tomBitonti
Adventurer
Technically, wasn't there an exchange? The OGL granted certain rights, while imposing certain requirements? That's more of a transaction than a sharing.
Thx!
TomB
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D&D 5E So, 5e OGL
- Thread starter Michael Morris
- Start date
Technically, wasn't there an exchange? The OGL granted certain rights, while imposing certain requirements? That's more of a transaction than a sharing.
Thx!
TomB
Jeff Carlsen
Adventurer
It imposes restrictions, but the only requirement is that you include the OGL with the material. Now, the license to use the d20 logo had additional requirements, such as making a certain percentage of your product open content.
am181d
Adventurer
Yeah, but that's a fairly important requirement. The people who use the OGL to use other people's content must also make their content available for use. I think that's all he meant.
It's not so much that you have to make your content open - it's that it's stipulating that if your content is a derivative work of existing open content, it's already open. You can't close work that is already open.
Nellisir
Hero
WotC's interaction with the OGL is a little bit different from everyone else's.
One way to think about it is that there are two chains of ownership. One is D&D, the other is the SRD. They are not the same.
WOtC has D&D. Lock, stock, and barrel. 3e, 4e, 5e, etc. WotC is under no OGL requirements regarding D&D because they own it.
WotC also put out the SRD under the OGL.
The SRD is derived from D&D, but is not D&D. If you're using material from the SRD, basically you shouldn't ever look at a D&D book.
The OGL allows other people to use material from the SRD, but they must accredit the source (in Section 15), include the OGL, and anything derived from OGC must also be OGC (so if you invent a new game mechanic, it's not required to be OGC. Hero point systems were often not declared OGC.)
The OGL does not require you to give up copyright (indeed, you have to have copyright to agree to the license); it's a license that lets other people use your copyrighted material so long as they do so under the same license you did (the OGL).
If WotC wanted to use someone else's OGC, they would have to use the OGL, or reach an independent agreement with the copyright holders.
Since WotC essentially* never used anyone else's OGC, they really just shared outward/downstream.
I suppose normal OGL use could be considered a transaction; I think of sharing as a two-way street (otherwise it's just giving) in which both parties voluntarily give the other something. The upstream OGL user is sharing blindly downstream - they have no idea who will reuse their material. I guess that's what differentiates it from a transaction in my mind.
Anyways, it's all minor nitpick stuff and I'll shut up about it.
*I know there were two monsters in the FF or MM2 or something, and maybe a little bit here and there, but overall? Nothing.
Edit: OK, so my original point in response to the original post about WotC not giving away ALL of their intellectual property: WotC still owns all of their intellectual property. They do not control the reproduction of the game mechanics that were released under the OGL so long as they are reproduced under the OGL, but WotC still owns the property. It's not in the public realm.
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Mark CMG
Creative Mountain Games
"You must spread some Experience Points around before giving it to Nellisir again."
So many times . . .
A little help?
tuxgeo
Adventurer
"You must spread some Experience Points around before giving it to Nellisir again."
So many times . . .
A little help?
Covered one time.
(Others, of course, are free to add to it, so he might get multiples.)
darjr
I crit!
"You must spread some Experience Points around before giving it to Nellisir again."
So many times . . .
A little help?
a couple times now
Spinachcat
First Post
The OGL destroyed the D&D brand and there is no way to put that genie back in the bottle. Remember that when I say OGL, I don't mean the great D20 license which was a completely separate issue.
And before you say "the OGL didn't destroy their brand", please let me introduce you to Pathfinder, the juggernaut of Paizo, and to a much lesser extent, introduce you to the OSR and 13th Age.
If you look at DriveThruRPG for 4e products, you see little reference to the GSL. Instead, almost everything is produced under the same OGL dodge, shuck and jive that the OSR used to "reverse engineer" AD&D out of 3e. Its all legal since the OGL was so badly written and the so-called protections WotC put into the OGL are utterly useless in actual defense of their brand and intellectual property.
As for 5e, I expect the same song and dance. 3PP will use the OGL to produce "For Use With the Current Edition of the World's Best Fantasy RPG" or some such wink-wink-nudge-nudge language which is actually legally defensible under Fair Use laws in the USA.
As for an actual 5e OGL, that remains to be seen.
There is strong logic in making the Basic PDF the only OGL document and letting the 3PP go wild, flooding the barely there marketplace while WotC focuses on "official expansions" and thus, only their adventures have WotC defined races and classes outside the Basic PDF.
AKA, a 3PP may put out a Ranger class, but it would be that 3PP's variant and not the "actual" "canon" one from the PHB.
And before you say "the OGL didn't destroy their brand", please let me introduce you to Pathfinder, the juggernaut of Paizo, and to a much lesser extent, introduce you to the OSR and 13th Age.
If you look at DriveThruRPG for 4e products, you see little reference to the GSL. Instead, almost everything is produced under the same OGL dodge, shuck and jive that the OSR used to "reverse engineer" AD&D out of 3e. Its all legal since the OGL was so badly written and the so-called protections WotC put into the OGL are utterly useless in actual defense of their brand and intellectual property.
As for 5e, I expect the same song and dance. 3PP will use the OGL to produce "For Use With the Current Edition of the World's Best Fantasy RPG" or some such wink-wink-nudge-nudge language which is actually legally defensible under Fair Use laws in the USA.
As for an actual 5e OGL, that remains to be seen.
There is strong logic in making the Basic PDF the only OGL document and letting the 3PP go wild, flooding the barely there marketplace while WotC focuses on "official expansions" and thus, only their adventures have WotC defined races and classes outside the Basic PDF.
AKA, a 3PP may put out a Ranger class, but it would be that 3PP's variant and not the "actual" "canon" one from the PHB.
Mistwell
Crusty Old Meatwad (he/him)
You've confused the D&D brand, with the D&D RPG. They're not the same.
If I ask my aunt what Pathfinder or 13th Age or OSR is, she will have no clue. If I ask her what D&D is, she will have an answer. If she sees a D&D mug at Target, she will know what it is. She won't even see a Pathfinder Mug, much less an OSR or 13th Age one.
It's a really important distinction.
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