Ryan Dancey -- Hasbro Cannot Deauthorize OGL

I reached out to the architect of the original Open Gaming License, former VP of Wizard of the Coast, Ryan Dancey, and asked his opinion about the current plan by WotC to 'deauthorize' the current OGL in favour of a new one.

He responded as follows:

Yeah my public opinion is that Hasbro does not have the power to deauthorize a version of the OGL. If that had been a power that we wanted to reserve for Hasbro, we would have enumerated it in the license. I am on record numerous places in email and blogs and interviews saying that the license could never be revoked.

Ryan also maintains the Open Gaming Foundation.

As has been noted previously, even WotC in its own OGL FAQ did not believe at the time that the licence could be revoked.

7. Can't Wizards of the Coast change the License in a way that I wouldn't like?

Yes, it could. However, the License already defines what will happen to content that has been previously distributed using an earlier version, in Section 9. As a result, even if Wizards made a change you disagreed with, you could continue to use an earlier, acceptable version at your option. In other words, there's no reason for Wizards to ever make a change that the community of people using the Open Gaming License would object to, because the community would just ignore the change anyway.

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[Ruin Explorer]

A friend of mine thinks it's not too bad, and that WotC deserves some royalties for allowing people to make content with their rules, and that the royalty limit is too high anyway.

He also happens to my podcast co-host so I know I'll fiercely try to convince him the next time we meet.

I'm guessing he hasn't really thought through the wild and generalized destruction removing the 1.0a OGL from existence would cause. So far everyone I've pointed that out to has either not understood it because they don't actually understand what the OGL is, or gone "Huh that's not good they should just not do that bit".

 

[Henadic Theologian]

A friend of mine thinks it's not too bad, and that WotC deserves some royalties for allowing people to make content with their rules, and that the royalty limit is too high anyway.

He also happens to my podcast co-host so I know I'll fiercely try to convince him the next time we meet.

Okay so were down to 99.5% of fans.

 

[jerryrice4949]

Can confirm, as a 3rd party creator who just kickstarted his first 5e book.

Not to derail but what is your KS?

 

[Ondath]

I'm guessing he hasn't really thought through the wild and generalized destruction removing the 1.0a OGL from existence would cause. So far everyone I've pointed that out to has either not understood it because they don't actually understand what the OGL is, or gone "Huh that's not good they should just not do that bit".

Yeah, the last time we discussed it was with the assumption that OGL v1.0 would stay intact.

 

[Greg Benage]

Just out of curiousity, does anyone, anyone at all support WotC doing this or think it's a great idea, because so far it seems 100% against WotC revoking the 5e OGL

I am 100% opposed from a hobby (and human) perspective, but I'm not at all sure it isn't a "good idea" from a business perspective. It really depends on their legal position. If they're really convinced their legal position is solid and that they can enforce it (practically speaking), I can definitely be persuaded that regaining control of their IP is in the company's best mid- to long-term interests.

But I think a more likely scenario is that their legal position is weak, they're trying to railroad publishers with a tight deadline, and it's going to blow up in their faces.

 

[mamba]

I am 100% opposed from a hobby (and human) perspective, but I'm not at all sure it isn't a "good idea" from a business perspective. It really depends on their legal position. If they're really convinced their legal position is solid and that they can enforce it (practically speaking), I can definitely be persuaded that regaining control of their IP is in the company's best mid- to long-term interests.

and why would that be your primary concern rather than the first part of your post?

 

[Greg Benage]

and why would that be your primary concern rather than the first part of your post?

It's not my concern. At all. I was answering in the "what are they thinking?" spirit of the question.

 

[Steel_Wind]

A friend of mine thinks it's not too bad, and that WotC deserves some royalties for allowing people to make content with their rules, and that the royalty limit is too high anyway.

He also happens to my podcast co-host so I know I'll fiercely try to convince him the next time we meet.

While it has nothing to do with the legal argument, the facts and how they strike the judge hearing a case in terms of equity do matter. Justice is complicated; injustice, however, is an emotional reaction to a set of facts. It's visceral.

How those facts appear to the consumer market is probably more important in a commercial context. If WotC does this? They are going to find they have grabbed on to the Third Rail of RPGs. Your podcast co-host aside, this will not end well for them. WotC is evidently feeling gorilla-like again and forgets that ~10 years ago? Its RPG products essentially abandoned store shelves and Paizo ruled the RPG roost for more than half a decade.

It can happen again, too. The over-the-top pro D&D bias on ENWorld leads to a knee-jerk scoffing at this. That would be ill-considered & unwise.

 

[Bacon Bits]

I can not stress enough how 2000 and before D&D was in a completely different place then 2023 D&D.

Not just that, so was WotC. It was still a privately owned gaming company owned by Peter Adkison. It was not the multibillion dollar juggernaut known as Hasbro.

OGL 1.0a was to keep D&D available as a game to the community forever. Even if WotC failed. So that what happened to TSR where the game nearly got parted out to dozens of different owners in bankruptcy court would instead always be there for the fans.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

Its RPG products essentially abandoned store shelves and Paizo ruled the RPG roost for more than half a decade.

Just as a cold matter of fact, that's not actually true. Paizo did well but someone had the actual figures a while back and they were not outselling 4E, contrary to the popular narrative. They were getting dangerously close at times.