Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="phloog" data-source="post: 4331932" data-attributes="member: 59219">This thread has got me imagining scenarios, and I'm thinking about this one right now:Most of these assumptions could be bogus, but here goes for discussion.Assume: There are still those individuals who believe/know that having some form of openness benefits WOTC in the form of maintaining a large customer base.Known: Companies MUST take action in the best interest of the shareholders, and cannot take actions which could in any way harm the stock value.Belief: 'Harming Stock Value' is so loosely defined as to frighten most company leadership out of doing anything that could in any way be interpreted/accused of harming value.Belief: Sales of products for any given rule set will decline as customers grow weary (or some other effect) near the end of the 'lifespan' of that product.Doesn't this mean that the instant a product from a non-WOTC publisher sells more than a WOTC product of a similar type, there will be a huge push internally to zap the GSL?More interestingly, doesn't this suggest that in the future we may see a situation where, near the end of 4E, WOTC becomes mysteriously far more lenient in terms of what they allow, so that they can begin spending less on 4E in preparation for 5E?And would this mean that for all the justifiable concern/fear about the GSL in these early days, the real problem will not happen until the end of 4E, when they use the GSL mutability to not tighten restrictions, but to loosen them, then snap it shut completely (total revocation) for 5E, causing tons of products to have to be scrapped and all to be forced to go to 5E?This is, as always, not an accusation of evil or unethical behavior by Hasbro/WOTC, but perhaps it is just a natural result of this setup...at the end they will need to spend less on 4e to ramp up 5E, but the proper business move is to open up to others to allow continued 4e support/customer base. Then the next proper business move for 5E would be to destroy all support for 4E immediately - something I'm sure they would have loved to do for 3E, but couldn't due to the nature of OGL.Maybe 3pps should be worried now, but more worried with each passing month.</blockquote>

Verification