What non-4e would you play if there was no OGL at all?

[Calico_Jack73]

Palladium FRPG, Warhammer FRP, or Dark Heresy.

 

[pawsplay]

This is such a strange thread. First of all, the OGL was not "a mistake," things just didn't turn out precisely as some people hoped/expected. Second, even without an OGL, how long do you think 3e would have gone without third party products springing up? The OGL was a tool to protect WotC's property as much as it was to enable publishers. Under the GSL, WotC has a clearer field of fire, so it will be interesting to see whether they decide to attack. Third, the poll itself is strange; why does it have only single options, and rather idiocyncratic choices at that?

 

[tankschmidt]

OD&D or RCD&D for me!

 

[scourger]

Savage Worlds. I wish I was playing (running) it right now.

Others on my radar currently include Rifts (Machinations of Doom) and Star Frontiers. 40KRP is now probably a longshot, too.

 

[Agamon]

Can I play 4e non-reluctantly? What an odd way to state it....

Anyhoo, the non-d20 game that I would play would be WFRP. But I am playing 4e, so I'm having hard time answering the poll truthfully.

 

[shadewest]

In my perfect world, I'd be playing Hero for every genre. Since that's not the case, I find myself playing the game that's being run. The OGL didn't affect me much at all.

 

[Melan]

I don't know why you assume it was a mistake.

Go back and look at Ryan Dancey's discussions of the OGL at the time. The mode of thought then was that it's not rules that drive game editions, but groups. Network Externalities. The validity of this theory might be in question (but I'm hearing lots of people rave about 4e sales, so that remains to be demonstrated), but a mistake it wasn't.

Pretty much. I also think it was a generous, if somewhat self-serving gesture after the Lorraine Williams years. But very much intentional.

As for my pick, I would probably have either returned to AD&D 1st edition (although played in a simplified way, likely incorporating the d20 mechanic and stuff), or developed my light house system as I have (not a certainty, since C&C was instrumental in getting me started).

Palladium fantasy is a third alternative, not impossible but not very likely either.

 

[Turanil]

What I said about the OGL is from what I did read years ago on some internet forum or newsletter. What they said is that the d20 OGL had been worded in such a way that some people discovered they in fact didn't need to use it specifically for making d20 compatible products. They could use it to make games based on the OGL, but without d20 logo and any comment that it would be compatible with d20. What I did read is that this hadn't been foreseen by WotC who only wanted to enable d20 compatible products, not C&C or True20 stuff.

Other than that, this thread is geared at people who don't want to play 4e, reason for which I wrote "reluctantly" play 4e.

 

[pogminky]

Games I wanna play except 4e (some of these are OGL, but hey....):

nWod
V:tR
Promethean
Paranoia XP
CoC
ToC
SW:Saga
Aces & 8s
M&M
Golden Heores
Judge Dredd
W40kRPG

That should do for now....

 

[Treebore]

Well, this for those who are not interested in 4e, and will instead choose Pathfinder, True20, C&C, whatever. The thing is, that such OGL games do exist solely because the guy who first wrote the d20 OGL license, didn't do his job very well. He left a bad-wording / loophole that let publishers use the OGL to write their own independent systems that can now exist on their own without any concern for GSL and such. However, if the original lawyer had done his job properly, there wouldn't be any True20, C&C, Pathfinder, etc. available. The only available thing reminding of D&D would be 4e.

As such, my question is: for those who opted for such OGL games, rather than any 4e, if you didn't have them, what would you do?

-- Reluctantly go 4e?
-- Go used books from previous editions?
-- Go GURPS?
-- Go Savage Worlds?
-- Go HARP?
-- Go BRP Cthulhu?
-- Go Runequest?
-- Go WHFRP?
-- Go another game (explain)?
-- Abandon gaming altogether?

Myself, next game I am a player in, is BRP Call of Cthulhu. I am really enthusiast about it...

I disagree. With the exception of Pathfinder, anyways. However, if you were right, and True20, C&C, etc... didn't happen I would have either quit or gone back to 2E. GURPS 4E, Savage Worlds, HARP, and Runequest are definite possibilities, especially since I own the rules books for 3 of them already.

However I would like to think True 20 (and Mutants and Masterminds), C&C, and such would have all happened anyways. I think they are all different enough from 3E that they would have been fine under US copyright law. Not exactly as they are right now, but definitely close enough.

What I said about the OGL is from what I did read years ago on some internet forum or newsletter. What they said is that the d20 OGL had been worded in such a way that some people discovered they in fact didn't need to use it specifically for making d20 compatible products. They could use it to make games based on the OGL, but without d20 logo and any comment that it would be compatible with d20. What I did read is that this hadn't been foreseen by WotC who only wanted to enable d20 compatible products, not C&C or True20 stuff.

Other than that, this thread is geared at people who don't want to play 4e, reason for which I wrote "reluctantly" play 4e.

Like I said in my previously, the OGL made certain things "friendlier", but the systems would have still been very doable outside of the OGL. So maybe they wouldn't have happened without the extra friendly atmosphere the OGL created, but they were still certainly possible.