the OGL itself.

A number of third party companies do not really use the OGL properly, and thus their products may contain OGL violations. I know of at least one company with violations in at least 2 major products. If WotC's lawyers wanted to, they could quite easily shut that company down through proper and legal channels because of this.

Then there is the situation that eyebeams pointed, using potential litigation (whether proper or not) to shut companies down as well. Then there is also the DMCA, which could be used to hurt those companies as well, or at least shut them down long enough for them to go under.

Of course, all of the above is nothing more than a worst-case scenerio, but it is one that companies do need to think about and plan for.

It's refreshing to see someone online who understands the potential WOTC has if they want to pull the rug out from under the OGL. If WOTC's current attorneys don't like the OGL, or at least have trouble with it, don't be surprised if some kind of action follows in 2006. Worst case, of course.

 

[Michael Tree]

Several months ago, Dancey made a comment to the effect that the lawyers who currently work for WotC do not like the OGL.

What would happen if those lawyers decided that with a non-OGL 4th edition, that they want to reduce some of the competition from 3.5 publishers? They already have the mechanism in place to do so, the OGL itself.

A number of third party companies do not really use the OGL properly, and thus their products may contain OGL violations. I know of at least one company with violations in at least 2 major products. If WotC's lawyers wanted to, they could quite easily shut that company down through proper and legal channels because of this.

I think you're vastly overestimating the amount of competition WotC actually has from OGL companies. If 4e isn't open, the amount of competition would drop even further. The gains from litigating this would be, at best marginal, and probably not worth the bad press it would create. I suspect that WotC would only bring out the lawyers if other companies use closed 4e material (or material that looks very similar) in OGL books.

I suspect that if 4e isn't open, the OGL lines that are actually independent games rather than D&D 3.5 supplements or "setting books with modified 3.5 rules" will continue to do well, but almost everything else will drop off. M&M and True20 will continue to do well, since they're great games and have gone in directions that D&D will never go. Arcana Evolved will too, unless D&D4e dramatically improves the D&D magic system.

I suspect that if a non-open 4e comes out, we may see a bunch of new editions of OGL games, ones which don't exactly use the 4e rules, but which redesign their own games based on what 4e improved in D&D.