Still no SRD for 3rd party companies

[The Little Raven]

Also even if the Tweet, Mearls and whoever want to send out the SRD, I strongly doubt they can override the Hasborg Suits who want the SRD release delayed.

Well, considering that Hasbro let the first OGL and SRD go through without issue, and the fact that Wizards still makes them gobs of money through Magic, I think this whole "Hasbro is meddling directly" line of thought has no basis in reality. A few people from Wizards have made it clear that while Hasbro does own them, they don't micro-manage them, since Wizards has proven themselves capable of success without it.

 

[Wolfspider]

IIRC, the 3e SRD was released well AFTER the 3e books hit. Several publishers had a working copy o' the rules ahead of time (and the gentlemen's agreement [pre-SRD]). But the 'official' SRD didnt come til later.

This is true as far as I know. But at least these publishers had copies of the PHB and a gentleman's agreement.

 

[Brown Jenkin]

Except insofar as every major development project is haphazard.

The software industry has made it pretty clear - the idea that you can plan out a major, collaborative, development of new stuff, and have things actually follow the plan to hit a deadline just does not match reality. Human ability to estimate how long large tasks will take to complete is pretty poor, actually. And out ability to predict the unforeseen is nonexistent.

I doubt Agile development and management techniques have reached into RPG design yet...

Well Agile Development has reached WotC and is being used in the Gleemax design, and we all see how well that is going.

 

[Voadam]

IIRC, the 3e SRD was released well AFTER the 3e books hit. Several publishers had a working copy o' the rules ahead of time (and the gentlemen's agreement [pre-SRD]). But the 'official' SRD didnt come til later.

The draft srd was up on www.opengamingfoundation.org, I'm not sure when it went up there but that is where I saw it and what I used when I did freelance work (which was after the release of 3e) before WotC came out with the actual srd on their own site.

 

[withak]

Oh really?

Interesting.

Your post failed to convince me.

Throwing more resources at a late project tends to make it later. It applies in software engineering , and I wouldn't be surprised if it applies in game design, as well.

 

[The Little Raven]

Well Agile Development has reached WotC and is being used in the Gleemax design, and we all see how well that is going.

WIZARDS OF THE COAST IS NOT THE DEVELOPER OF GLEEMAX. THEY ARE THE CLIENT THAT COMMISSIONED IT.

 

[Psion]

Eh. When schedule crunch comes where I work, stress levels go up, but things still get done in orderly fashion. That's because the leadership/management is very good at communicating to everyone under them what needs to be done and when and because we have enough resources to get everything done.

I guess I'm lucky in this regard.

I hope WotC is lucky, too.

Habro just went through a cycle of turning out managers over RPGs because they were too well paid. I wouldn't bank on it.

 

[Victim]

This is true as far as I know. But at least these publishers had copies of the PHB and a gentleman's agreement.

Granting certain publishers early access to the rules seems like a non-competetive practice that really screws over would be d20 companies not granted those advantages.

 

[Majoru Oakheart]

I think this is simply because they are making fairly large changes to the rules on a regular basis until the end of playtesting. You'll see that at the February it will likely be finalized. I anticipate that the SRD will be created sometime around then.

This gives publishers 4 months with the rules before everyone else to start working on their books and have them out probably a month or 2 after the core books come out.

 

[The Little Raven]

Granting certain publishers early access to the rules seems like a non-competetive practice that really screws over would be d20 companies not granted those advantages.

It's no different than major media outlets being given advanced copies of games and movies to review, while the smaller ones do not. Any company that Wizards gives access over others has proven themselves an able partner in the d20 market, and why shouldn't Wizards reward companies that have a track-record for quality d20 materials if it helps both themselves and the company?