Ryan Dancey - D&D in a Death Spiral

[Dire Bare]

I can't speak for anyone else, but I know that a major factor in 3pp purchases for me was the % of OGC that I could rework, and a major factor in my decision to bypass several WotC offerings was the lack of same.

I'm no expert on the d20 boom, although I purchased my fair share of products, both WotC and 3rd Party. But, really, how many publishers took advantage of other companies OGC? I know some did, of course . . . but outside of compilations of other peoples work, I never saw much of it.

And as a consumer, how much of a product is/was OGC is meaningless. I don't need "open" content to use in my games, the legality and licensing of it doesn't matter. It only matters if I wish to make the leap to publisher, which the vast majority of us had no desire to do.

 

[Raven Crowking]

Well, it is important to me!

 

[carmachu]

Wasn't Games Workshop in pretty serious financial trouble a few years ago? Have they been able to pull themselves together?

Depends on what you mean by "pull themselves togther" exactly. They are in better finacial shape then they were before-removed debt, reduced costs. However, long term? If you look at their unit sales they seem to still be shrinking overall, not growing. I wouldnt call it a death spiral, but I wouldnt exactly call it healthy either.

 

[billd91]

I'm no expert on the d20 boom, although I purchased my fair share of products, both WotC and 3rd Party. But, really, how many publishers took advantage of other companies OGC? I know some did, of course . . . but outside of compilations of other peoples work, I never saw much of it.

Paizo uses a fair amount of OGC stuff now, and to good effect. But then, they have good reason to since they've been cut off from the official non-open content.

 

[Jhaelen]

Well, it is important to me!

Yeah, but I doubt you'd be surprised to find you're in the minority.

The amount of OGC has never influenced my buying behaviour.

 

[Wulf Ratbane]

I'm no expert on the d20 boom, although I purchased my fair share of products, both WotC and 3rd Party. But, really, how many publishers took advantage of other companies OGC? I know some did, of course . . . but outside of compilations of other peoples work, I never saw much of it.

Pick any 3pp book you own and flip to the back page, OGL, Section 15.

I doubt you really looked, or would have known it if you saw it, or would have cared if you did.

 

[AllisterH]

(Shrug)


I can't speak for anyone else, but I know that a major factor in 3pp purchases for me was the % of OGC that I could rework, and a major factor in my decision to bypass several WotC offerings was the lack of same.



RC

Um..I'm confused.

Why would a book having OGC affect your HOME game unless you were a publisher?

Personally, I stand by my belief that if WOTC had DDI running in 3.x, they could've even made EVERY book they produced OGL and STILL killed off the vast majority of the 3pp market.

 

[Dire Bare]

Pick any 3pp book you own and flip to the back page, OGL, Section 15.

I doubt you really looked, or would have known it if you saw it, or would have cared if you did.

Huh? Not sure if we're talking about the same thing (we might be). I'm not saying that 3rd Party publishers didn't use the OGL license, but how many of them used significant OGC content from other companies works? Granted, I didn't scour the section 15's of all the books I own, but I really doubt it's significant . . . . or am I way off base here as you seem to imply?

I'm certainly too lazy to head out to the garage, unbox some of that stuff, and start looking . . . .

 

[Raven Crowking]

Um..I'm confused.

Why would a book having OGC affect your HOME game unless you were a publisher?

Personally, I stand by my belief that if WOTC had DDI running in 3.x, they could've even made EVERY book they produced OGL and STILL killed off the vast majority of the 3pp market.

You know, this came up for me first because I ended up allowing options into my home game. And then, to make things easier for my players, I began to consider how I could make those options available to them. Could I, for example, make a campaign web page with optional rules posted? Could I share them with others? Could I use an online database to allow players in other parts of the world to partake in my game?

If they were OGC, I could do that without having any shadow of a problem. If not, well, not.

I found myself in a quandry between using the best rules I could, OGC or not, and limiting the scope of how I used them, or using the best OGC rules I could, allowing me to throw the scope wide open.

And, suddenly, it became obvious to me just how inclusive the OGL could be, and publishers who provided plenty of OGC were. They were helping me make my game my own, and helping me share it with others. OGC says "This game is yours" while closed content says "But this is ours". I discovered that I value the former.

And now I am working on a free ruleset that I can share, which will be well over 90% OGC, which can be used by other GMs to tinker with other rulesets, or run as-is, or whatever they like.

Because I value that, and I want the scope, and I want to contribute.



RC


EDIT: Oh, and Dire Bare, the Section 15 will show you where OGC was taken from. Many publishers have built on, and modified, each other's work. That is a good thing, and has led to some great products!

 

[Hussar]

Except that this "competing" started even BEFORE 3.0 was officially released. Remember the Scarred Lands Monster book came out BEFORE the 3.0 books did.

I distinctly remember people chuckling that WOTC was being upstaged.

Personally, while paizo has shown that adventures CAN sell, rules supplements seem to be an EASIER sell.

Of course, if DDI was available back then, I also believe that rules supplements would be as dead as a doornail as they are now for 3pp in 4e.

Heh, the Scarred Lands books even listed themselves as "Core" rulebooks. Nice.