Over 1,500 Publishers Support Paizo's Upcoming Open RPG Creator's License

Paizo has revealed some of the 1,500+ tabletop RPG publishers who have expressed an interest in their new Open RPG Creator's License (ORC), describing the group as the 'ORC Alliance'.

The license itself is still being worked on, so these 1,500 publishers have not actually seen it or signed anything. But they have indicated to Paizo that they support a new, truly open, irrevocable industry license.

Over the course of the last week, more than 1,500 tabletop RPG publishers, from household names going back to the dawn of the hobby to single proprietors just starting out with their first digital release, have joined together to pledge their support for the development of a universal system-neutral open license that provides a legal “safe harbor” for sharing rules mechanics and encourages innovation and collaboration in the tabletop gaming space.

The alliance is gathered. Work has begun.

It would take too long to list all the companies behind the ORC license effort, but we thought you might be interested to see a few of the organizations already pledged toward this common goal. We are honored to be allied with them, as well as with the equally important participating publishers too numerous to list here. Each is crucial to the effort’s success. The list below is but a representative sample of participating publishers from a huge variety of market segments with a huge variety of perspectives. But we all agree on one thing.

We are all in this together.

• Alchemy RPG
• Arcane Minis
• Atlas Games
• Autarch
• Azora Law
• Black Book Editions
• Bombshell Miniatures
• BRW Games
• Chaosium
• Cze & Peku
• Demiplane
• DMDave
• The DM Lair
• Elderbrain
• EN Publishing
• Epic Miniatures
• Evil Genius Games
• Expeditious Retreat Press
• Fantasy Grounds
• Fat Dragon Games
• Forgotten Adventures
• Foundry VTT
• Free RPG Day
• Frog God Games
• Gale Force 9
• Game On Tabletop
• Giochi Uniti
• Goodman Games
• Green Ronin
• The Griffon’s Saddlebag
• Iron GM Games
• Know Direction
• Kobold Press
• Lazy Wolf Studios
• Legendary Games
• Lone Wolf Development
• Loot Tavern
• Louis Porter Jr. Designs
• Mad Cartographer
• Minotaur Games
• Mongoose Publishing
• MonkeyDM
• Monte Cook Games
• MT Black
• Necromancer Games
• Nord Games
• Open Gaming, Inc.
• Paizo Inc.
• Paradigm Concepts
• Pelgrane Press
• Pinnacle Entertainment Group
• Raging Swan Press
• Rogue Games
• Rogue Genius Games
• Roll 20
• Roll for Combat
• Sly Flourish
• Tom Cartos
• Troll Lord Games
• Ulisses Spiele

You will be hearing a lot more from us in the days to come.

 

[Dreamscape]

Many of the 1500 won't publish anything under this new license, if they haven't before under the OGL 1.0a there's no reason that it will change.
I might be wrong but I don't dream too much regarding this...

It's possible that they will change their mind once ORC is finalised, but as it stands most supporting publishers who have made statements are saying they will release SRDs. A fair portion of those say they will use CC if ORC turns out not to meet their needs. This is already shaping up to be a very different venture to the OGL - the latter aimed to draw 3PPs into one system, ORC looks set to be a much more outward- and onward-looking ecosystem.

 

[demoss]

we know that, the site says that somewhere, copper is like > 100 copies sold (assuming it is the lowest tier) with adamantine being > 5000 sold, of course that can be a lot more than 5000 too…

We also know the numbers of publications under each category.

 

[Nylanfs]

Trying to get a general handle here... what, in terms of free to use gaming material, does ORC offer?

The ORC is strictly going to be a license, publishers will then use that to create SRD's (Paizo, Kobold Press, Chaosium, etc.), and 3pp publishers will use the ORC to produce products to support those systems.

 

[GMforPowergamers]

Ulisses Spiele wants to make the license viable for the German and EU law. They are also going to release SRDs for all game systems they have the rights to (Torg, Fading Suns, Hexen and all editions of the Dark Eye). Hopefully Pegasus and Uhrwerk will join this effort. Maybe other publishers from Europe like Black Book Editions will do the same.

Ulisses making TORG Eternal to the SRD would be my dream come true... I have been saying for over a week now that TORG should be our new D20 system anyway...

 

[Clint_L]

Ulisses Spiele wants to make the license viable for the German and EU law. They are also going to release SRDs for all game systems they have the rights to (Torg, Fading Suns, Hexen and all editions of the Dark Eye).

Was surprised to see this name on the list, to say the least! They previously had a reputation for really aggressively keeping the lid on their IP, to the point of even shutting down fan fiction. If they follow through on releasing SRDs for their stuff, that will be a massive reversal!

 

[Incenjucar]

Was surprised to see this name on the list, to say the least! They previously had a reputation for really aggressively keeping the lid on their IP, to the point of even shutting down fan fiction. If they follow through on releasing SRDs for their stuff, that will be a massive reversal!

It would be a welcome twist if WotC just made everyone in the industry but themselves realize the benefits of open source in building customer engagement.

 

[mamba]

From Kobold Press

“Celeste Conowitch, our Senior Game Designer, is the lead on game design for this new fantasy RPG. She has been working on Project Black Flag behind the scenes since the summer of 2022. Additional designers and developers are currently engaged with the project, as well as several partners from the community.”

playtest to start in February

Project Black Flag Update: Sticking To Our Principles

What is Project Black Flag from Kobold Press? It's a new core fantasy RPG system, available to any publisher or creator who accepts the terms of the soon-to-be-released Open RPG Creative License (ORC). Find out more!

koboldpress.com