WotC Talks OGL... Again! Draft Coming Jan 20th With Feedback Survey; v1 De-Auth Still On

Following last week's partial walk-back on the upcoming Open Game Licence terms, WotC has posted another update about the way forward.

The new update begins with another apology and a promise to be more transparent. To that end, WotC proposes to release the draft of the new OGL this week, with a two-week survey feedback period following it.

WotC Walks Back Some OGL Changes, But Not All

Wizards of the Coast has finally made a statement regarding the OGL. The statement says that the leaked version was a draft designed to solicit feedback and that they are walking back some problematic elements, but don't address others--most notably that the current OGL v1.0a is still being...

www.enworld.org

They also list a number of points of clarity --

• Videos, accessories, VTT content, DMs Guild will not be affected by the new license, none of which is related to the OGL
• The royalties and ownership rights clauses are, as previously noted, going away

OGL v1 Still Being 'De-Authorized'
However, OGL v1.0a still looks like it's being de-authorized. As with the previous announcement, that specific term is carefully avoided, and like that announcement it states that previously published OGL v1 content will continue to be valid; however it notably doesn't mention that the OGL v1 can be used for content going forward, which is a de-authorization.

The phrase used is "Nothing will impact any content you have published under OGL 1.0a. That will always be licensed under OGL 1.0a." -- as noted, this does not make any mention of future content. If you can't publish future content under OGL 1.0a, then it has been de-authorized. The architect of the OGL, Ryan Dancey, along with WotC itself at the time, clearly indicated that the license could not be revoked or de-authorized.

While the royalty and ownership clauses were, indeed, important to OGL content creators and publishers such as myself and many others, it is also very important not to let that overshadow the main goal: the OGL v1.0a.

Per Ryan Dancey in response this announcement: "They must not. They can only stop the bleeding by making a clear and simple statement that they cannot and will not deauthorize or revoke v1.0a".

Ryan Dancey -- Hasbro Cannot Deauthorize OGL

I reached out to the architect of the original Open Gaming License, former VP of Wizard of the Coast, Ryan Dancey, and asked his opinion about the current plan by WotC to 'deauthorize' the current OGL in favour of a new one. He responded as follows: Yeah my public opinion is that Hasbro does...

www.enworld.org

Amend At-Will
Also not mentioned is the leaked draft's ability to be amended at-will by WotC. An agreement which can be unilaterally changed in any way by one party is not an agreement, it's a blank cheque. They could simply add the royalties or ownership clauses back in at any time, or add even more onerous clauses.

All-in-all this is mainly just a rephrasing of last week's announcement addressing some of the tonal criticisms widely made about it. However, it will be interesting to see the new draft later this week. I would encourage people to take the feedback survey and clearly indicate that the OGL v1.0a must be left intact.

 

[mamba]

See my post above.

see my reply to that

I agree that I have no better explanation, but I disagree with revoking 1.0a being needed for this at all

Also, they walked that part back yesterday, so they too agree it is not needed, yet they still want to get rid of 1.0a. I believe it is about it being perpetual and irrevocable, nothing else, they want to be able to change their minds in the future.

 

[Bagpuss]

Not many 3PP(probably none) are making movies or video games.

Video Games that used OGL

Pathfinder: Kingmaker
Pathfinder: Wrath of the Righteous
Worlds of Magic aka Planar Conquest
Low Magic Age
Demons Age (admitted already gone due to infringing on IP but not WotC).
Knights of the Chalice 1 & 2 (based on 3.5)
Sands of Slumber (based on 5E)

Games that you might think use the OGL but don't
Solasta: Crown of the Magister - supposedly negotiated a seperate license, rather than use the OGL to use SRD material.
Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic

So yeah not many, but not none and who knows what's in production.

Still does it really matter? Just as Words with Friends didn't need a license to exist does a computer game that uses the mechanics of D&D but without the IP need the OGL at all?

 

[Bagpuss]

Larger companies and major brands starting to make D&D and RPG products and using their IP.

Their IP isn't given away by the OGL, in fact it is specifically protected.

Although I agree they are probably dreaming to have D&D become the IP success of Marvel MCU.

 

[ilgatto]

They need to make 6e its own game. Its the only way to protect their interests. This attack on the 1.0a will cost them way too much to "win".

Possibly. But, in this case, leaving OGL 1.0/1.0a as is may well lead to a fundamental forking of D&D - into a continuation of 5E and their new 6E - and therefore the need for 6E to compete with Wizbro's own 5E game, 3PP fed as it may become. And I suppose that's not really what the company are after, if only to avoid the risk of the 5E fork growing to PF1-like proportions, which may well happen if enough people decide that being trapped in a virtual environment they have no control over and involving monthly payments (and then some) is not their cup of tea.

 

[FormerLurker]

This is silly. This isn't a negotiation where both sides willingly decided to negotiate. Hasbro made demands. The other side rejected them.

Your post remind me of someone trying to convince someone else to go out with them and getting mad they won't say yes. 'No' is an acceptable response. 'No' is always an acceptable response.

Then WotC will just remove the OGL anyway and the Open Gaming community won't have any say in what they get in return because when it came time time establish terms they just kept crying "NO!"

 

[Matt Thomason]

No you're missing my core point.

I don't think any major company can make a good RPG without stealing from WOTC enough to lose a fair use claim.

My core point is that there are few good, well designed RPGs that are "closed enough" and "broad enough" for any Megacorp to buy.

This sounds highly subjective. I don't even think the d20 system and its various derivatives are all that good in the first place, there's far better RPG systems out there from my perspective.

What would be more accurate is whether any major company can make a "D&D-enough RPG" without that infringement.

 

[FormerLurker]

Why is there any expectation that the “other side” should have to drop anything? WotC gave us a nice toy, said we could keep it forever (in fact, some only accepted it under that premise because they were suspicious WotC might take it back some day), and now they’re trying to it back anyway, and instead offering us a different toy that’s covered in rusty razor blades and barbed wire. And when we complained, they said “oh, that was just a prototype. The finished version won’t be rusty or have any barbed wire on it,” but refused to comment on whether or not it would still have razor blades that aren’t rusty, or whether people who don’t want the crappy new toy will still be able to play with the old one. And some people are actually sitting there unironically saying “come on, they promised to take off the barbed wire and the rust, and you haven’t been willing to compromise anything!” Yeah, no duh we haven’t compromised, we never asked for this horrible new toy in the first place! How’s this for a compromise: Let us keep playing with the old toy, like you promised and have been honoring for 20 years, and you can put whatever hazardous materials you want on the new toy.

WotC is going to remove the OGL 1.0a. That seems to be a major goal of this. Everything else is negotiable.
The Open Gaming community can get something in exchange for the 1.0a going away, negotiating for something else. Or they can posture and make analogies and forfeit any right to participate in the negotiation and WotC will decide what to give for them.

 

[FormerLurker]

Their IP isn't given away by the OGL, in fact it is specifically protected.

Although I agree they are probably dreaming to have D&D become the IP success of Marvel MCU.

Enough of it is given away for them to be worried, as the rules themselves are available.

 

[FormerLurker]

And you think they couldn’t do that without the OGL?

They can. But WotC doesn't need to make it easy for them and allow them to coast off of all their hard work and design.

 

[FormerLurker]

The SRD has rules in it. Some of those rules embody vague worldbuilding concepts, but I would argue that few of them rise to the point where you could have copyright on them – mostly some of the monsters that aren't drawn from mythology, like xorns. The SRD also generally doesn't provide physical descriptions of these monsters. The xorn, for example, have one bite and three claw attacks, is described with height and weight, and their All-round vision ability mentions "symmetrically placed eyes". But the SRD doesn't say they're vaguely conical beings with three symmetrically placed arms and three symmetrically placed legs, with a mouth at the top and that they're made of rock. That part is from the Monster Manual, and not open content.

And more importantly, the SRD doesn't have any actual characters or concrete worldbuilding (basically anything with names). It's all rules and vague concepts. So basically, anything a major entertainment corporation like Disney could get out of the SRD, they could probably build themselves, and likely better.

But the SRD has the rules. Which are the hard bit of making an RPG.
People have been making D&D worlds and characters for almost 50 years but making balanced rulesets that people like playing? That's a challenge. There's a graveyard of RPGs that failed and have been forgotten. And making a good RPG that competes with D&D costs a lot of money and could take a couple years. It's much easier to just take the rules for D&D and make a "D&D compatible" product.