WotC Unveils Draft of New Open Gaming License

As promised earlier this week, WotC has posted the draft OGL v.1.2 license for the community to see.

A survey will be going live tomorrow for feedback.

Starting the OGL ‘Playtest’

In this article, you can review a draft of OGL 1.2, submit feedback via survey, and learn about a Creative Commons license that puts D&D's core mech...

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The current iteration contains clauses which prohibit offensive content, applies only to TTRPG books and PDFs, no right of ownership going to WotC, and an optional creator content badge for your products.

One important element, the ability for WotC to change the license at-will has also been addressed, allowing the only two specific changes they can make -- how you cite WotC in your work, and contact details.

This license will be irrevocable.

The OGL v1.0a is still being 'de-authorized'.

 

[Snarf Zagyg]

For an open licence I'd expect to see a severability provision like the one in OGL 1.0, in case of illegality sever the illegal clause & the rest remains in effect. Whereas this one says WoTC get to decide at their option whether to sever the clause or terminate the licence. I definitely don't think anyone is being hysterical.

If the license (and this is the OGL par- remember that they have expanded use u dear the CC which everyone is ignoring) is HELD (found be a court because someone has challenged it) to be unlawful, then it is severable. Obviously, if the term is important to WoTC then the license is void.

 

[dave2008]

As it stands, this draft says a compliant publication contains only WotC's content and your content.

Sounds like a good thing to comment on in the survey!

 

[dave2008]

I think it is too restrictive and I would want it improved before I sign off on the OGL

To be clear, the VTT is separate issue from the OGL. All the OGL says is: you have to use their VTT policy. So holding off on the OGL because of the VTT doesn't make a lot of sense. Unless you are saying you want it included in the OGL, which I don't think is ever going to happen and I am OK with that. Let them be separate.

It is also relevant that the de-authorization of 1.0(a) is also separate from the OGL. The OGL 1.2 does not de-authorize 1.0(a).

 

[pemerton]

As it stands, this draft says a compliant publication contains only WotC's content and your content.

Where is this? I'm looking at section 1(c) which says:

Your Licensed Works. To be a Licensed Work under this license, it must:
(i) be a covered work as defined in Section 1(b);
(ii) contain both Our Licensed Content and Your Content; and
(iii) not contain Our Unlicensed Content.​

There is nothing here that says a licensed work must contain only WotC's content and your content.

And section 5 has express rules for how a party to the licence can licence their work to another party, which might also include WotC licensed content.

 

[Cadence]

For an open licence I'd expect to see a severability provision like the one in OGL 1.0, in case of illegality sever the illegal clause & the rest remains in effect. Whereas this one says WoTC get to decide at their option whether to sever the clause or terminate the licence. I definitely don't think anyone is being hysterical.

In this case, say for example that the "no challenging obscenity decisions" is ruled bad for some reason. If it was fully severable, but the morals section is in the group that can never be modified, then WotC could never go in and fix that section. Right?

 

[Justice and Rule]

that is why I will be providing feedback about what needs improving. That seems to be the whole point of this exercise

Having a backdoor like that doesn't make me feel like the whole point of this is to get feedback, but rather to sneak in a trapdoor that allows them to terminate this new version of the "OGL" with no sort of contestation, and then impose a new one with 1.0a out of the way. I expect them not to remove it, and without removing it nothing they say can be taken at face value.

 

[mamba]

It's not that a contributor designates their copyrighted work as Open Game Content and then other people automatically get to use it. It's that a contributor agrees to give someone who agrees to and abides by the terms of the OGL a license to use their copyrighted work.

using a different version of the OGL is one of those terms, isn’t it?

So in your interpretation, this cuts off everything licensed under 1.0a from being used in works licensed under 1.2 unless it gets licensed under 1.2 by the original creator first. Correct?

 

[mamba]

Exactly this. As I just posted in another thread, you can't consider 1.2 a version of the same thing as 1.0a, the mechanisms just aren't there to support its use as "any acceptable version." It's an OGL in name only.

well, that kinda is a showstopper then

I'm now convinced this is by design. OGL 1.0a allowed a licensee to sublicense their work, meaning their recipient licensees would enjoy not just the bits of OGC added by their licensor, but everything else up the chain, sublicensed solely through their licensor. So in other words, you'd get bits of the SRD (potentially even the whole SRD) without actually having a license with WotC.
I think this is one of the things they've specifcally wanted rid of. Under 1.2, any new user has to have their own 1.2 agreement between themselves and WotC, due to the lack of the viral sublicensing they cannot get it through other works.

probably, at the same time if they make it irrevocable (and they mean it… which is not that easy to believe) then this would not matter

 

[mamba]

What does 3.5 have that 5e doesn't?

if I knew that I wouldn’t be asking Also that is not entirely correct. 3e was not BX or 1e either, yet compatible games were created out of it.

 

[Matt Thomason]

well, that kinda is a showstopper then


probably, at the same time if they make it irrevocable (and they mean it… which is not that easy to believe) then this would not matter

Yeah. That irrevocable thing, with various clauses that still allow them to terminate at-will Meanwhile, they do not appear to be able to terminate, revoke, deauthorize, or otherwise affect in any way whatsoever an agreement using the OGL where a third party is the downstream licensor to the licensee. This likely had legal minds at WotC absolutely furious that it had sat like that for 20 years.