What monsters are protected by trademark?

[Sagiro]

Hey there,

Is there a complete list anywhere of all the monsters that are the intellectual property of WotC?

I've found an older list that includes the following:

beholder, gauth, carrion crawler, tanar’ri, baatezu, displacer beast, githyanki, githzerai, mind flayer, illithid, umber hulk, yuan-ti

...but I can't find any proof that it's exhaustive. If I wanted to (for example) design a fantasy-themed board game, where would I go to make sure I didn't run afoul of trademark or copyright violations?

Thanks,

-Sagiro

 

[Alzrius]

The aforementioned monsters are the ones deliberately withheld from the d20 SRD released under the OGL. It's not a question of copyright or trademark (I think) so much as you can't use those if you're using the Open Gaming License.

What's under copyright, or has been trademarked, are very different issues (from each other, as well as from questions of being Open Game Content).

 

[Sagiro]

The aforementioned monsters are the ones deliberately withheld from the d20 SRD released under the OGL. It's not a question of copyright or trademark (I think) so much as you can't use those if you're using the Open Gaming License.

What's under copyright, or has been trademarked, are very different issues (from each other, as well as from questions of being Open Game Content).

I appreciate the clarification; thanks!

The heart of my question remains the same, though. If I'm making a game with fantasy-themed monsters, how do I find out what monster names are owned by WotC?

Thanks,

-Sagiro

 

[Philosopher]

If I'm making a game with fantasy-themed monsters, how do I find out what monster names are owned by WotC?

Take a look at the monsters in the SRD (you can find them here); if it's in the Monster Manual, but not in this list, then it's probably because WotC owns the name.

 

[JoeGKushner]

contact a laywer if you have to ask.

Or stick with mythology. Much safer.

 

[Starglim]

The heart of my question remains the same, though. If I'm making a game with fantasy-themed monsters, how do I find out what monster names are owned by WotC?

Very few monster names are or could be protected as trademarks, which could cause problems for you using the name at all.

Don't copy monsters from anyone else's products unless you include them as Open Game Content (that means you have a copy of the source and it declares what you have used as OGC) or the equivalent. If you can show your work is original but it happens to have the same name that someone else used, they ultimately have nothing to say about it, though that doesn't stop them raising an argument.

edit: Also, what Joe said.

 

[amethal]

As other have said, you are looking at it backwards.

Assuming you are talking about 3rd edition, if its in the SRD, then WotC have released it as open game content.

If it isn't - whether its in the MM, MM4, or came out in a previous edition but not updated for 3.5 - then its not open.