So has the D20 STL been officially revoked?

[Brown Jenkin]

This is very telling on the issue of whether WOTC has in fact terminated the license; thanks for finding that.

I'd be very interested to hear Paizo's views on how they expect WOTC to go about terminating the license, but it seems that Vic, at least, believes WOTC is within its rights to do so in the first place.

Reading the d20stl v.6 it seams the way to do it is to release a d20stl v.7 that includes a termination clause with any grace periods they wish. Then terminate the license as per the new clause. I am not saying they can't terminate the license but rather there is a way they need to and that they haven't done it yet. A press release and a forum post are not it.

 

[Wicht]

I'd be very interested to hear Paizo's views on how they expect WOTC to go about terminating the license, but it seems that Vic, at least, believes WOTC is within its rights to do so in the first place.

I doubt there are that many 3pp who would argue over WotC's rights in regard to the d20 license. It's always been their ball and their house. (as opposed to the OGL which is thankfully public forever). Most 3pp, in point of fact, gave up on the d20 STL some time back and went all OGL all the time.

But it's to me like the case of a mom who tells her son's friends they'll have to leave soon but never actually gets around to telling them to go home. Sure she has the right, but the departure time doesn't actually come until she remembers to stop watching the telly and go kick them out of the house.

 

[kenmarable]

What I'm really trying to say is, there's another way to look at this beyond "WOTC's lawyers don't know as much about the law as do random posters on an Internet forum!"

I see this attitude all the time in another forum I frequent. It's bewildering. Why the urge to find a third-party proprietary interest in WOTC's property? If WOTC gives notice that the D20 STL is about to die, and 3PPs dutifully expend effort (in some cases, a great deal of effort) to comply, why does that automatically mean that the 3PPs are caving and WOTC is just being a big bully? Why does WOTC automatically have to be in the wrong, not just ethically but legally?

And how is it that a few random Internet posters can suss out what's "really" going on when WOTC says nothing (or nothing *public*)? Why not explore the assumption that WOTC does, in fact, know what they're doing legally even if (even though) they've made hash of the PR end?

This keeps coming up and I have to wonder why WotC has not actually addressed it beyond the one press release? A single statement from a WotC representative (preferably containing legal language) would go a long ways to stopping this speculation.

Basically I think the response to both of these is that WotC doesn't care. Scott Rouse made the post, all the major publishers (and apparently even all of the small ones as far as I can tell) complied and the d20 logo is gone. I do think WotC knows what they are doing, it's just not worth their time to clarify things since their intended purpose is done. They are busy people and we can debate all we want here on this forum, but WotC wanted the d20 STL to go away, publishers followed along, end of story in WotC's eyes. No big bullies, no 3 PP's caving in, no automatic assumption that WotC is in the wrong. Just WotC wanted X to happen, and it happened.

I think it's a fun academic exercise in contract analysis to debate whether WotC legally did enough or not, but that won't put d20 logos back on the books.

What I've tried to do is provide an alternate view of what happened that backs up Morrus's understanding of things (he having WOTC's ear to a much greater degree than many posters here). I don't have any vested interest in whether anyone buys into it or not. I'm just saying that there's a consistent story here that could be offered in a legal brief (or, heaven forfend, at trial) that explains why WOTC might not have done anything wrong.

My point is that it doesn't matter how much Morrus has WotC's ear, and what he or any other publisher knows. I entered that contract with WotC (as did Andreas, I assume). What WotC has or has not said to Morrus has no bearing whatsoever on my contract with WotC, as it has no bearing on Andreas' contract with WotC. Hundreds of other people are in the same legally-binding contract with WotC.

Also, we're not claiming WotC has done something wrong as in "they did a bad thing". It's clearer (for me at least) to say that for X to happen, they needed to do Y. But they did Z instead, so therefore X hasn't happened. It's not a PR blunder. It's not them being bad. They were just supposed to do Y and didn't. That's all.

 

[Marius Delphus]

I don't anyone saying WotC lawyers don't know as much as random internet posters. Wotc lawyers haven't said anything so the random internet posters are interpreting what the d20stl says for themselves.

I've seen it claimed multiple times that the D20 STL cannot be revoked except for cause. Yet WOTC clearly intends to do just that, if they have not already (at least one major publisher agrees with several posters in this thread that they have not). The claim is equivalent to saying that the poster is better at writing and/or interpreting a unilateral licensing agreement than WOTC's lawyers are. Who knows? They may have made a mistake. I don't think they have, but I could be wrong.

There is no right and wrong here as WotC has taken no position at all. This issue being discussed right now is not whether 3PPs are caving, but whether there is a termination of the d20stl at all. I don't care whether 3PPs choose to convert from OGL + d20stl to OGL only at all.

Surely WOTC takes the position that the D20 STL can be unilaterally revoked at will. It was pointed out that even if this is manifestly untrue, the 3PPs are unable to pay court costs to litigate the matter, and it was suggested that they are removing d20 logos in part because of this. It was also pointed out that 3PPs in general prefer to "play nice" so as to continue in WOTC's "good graces," and it was suggested that some are removing d20 logos in part because of this as well.

I give, what is going on at WotC? No one is questioning their motives, but rather their actions or lack thereof. They may very well know what they are doing legally, but as they have not given any comment at all there is no way to know. No one said they don't know what they are doing, but rather that they have not actually revoked the d20stl as some assume.

I agree that the silence is mystifying. Does it amount to failure to affirmatively revoke the D20 STL? It might. I'm not certain it does, so I'm looking for an explanation that hangs together in this vein.

Again, no one tried to come up with their story or motivations. It is not a question of views, but rather trying to figure out where the legal standing of the d20stl actually is.

Well, one story is that it is revoked. Another is that it is not. There's no great wallop of evidence either way, just belief and supposition and opinion and debate, so in my view it falls to storytelling to support a cohesive interpretation of things.

But ultimately, yes, it is all conjecture and only WOTC knows "for sure" what the full story is.

 

[Ranger REG]

The reason Ranger that the GSL should have been ready at launch is because it would have helped "kill" 3x and made the transition between editons much much smoother.

Now because Wotc has been tardy with releasing a good GSL and cannot legally revoke the OGL it has put itself in the rather unusual postion having having to compete with itself in the form of Pathfinder.

If there had been a good GSL at launch perhaps Paizo might signed it and Pathfinder would be a 4e setting and not the "Real" successor to D&D as some 3x partisans have put it.......

They factured their own brand and that is never a sound buisness practice.

Personally, I prefer Pathfinder to be a successor to 3.x ruleset.

I also prefer they DO NOT revoke the OGL. OGL is still a good thing, even if it is not limited to the d20-based ruleset set out by WotC.

 

[dmccoy1693]

OGL is still a good thing, especially because it is not limited to the d20-based ruleset set out by WotC.

Fixed that for you.

 

[kenmarable]

I also prefer they DO NOT revoke the OGL. OGL is still a good thing, even if it is not limited to the d20-based ruleset set out by WotC.

Good news:

The OGL cannot be revoked. That one was thankfully based upon truly open source licenses and is for all intents and purposes perpetual. 50 years from now, the OGL will still be valid regardless of what WotC does or doesn't want. That is a very, very good thing and one of the top reasons I'm still more interested in writing for 3.5/Pathfinder than 4e. (And the corollary is that therefore Pathfinder RPG is perpetually open regardless of what Paizo does or doesn't want.)

No matter what (barring a major reversal of law concerning open source licenses), at the very least D&D 3.x is open to everyone forever and ever.

 

[Angellis_ater]

The major benefit of Pathfinder RPG being completely open is that it is now a FULL roleplaying game, available as OGL, versus what Wizards did by removing the XP and leveling information from their SRD. Hopefully a future "PFRPGSRD.org" will make the entire game system available to current and future gamers.

 

[amethal]

If anyone is interested in a lawyer's opinion, this might be quite informative.

RPGNow.com - Necromancer - - The leading source for indie RPGs

 

[freyar]

If anyone is interested in a lawyer's opinion, this might be quite informative.

RPGNow.com - Necromancer - - The leading source for indie RPGs

It might be that, if you buy these, the downloads have the d20 stuff removed. At least I thought some of the file names I bought on Dec 31 said "nod20" on them. But now that I look at the PDFs, they have all the d20 stuff. So I'm a bit confused.