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<blockquote data-quote="delericho" data-source="post: 6053218" data-attributes="member: 22424">Even in terms of sales, the third-party products were a major factor in 3e's success - for the first few years the overwhelming majority were supplements for D&amp;D (okay, &quot;third edition fantasy roleplaying&quot; or the like). It wasn't until later that we saw lots of complete OGL games being released.Unfortunately, one of the unintended consequences of the OGL (and the SRD in particular) may well be that it has made it impossible for WotC to succeed with any new edition of D&amp;D - any new edition must inevitably compete with a very good past edition that is available, legally, for free.If the new edition is closed, the market will split as people divide between official D&amp;D and the OGL-derived material; if the new edition is open then it will just be absorbed by the free version.The likely consequence of this is that WotC can manage 4e-level sales, which would be eagerly jumped upon by any other RPG company, but may well never be able to do significantly better.The consequence of the OGL may well be that &quot;D&amp;D&quot; will live forever in the SRD, but that D&amp;D itself dies.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="delericho, post: 6053218, member: 22424"] Even in terms of sales, the third-party products were a major factor in 3e's success - for the first few years the overwhelming majority were supplements for D&D (okay, "third edition fantasy roleplaying" or the like). It wasn't until later that we saw lots of complete OGL games being released. Unfortunately, one of the unintended consequences of the OGL (and the SRD in particular) may well be that it has made it [i]impossible[/i] for WotC to succeed with any new edition of D&D - any new edition must inevitably compete with a very good past edition that is available, legally, for free. If the new edition is closed, the market will split as people divide between official D&D and the OGL-derived material; if the new edition is open then it will just be absorbed by the free version. The likely consequence of this is that WotC can manage 4e-level sales, which would be eagerly jumped upon by any other RPG company, but may well never be able to do significantly better. The consequence of the OGL may well be that "D&D" will live forever in the SRD, but that D&D itself dies. [/QUOTE]

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