D&D (2024) Using AI for Your Home Game

[GMforPowergamers]

To summarize, I think its worth remembering the cost of generative AI systems:

• The use tons of power and water.
• The were built off of creators who didn't agree and got no compensation.
• They're filling the internet with slop.
• Bosses are using crappy AI systems to replace real workers.

first thank you for the summery. I don't understand how it uses water but I will trust you did more then my 5 second google search so you know more then me here...
I think we can all agree the last point is a problem. That AI replacing actual jobs is a problem... not one I expect anyone here can fix, but a problem.
Filling the internet with slop is interesting... the amount of fantasy 'art' made by AI that now comes up when I search is high, but not over taking Pinterest and Deviant Art (at least not yet). so I am not sure I agree with that, and even if it WAS filling up with junk then it would just be not viewed as much and it would self select out of searches anyway (at least as I understand it)

That leaves the big one:

• They were built off of creators who didn't agree and got no compensation.

If no company was going to do the last point (replace artist) and we knew that it wouldn't jam up search engines, BUT you or I could still use it to create free low quality art for our games would we worry about this? I don't know we don't live in that world. We live in the one where we have to decide based (on all of those things but mostly) do we feel okay using creators images for our private games without permission...

I think everyone in this thread know where everyone falls on this.

I do wonder though if you would really call someone a thief to there face if at Gencon (or even your local con) they had pictures for there D&D game pregens, and you knew they were from artists they didn't buy them from, but just googled and printed...

 

[Charlaquin]

I do wonder though if you would really call someone a thief to there face if at Gencon (or even your local con) they had pictures for there D&D game pregens, and you knew they were from artists they didn't buy them from, but just googled and printed...

I mean, no, because that wouldn’t be appropriate in that social context. But I would judge them silently.

 

[SlyFlourish]

first thank you for the summery. I don't understand how it uses water but I will trust you did more then my 5 second google search so you know more then me here...
I think we can all agree the last point is a problem. That AI replacing actual jobs is a problem... not one I expect anyone here can fix, but a problem.
Filling the internet with slop is interesting... the amount of fantasy 'art' made by AI that now comes up when I search is high, but not over taking Pinterest and Deviant Art (at least not yet). so I am not sure I agree with that, and even if it WAS filling up with junk then it would just be not viewed as much and it would self select out of searches anyway (at least as I understand it)

That leaves the big one:

• They were built off of creators who didn't agree and got no compensation.

If no company was going to do the last point (replace artist) and we knew that it wouldn't jam up search engines, BUT you or I could still use it to create free low quality art for our games would we worry about this? I don't know we don't live in that world. We live in the one where we have to decide based (on all of those things but mostly) do we feel okay using creators images for our private games without permission...

I think everyone in this thread know where everyone falls on this.

I do wonder though if you would really call someone a thief to there face if at Gencon (or even your local con) they had pictures for there D&D game pregens, and you knew they were from artists they didn't buy them from, but just googled and printed...

You can go to the article I linked and find links for all the stuff, including a Chat GPT query using up a bottle of water.

 

[SlyFlourish]

If no company was going to do the last point (replace artist) and we knew that it wouldn't jam up search engines, BUT you or I could still use it to create free low quality art for our games would we worry about this?

My point is that it isn't free. OpenAI got 20 billion from Microsoft and another valuation for another 6 billion. Huge companies are throwing huge cash at AI and none of it is making it back to the creators who made the material it trained off of it and those generative AI models would be worthless without that material.

Even if somehow we get it for free, it's not really free. It's just giant corporations being good to us until they decide not to.

 

[GMforPowergamers]

I mean, no, because that wouldn’t be appropriate in that social context. But I would judge them silently.

I am a little put off by this... but at least you are consistent so okay.

 

[GMforPowergamers]

You can go to the article I linked and find links for all the stuff, including a Chat GPT query using up a bottle of water.

I trust you However just to make this ironic... I can't read that article it's behind a pay wall (a GREAT example of hopefully the writer getting paid).

Even if somehow we get it for free, it's not really free. It's just giant corporations being good to us until they decide not to.

this is a weird argument I don't get... it's like saying "Your dog isn't getting free food YOU paid for it" or (it is the week of my birthday) the 3 times I am getting taken out to eat this week isn't "Free food" cause my mom, my sister and my best friend are paying... I will say when/if my wife takes me out that ISN'T free cause our money is Fungible.

No the website I used isn't free cause it cost nothing to make, it's free because I can use it without it costing ME money.

We all draw our ethical lines somewhere... I have friends (who are writers) who torient or what ever the new way to get PDFs is for free RPG books. Text Books, and comic books... in at least 1 case an entire novel. I wont, but I have an exception, if I buy the book AND one of them has a PDF I will take a copy from them... that's where i draw my line.
When I was WAY younger in late 90s early 2000s I thought bootleg movies were awesome... I wouldn't buy one today.

I am not going to call someone a thief if they DO own pirated stuff though. I think we all have our own lines.

If I ever get off my butt and write my own retroclone and sell it online, any art will come from artists, not AI (unless the artists passes off AI as there work) and will be credited... If however I am running a game that I am not paid for, no one is watching but me and my players I have no problem using AI art

 

[trappedslider]

I wrote an article to be published Monday on Sly Flourish (but you can get a sneak preview right here) talking about generative AI and our RPGs. And plan to talk about it on my show.

To summarize, I think its worth remembering the cost of generative AI systems:

• The use tons of power and water.
• They're filling the internet with slop.

1. Do you also discuss other waste of power and water, or is the focus currently on AI because of it's doing?
2. The internet has always been filled with slop.. that's why we have sturgeons law.

We all draw our ethical lines somewhere... I have friends (who are writers) who torient or what ever the new way to get PDFs is for free RPG books. Text Books, and comic books... in at least 1 case an entire novel. I wont, but I have an exception, if I buy the book AND one of them has a PDF I will take a copy from them... that's where i draw my line.
When I was WAY younger in late 90s early 2000s I thought bootleg movies were awesome... I wouldn't buy one today.

I am not going to call someone a thief if they DO own pirated stuff though. I think we all have our own lines.

Napster,limewire,the pirate bay. Remember this gem and how everyone (well almost everyone) at the time mocked it



EDIT: Also depending on what you're going for it can indeed take hours if not mroe of work to get what you want with an AI art generator. There's inpainting, coming up with a prompt and any number of other steps.

 

[Charlaquin]

1. Do you also discuss other waste of power and water, or is the focus currently on AI because of it's doing?

Yes. We are on the verge of climate crisis, these are things we need to be concerned about.

Napster,limewire,the pirate bay. Remember this gem and how everyone (well almost everyone) at the time mocked it

I mean, piracy is stealing, but in the cases this ad was referring to, the party being stolen from is wealthy corporations. In the case of AI art, the party being stolen from is individual creators.

EDIT: Also depending on what you're going for it can indeed take hours if not mroe of work to get what you want with an AI art generator. There's inpainting, coming up with a prompt and any number of other steps.

No one ever said stealing wasn’t more convenient than working.

 

[Scribe]

1. Do you also discuss other waste of power and water, or is the focus currently on AI because of it's doing?

Considering its an AI topic, why the whataboutism?

 

[Clint_L]

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I’m not accusing anyone of doing anything they are not themselves claiming to be doing. Taking the fruits of someone else’s labor without due compensation for that labor is theft.

I don't think you understand the sentiment of that cartoon.

You are not suggesting "improving society." You are suggesting that one particular kind of automation that you don't approve of amounts to theft, while applying a different standard to others, specifically the ones that you enjoy. But thanks for the lazy and insulting meme.