Dungeons & Dragons Fans Prepare to Face Their Greatest Adversary: Corporate Greed Also, Pathfinder is creating their own OGL, which has been met with massive support.
I barely get TFs anymore and I wait to get Warhammer stuff on the cheap. I got over 2,000 points of Dwarfs for under $200 US.
I play in person and out of the books...so I really don't have a dog in the hunt and no reason to grab a pitchfork.
...you've been defending them this entire time. I don't have a problem, it is your opinion, but it is really weird to suggest that you are neutral.
I've said the reaction is overwrought and given reasons why I think it is. The people who stand to lose the most from the new OGL are the publishing companies such as Kobold Press and the online services like RollD20. The choice for the former is to increase the price of their product or create their own open license gaming system (and they're choosing this, from what I understand). I have no reason to bail on DnD simply because Kobold Press is throwing a tantrum because I don't purchase their product - nor do I use online services like RollD20. So no, I have no dog in this hunt...just offering commentary on the kickball game that's going on right now. EDIT: I will say that WotC's response misses the mark in some ways, especially by leading with the "inclusivity clause" which no one was having a beef with, in particular. They do point out what I pointed out - this is partly to help protect the brand in court. And they aren't backing off from that.
If you think it is just 3rd party throwing a tantrum, idk what to tell you. It's a sword of Damocles over the entire homebrew marketplace. This is all about money, as pert their last investor call. As for why they led with inclusivity, it is one of two things. The better option is that they're tone-deaf, but the more cynical possibility is that they want to have the option so any competitor can be deemed to be problematic, have its license pulled and be thrown off kickstarter, indiegogo, drivethrurpg, etc. The denial about clauses never being intended to be means to steal people's work is hysterical, that's all the permanent, irrevocable, any way we want to use it forever and ever amen if you make anything under this license language was ever supposed to be. They didn't say anything about the revocation for any reason to include no reason at all provided 30 day's notice of revocation is given, either. So I presume that stays, lol. As for it only affects 750k and over, that is for the moment. If you gross over 50k you will have to report it to Hasbro, and it is pretty clear that the threshold will be lowered as time goes on. They have investors to placate, after all. If WotC cared about the customers, DnD Beyond wouldn't have removed the delete account button and require customers to submit a problem ticket.
Anyone making $2 PDF adventures wouldn't have been affected at all...well, aside from the idea that WotC could claim the adventure as official. The likelihood of that happening was incredibly small, though. This was more about the companies making money hand-over-fist off the property and IP with WotC having nothing to show for it. In that case, WotC has every right to put up a toll bridge as the brand expands. To me, that clause in particular feels unenforceable - or, rather, so complicated that it could potentially cause more headaches down the road. A module that has the heroes fighting for a fascist tyrant? I suppose that could be an easy call. But what if someone complains that there's a group of "Amazonian" women that actively keeps men out of their kingdom in a module? Isn't that non-inclusive writing? I mean, what's the line? So yes, I agree with the cynical take on this. WotC isn't 100% clean on the OGL update - there are missteps. Quite possibly. Like I said, I think this is aimed more at the big guns than the small time homebrewer, though, that will pretty much fly under their radar. Perhaps. But we can't really deal in assumptions - we can deal with what's now. And right now, this feels like third party publishers are causing a riot and getting people who aren't affected at all scared and grabbing pitchforks when they don't even understand why. Well, the site was crashing. So, keep up the site and piss off those who are already pissed off or allow the site to crash and piss off the ones who AREN'T so that everyone is pissed off. I can understand why they chose the former over the latter.
Pretty much agreed here. I have NO pity for ANY corporation, let alone one that's biggest problem is itself. Their response is nearly exactly what I expected. Basically, a dogshit side-mouth admittance that "Ooooooo you caught us. We almost got ya! Now we won't...for now." It's the follow through that matters now. Lol this was a draft not meant to be seen. Bulllll shit.
I mean, they did say that they were going to remove any claims of ownership to content created by others so that's a win right? Aside from Kobold Press that was the biggest complaint I saw coming from normal people.
The statement does address about 75% of the complaints, even if it has a slightly "sorry, not sorry" approach about it. That said, let's not kid ourselves. Paizo, Kobold Press and others are delighting in ginning up the mob to run over to their product right now. "Never let a good crisis go to waste," right?
They're still trying to kill 1.0. Anyhow, multiple leakers are confirming this as matching with what their sources tell them.
I think they're using the new movie as a pivot point. They may lose some players but they reckon they'll gain as many as they lose. It's kind of funny. We Transformers fans have been dealing with price creep for a decade now. It makes me wonder what Hasbro would do if we all simply walked away from the franchise for a year in protest.
They'd decide no one was interested in the franchise anymore (at least as far as collectors go). With corporations it's never an "oh, people think we're price gouging". It's always "well, I guess people just aren't interested".
I kind of doubt that, though, especially if it happened en masse with a social media campaign behind it. The problem is that there's really no domestic analogue for fans to run to. No Transformers fan is going to say they only plan to purchase Cracker Barrel transforming toys as an alternative and Hasbro has all but assured they've choked out that market. Personally, I think this would be a great time for Bandai to get off their laurels and bring Machine Robo back to America. Or reboot the Brave line here, since they now seem to own that franchise, designs and all (minus the originally produced Takara toy molds). Hasbro needs some competition.
Anyhow, back to the original topic. I have a closet full of board games that never get played. But I'm happy to say I've at least got some use out of my Heroquest game recently. Otherwise, my family is more into Cards Against Humanity Family Edition and What Do You Meme? My son is really into nation-building games, though, so I should try to buy Civilization some time.
Basically, WotC wants to get rid of physical playing of DnD and turn it into something akin to an MMO. The reason why they can honestly say that they will never make a $30 DnDB tier is because Cao wants to get rid of it too. Choice quotes from the leakers
