NOW LIVE! Today's the day you meet your new best friend. You don’t have to leave Wolfy behind... In 'Pets & Sidekicks' your companions level up with you!

Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="Lizard" data-source="post: 4125111" data-attributes="member: 1054">I think it's mostly because while it's the same company, it's different PEOPLE. The folks who really pushed the OGL are long gone. A company doesn't really exist -- only people do.I don't think WOTC is made up of mega evil Bill Gates clones. I *do* think that many of the people inside the company did not understand the license as well as people outside the company whose livlihoods depended on it and who were part of the original development process on the semi-public OGL mailing lists. I think they coasted for the bulk of the 4e development process on the assumption they could change a few sentences in the OGL and that would be that. I think they -- and Hasbro's lawyers -- were taken aback by public comments on the nature of the license. I also think that they didn't realize the complexities of 'just release a new license' vis-a-vis the issue of older content.At this point, it may well be that they cannot find a way to make a license which serves the twin goals of protecting their IP and encouraging the creation of third party products, without imposing on them the costs of approval. I think the GSL is going to be very, very, different from the OGL. I do not think it will allow for any kind of non-commercial use of 4e -- bringing back the customer relations issues we saw during the days of 2e and Lorraine "We have tradmarked 'Armor Class'" Williams. I think it's going to contain a lot of clauses which will worry many publishers, especially those with thriving independant D20-derived lines. I suspect we're going to see a lot less creativity and imagination in the first wave of 4e products, as there will be a real fear of 'stepping out of line'. Unlike the OGL/STL, there will be no way for publishers to 'push the envelope' at the cost of foregoing the logo/branding; this will give WOTC tremendous control over content, and the ability to shut down any product they don't like -- or which competes with them. We will also very likely NOT see a PCGen 4e, or any similar product, as they will undermine DDI. It's going to be a much duller first year. The kind of ingenuity, excitement, and sense of fun which characterized the first year or so of 3e will not, in my opinion, be present. This may be waht WOTC want -- keep everyone focused on producing modules and nothing but. However, I think it will hurt 4e in the long run, especially if Pathfinder can establish itself as the new 3e standard bearer.While I'd like to say "We'll know soon", I don't know. I never would have guessed it would take until nearly April to release the GSL...and it still hasn't been released. It's been "soon" since at least the beginning of March. It's, what 75 days until release now? If it were released tomorrow, that would be 4 months or so to get a product ready for GenCon.</blockquote>

Verification