Whizbang Dustyboots
Gnometown Hero
I just want someone to put the Rankin-Bass Hobbit cartoon soundtrack up for legal sale again, please.
D&D 5E Steamboat Willie Available on DMs Guild!
Zardnaar
Legend
In the actual 6th Edition of D&D, halflings will reclaim the heritage stolen from them in the 70s!!
I don't expect D&D to do it.
Some OSR game though.......
Should be 2034 in the U.S. (1938 U.S. publication + 95 years + 1). The complete Lord of the Rings trilogy will be public domain in the U.S. in 2052 (1956 U.S. publication of Return of the King + 95 years + 1).
On the other hand, in the UK, all of Tolkien's works will become public domain in 2044 (Tolkien's death in 1973 + 70 years + 1). Which seems more efficient if one wants to write a public-domain Middle-Earth story...
overgeeked
B/X Known World
There are several on ebay, of varying quality and price.
teitan
Legend
That still violates trademarks LOL
teitan
Legend
Oh no, it runs afoul because it says 2 things: Mickey Mouse & Steamboat Willie, both of which are Disney trademarks. You can make a character called Wolverine, feature him in your comics etc. but nowhere can you put the name "Wolverine" as trade dress or to sell the character. Even the public domain version of Daredevil from Lev Gleason can't be sold in a comic called Daredevil because Marvel owns the trademark "Daredevil" for pretty much everything. You see him in miniseries dedicated to him as Reddevil, Death Defying Devil, even just "The Devil" while the interiors will refer to him as Daredevil. Even though the character was a popular WWII era character and looks nothing like the Marvel version, it has zero impact on a lawsuit. So you can totally now make a cartoon or comic or even RPG supplement that features the exact design from Steamboat Willie and call him Mickey Mouse in your product but can't use it as a the title of the book in any way. You can't make toys and put "mickey mouse" or "Steamboat Willie" on the labels. You could call it "The Original Mouse" though. A european company, Ablaze Publishing, had to publish their Conan adaptations as "The Cimmerian" because they couldn't put Conan on the cover to say "this is a Conan comic book". Inside he was Conan, even the story was the same as the Howard story.
teitan
Legend
AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAND Return of the King!
teitan
Legend
Gary found a good workaround though, hobbits are called Halflings, voila Halfling. Though even back then the D&D Hobbit bore only a slight resemblance to Tolkien in that while the lore was still very "Hobbit" actual play and then fiction they were all sneaky, conniving little monsters.
Dire Bare
Legend
Are you really nerdsplaining hobbits to us? Dude, we ALL get it!
Here's some right back at ya . . . D&D halflings are not based on Tolkien's hobbits per se, but rather the specific character of Bilbo Baggins, burglar extraordinaire!
Similar to how the ranger class is not based on the Rangers of the North from the Lord of the Rings, but Strider himself. A lot of the early D&D stuff was based on specific, individual characters.
Paul Farquhar
Legend
I think it's fair to say that Gygax and the other early D&D players would have had little understanding of the "English dialled up to 11" culture of Tolkien's hobbits. It would have been very foreign to them.
That halfling models in the two Pathfinder CRPGs have hairy feet....
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