Orc: I certainly hope you are right. But I have a hard time understanding the marketing strategy that they are using or the overall secrecy if they intend to be fully open with the third party vendors ahead of launch. I know you can't answer any of these questions, but are they just screwing up? (Everyone does.) Are they just overworked? Is 4e being rushed to market because of flagging 3.5 sales? Why the decision to leak only enough information to create wild speculation, fear of the unknown, and unrealistic expectations? It doesn't make sense.
I can tell you, if you want to know. At least my view anyway. They are rushing to get the game out and it isnt all the way done yet. They have to tease it and promote it so they are doing it. Its like a movie, they release the trailer before the final cut is done. Same thing here. There isnt secrecy. There just, in my guess, isnt a solid enough chunck of game to get out to us publishers yet. That is a bit scary.
Because if they PHB draft is due to WotC today, then what the heck are they playtesting--since playtesting just started? You absolutely cannot tell me that there is any time in the production process of this product to make any significant changes to the core rules as a result of playtesting at this point--playtesters would have to play for a month or two, then groups would have to send in reports, those reports would have to be reviewed and compiled and WotC would have to decide what to implement. Its Oct 5 today, there is no way that is less than a 2 month process. So that is Dec 5. And I'm sorry, but there is no way they arent hard into layout by then. They need the PHB to press (my guess only) by early Jan to make their release date. So what the heck is this playtesting for? I dont know. There is simply no time to incorporate anthing from playtesting given the timeline required to make a massive launch like this.
And if content can go out to playtesters, why cant it go out to third party publishers? That I dont know either.
But it isnt secrecy. I think it is simply staffing. They are cramming over there to get this done. A new edition is a MASSIVE undertaking. Heck, just coordinating all teh new art is a massive job. New layout. New design. New covers. Blah blah blah. Believe me, it isnt just writing the new content that makes for all the work.
And the bottom line is staffing. Say you are Bill S over there at WotC and you are jamming to get the edition out (and that is not a criticism by the way, find me one significant product or edition of a game or computer game that the developers arent cramming right before release, it is just the natural state of things) and you have to make staffing decisioins. What do you do? You need every body you have working to get this thing done. What kind of time do you have to dedicate to doing OGL issues? Now, in my view, the smart approach is to do what I suggested to them--send us draft PHBs with an email saying "for now, you can use this but not that, this will eventually be superceded by a more formal srd, place a notice in your products that any content used here pursuant to this permission is expressly revoked if the content is subsequently not included in a final srd." its that easy. But back to being Bill S--you have to staff this mofo and you need every body. I'm sure the thinking is that "once we hit pencil down on the phb in december (my guess, no inside info) we can deal with this third party thing." In my view, it is a pure staffing issue.
However, I don't understand how you think the up coming edition isn't grognard hostile. I can fully understand if they have decided that they need to avoid grognard capture in order to capture a younger, hipper, larger market. That's just business. But its pretty hard to convince me that decided to throw out 30 years of flavor because they thought the gamers steeped in the lore of the game would be exicted about it. As a setting supplement, sure, it's cool. But as core? It might be the smart move, but its certainly not grognard friendly. Outsider though I may be, I think I'm entitled to that opinion.
No game with Orcus on the cover of a book can be called "grognard hostile." In fact, I'm going to be a bit presumptious here, but I think WotC is well aware of teh grognard market and they want to include that market and they are specifically doing things to include the grognard element. Heck the secret name for 4e was "Orcus." Orcus is on the cover. Yes, they are changing some things and providing alternatives. But I dont think the game will be grognard hostile at all. They arent avoiding grognard capture at all, IMHO.
Clark
