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Role Playing (Games)

D&D Will Move To a Creative Commons License, Requests Feedback On a New OGL (polygon.com) 158

Posted by BeauHD from the giving-the-people-what-they-want dept.
A new draft of the Dungeons & Dragons Open Gaming License, dubbed OGL 1.2 by publisher Wizards of the Coast, is now available for download. Polygon reports: The announcement was made Thursday by Kyle Brink, executive producer of D&D, on the D&D Beyond website. According to Wizards, this draft could place the OGL outside of the publisher's control -- which should sound good to fans enraged by recent events. Time will tell, but public comment will be accepted beginning Jan. 20 and will continue through Feb. 3. [...] Creative Commons is a nonprofit organization that, by its own description, "helps overcome legal obstacles to the sharing of knowledge and creativity to address the world's most pressing challenges." As such, a Creative Commons license once enacted could ultimately put the OGL 1.2 outside of Wizards' control in perpetuity.

"We're giving the core D&D mechanics to the community through a Creative Commons license, which means that they are fully in your hands," Brink said in the blog post. "If you want to use quintessentially D&D content from the SRD such as owlbears and magic missile, OGL 1.2 will provide you a perpetual, irrevocable license to do so." So much trust has been lost over the last several weeks that it will no doubt take a while for legal experts -- armchair and otherwise -- to pour over the details of the new OGL. These are the bullet points that Wizards is promoting in this official statement: - Protecting D&D's inclusive play experience. As I said above, content more clearly associated with D&D (like the classes, spells, and monsters) is what falls under the OGL. You'll see that OGL 1.2 lets us act when offensive or hurtful content is published using the covered D&D stuff. We want an inclusive, safe play experience for everyone. This is deeply important to us, and OGL 1.0a didn't give us any ability to ensure it

- TTRPGs and VTTs. OGL 1.2 will only apply to TTRPG content, whether published as books, as electronic publications, or on virtual tabletops (VTTs). Nobody needs to wonder or worry if it applies to anything else. It doesn't.

- Deauthorizing OGL 1.0a. We know this is a big concern. The Creative Commons license and the open terms of 1.2 are intended to help with that. One key reason why we have to deauthorize: We can't use the protective options in 1.2 if someone can just choose to publish harmful, discriminatory, or illegal content under 1.0a. And again, any content you have already published under OGL 1.0a will still always be licensed under OGL 1.0a.

- Very limited license changes allowed. Only two sections can be changed once OGL 1.2 is live: how you cite Wizards in your work and how we can contact each other. We don't know what the future holds or what technologies we will use to communicate with each other, so we thought these two sections needed to be future-proofed. A revised version of this draft will be presented to the community again "on or before February 17."

"The process will extend as long as it needs to," Brink said. "We'll keep iterating and getting your feedback until we get it right."
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D&D Will Move To a Creative Commons License, Requests Feedback On a New OGL More

D&D Will Move To a Creative Commons License, Requests Feedback On a New OGL

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  • The draft says "the core D&D mechanics" will be under CC BY 4.0, which is quite a lot of freedom.

    • Re: Just saying "Creative Commons" doesn't mean mu (Score:5, Interesting)

      by pchasco ( 651819 ) on Thursday January 19, 2023 @10:22PM (#63223816)
      You cannot patent or copyright game mechanics anyway, so the entire idea of OGL is just WotC gaslighting its customers into believing that WotC is being generous by allowing you to do what the law already allows you to do.

      • You cannot copyright mechanics, but you can copyright some presentations of mechanics. It gets complicated and the line is not at all clear.

        • Right. But no one needs the OGL to make or sell companion material so long as they do not use copyrighted works (art, text, etc.) or trademarks beyond fair use (you canâ(TM)t claim your campaign is official D&D, but you can say it is compatible with D&D rules).

          • True, but you may need to be careful about using character options that are clearly specific to D&D. Does it fall under fair use or de minimis defense if one of your NPCs is an aarakocra Pact of the Tome warlock? How far do those go in what has historically been a permissive creative environment? More importantly, do you want to be the test case?

            • Aarakocra are not in the SRD so they are Copyright to Wizards

              Pact of the Tome Warlock is the description of a race and is copyrightable - the mechanics of how you build and play one is not

              The mechanics are not copyrightable - Names, and wording are

              • Just because something is copyrightable doesn't automatically mean that it can't be used. That's why I brought up fair use and de minimis defenses. WotC can't sue you or me for using the word "aarakocra" without seeking their permission. If they did, it would get thrown out on fair use grounds because we're using it to discuss something in the news. De minimis comes in when the use of a copyrighted material is so small that it doesn't affect the copyright and thus is not actionable. From the Second Circuit:

        • No, the line is pretty clear. You can't copyright mechanics, end of story. There is caselaw making this clear. All you can copyright is the pages and logos and the exact wording they use in the rule book. They can copyright the spell "fireball" for example, but if someone makes a spell called "explosion" that does the exact same thing in their content, it's not copyrighted.

          • Re: (Score:3)

            by radja ( 58949 )

            Yes, you can use different wording to represent the rules. It makes it difficult to refer to the RAW (Rules As Written) though, so there is a big incentive to not rewrite all the rules.

      • Using a permissive license on the game rules, even if such a license isn't necessary in my mind, at least makes it less likely that WotC will turn around and start suing small publishers over game mechanics. Most of us can't fight a big corporation in court, especially with licenses that are untested and seem to offer a lot of wiggle room. (revoking licenses? wow. didn't see that coming from the old "authorized" statement in the OGL 1.0a)

        That said, I feel the safest for us little people is to side-step WotC

      • The original OGL was actually a statement piece. See just because you can do something doesn't mean you can't be taken to court and hit with massive lawyer fees over the issue, and a company can outlast you because they have more money. And in fact, that's exactly what WotC's predecessor TSR did before they went bankrupt and WotC bought up the IP.

        The original OGL was essentially a statement that they wouldn't act like TSR, which severely hurt the industry.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by suutar ( 1860506 )

        True, you can't copyright/patent mechanics, but this is (afaik) yet another field where the exact boundary between safe and infringing is "what a court has explicitly ruled on", and the vast majority of actual content hasn't been explicitly ruled on so it's more of a "nobody has gotten ticked enough to make a court case out of it and find the real answer, so we're probably okay". Explicit licensing is useful to remove that edge of nervousness about if you did get into court, what would the judge actually de

    • They are proposing releasing the parts they can't copyright at all under a copyright licence they can revoke ...

      That's a nope

  • Was this problem widespread among d20 publishers under the original OGL? Why the sudden concern?

    • Re:Offensive or hurtful content? (Score:5, Insightful)

      by Barny ( 103770 ) on Thursday January 19, 2023 @10:14PM (#63223798) Journal

      It's a bigger issue than that. The wording is:

      No Hateful Content or Conduct. You will not include content in Your Licensed Works that is harmful, discriminatory, illegal, obscene, or harassing, or engage in conduct that is harmful, discriminatory, illegal, obscene, or harassing. We have the sole right to decide what conduct or content is hateful, and you covenant that you will not contest any such determination via any suit or other legal action.

      Quite a clause there. So any content containing "harmful" or "illegal" actions can be hit with a big ol' cease and desist (with no legal recourse) at any time by WotC. Assault, murder, manslaughter, etc are all illegal actions. Actions that tend to take place in a D&D game.

      Caveat: IANAL

      • Re:Offensive or hurtful content? (Score:5, Interesting)

        by Martin Blank ( 154261 ) on Thursday January 19, 2023 @11:02PM (#63223902) Homepage Journal

        While the entire section is problematic, the clause "or engage in conduct that is harmful, discriminatory, illegal, obscene, or harassing" means that if you tell an off-color joke that they don't like, they can strip you of your license.

        The rest of it is problematic because many scenarios in the past have been written to explore difficult topics of racism, sexism, slavery, inequality, oppression, morality, and ethics, often presenting dilemmas for which the players will not have a simple answer, and indeed may find themselves taking the least wrong option. I've run games where the players have stopped the game because of an ethical debate that they needed to parse, and that discussion would sometimes continue away from the table.

        WotC is potentially breaking players' ability to experience that. I don't know why, other than fear of a political backlash, but some of their biggest supporters have been people from marginalized groups. They're breaking a trend in some of the best-rated video games, too, where players often have to face uncomfortable decisions. Regardless of what they do, someone is going to write up an offensive scenario and release it and not care about the license. WotC can go through the motions to track the person down, but at that point, the cat is out of the bag and there's no point trying to stuff it back in. This is a pointless effort led by people who do not know the game or the community, because they don't play it and probably never have. And they're going to regret it because it's going to hurt their sales and they're not going to get their bonuses.

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by AmiMoJo ( 196126 )

          They are doing it because minorities are one of the biggest growth areas for their business, and they want to make sure they don't get discouraged by other people in the community. Trolls and bigots exist on every platform and in every community, and when that community is run by a for-profit company they have an interest in trying to keep it welcoming and enjoyable.

          • Funny how 'hate' provisions and similar conduct policies weren't needed for so long, even back when societal and legal discrimination were objectively much worse. Back then they were simply covered under specific prohibitions on harassment/bullying, or even 'don't be a dick' rules. It's almost as if a problem is being imagined by people of a certain ideological bent, the same people also happening to have a solution for sale.

            >They are doing it because minorities are one of the biggest growth areas for th

            • Re: (Score:2)

              by AmiMoJo ( 196126 )

              Funny how 'hate' provisions and similar conduct policies weren't needed for so long, even back when societal and legal discrimination were objectively much worse.

              The fact that it was much worse suggests that they were needed.

              Back then they were simply covered under specific prohibitions on harassment/bullying

              And you complained about vague definitions of harassment, and people being overly sensitive. In the 80s the popular term for it was "political correctness".

            • It's not a niche customer base anymore. In 2021, the branch of Hasbro that is WotC brought in $1.3 billion. That's 42% higher than in 2021 and nearly double 2019's numbers. Consider that in 1995, TSR's total sales were about $45 million. While part of that is MtG, a significant portion is D&D.

              What may be driving the OGL change is that by the end of Q3 2022, YTD WotC revenues were down. This was due to a combination of factors, but it panics executives when they see that. In that panic, they came up with

          • I understand that, and for those wishing to associate their work more tightly with D&D by getting into licensed trademarks and such, I think WotC is completely in the clear to require those provisions because they're lending their name and creative works to the material.

            But for the OGL content, I think it's overreach in that it invites confusion and fear and, as I mentioned, it undermines a major aspect of the game. I know that not every game deals with this sensitive stuff, but enough do that it takes

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by xevioso ( 598654 )

        So if I include text in a game about a race that is devoted to destroying all elves, because that race feels that elves are the bane of Orc-anity, and must be destroyed, is that hateful?

        It's assumed by DnD that all the caveats about content that is harmful, discriminatory, illegal, obscene, or harassing refers to real people... and yet EVERY FUCKING THING in DnD is based on, in some sense, about stereotypes about real people, races, and cultures. If it didn't, it would have no relation to reality and no on

        • Re: (Score:2, Troll)

          by Aighearach ( 97333 )

          So if I include text in a game about a race that is devoted to destroying all elves...

          No. Elves are not real, so it is not harmful, illegal, or discriminatory.

          You knew that, though. I wonder why you're gaslighting about it? Actually, that's not true. I don't wonder why. I know why.

          • Re: (Score:2)

            by Kokuyo ( 549451 )

            Something being real has stopped being relevant to the more better people back when they threw in hentai with child porn.

            • Re: (Score:2)

              by Shaitan ( 22585 )

              "the more better people"

              No. It didn't and there is a very simple reason why.

              People might not understand it in todays world but certainly some older gay folks will. There was most definitely a point where nobody would choose to be gay due to the social stigma. Well, NOBODY would choose to be attracted to kids. Whether it is nature or some deeply ingrained aspect of nature there is no way that is voluntary. That doesn't make it any less terrible or harmful if they act on their impulses in the real world.

              What

          • Re: (Score:2)

            by xevioso ( 598654 )

            You don't know why, and I don't think the word gaslighting means what you think it means.

            MTG, owned by WOTC, has banned cards that it believed could be perceived as offensive by real world people.
            Cards like:

            invoke prejudice.
            imprison.
            crusade.
            pradesh gypsies.
            stone-throwing devils.
            cleanse.
            jihad

            These cards had fantasy art, but could be perceived as being offensive to real people.
            OK, Fine.

            So why wouldn't WOTC crack down on people creating scenarios about genocide against a mythical race of child-eating black orc

          • >No. Elves are not real, so it is not harmful, illegal, or discriminatory.

            The above makes perfect sense to normal people. It'd be helpful if we were talking about normal people (e.g. people who don't believe orcs are black people). Instead we're dealing with corporate identity politics, either true believers or those who know to not acquiesce to a chosen one is career and social suicide.

            How about a belt or spell that changes a person's sex? What if the Vistani were the target of genocide? The terms by wh

          • Elves are real, one of them is even a Canadian lawyer who is covering the OGL controversy.

            https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com]

          • Re: (Score:2)

            by bsolar ( 1176767 )

            No. Elves are not real, so it is not harmful, illegal, or discriminatory.

            That will not stop people who identify as elves to argue they are real and are being discriminated against.

          • Don't you "elves are not real" me, elves, to begin with, are a metaphor for nordics, along with dwarves who are a metaphor for Jews. In general, although people won't admit it loud, one of the main points of the fantasy genre is to tell racial stories without offending people.

            P.s. I'm a je^H^H dwarf

          • No. Elves are not real, so it is not harmful, illegal, or discriminatory.

            You knew that, though. I wonder why you're gaslighting about it? Actually, that's not true. I don't wonder why. I know why.

            That's not what the D&D-buying public clearly feels. See, for example, Dungeons & Dragons' Racial Reckoning Is Long Overdue [wired.com] in Wired This is why recent books have moved away from the 20-year pattern of giving different player-character races different stats: can't have orcs -- who someone seems to believe are based on black stereotypes, someone somehow decided in retrospect -- to have +2 Strength and -2 Intelligence, after all. It's also why they're breaking with the 49-year pattern of having races

        • I played a campaign for years that in the end required several cross country flights to resolve. The DM was a Phd in Political Science and his campaign was loosely based on historical events. We were fighting a xenophobic demilich that was trying to wipe all the non-human races from existence. At one point we liberated a concentration camp full of halflings. It was an incredible experience, I wonder how that would have played out under this OGL?

      • Morality clauses are purposefully vague so the can claim just about anything they dislike violates it.

      • The only content that has had this recently was written and published by Wizards themselves ...

      • No Hateful Content or Conduct. You will not include content in Your Licensed Works that is harmful, discriminatory, illegal, obscene, or harassing, or engage in conduct that is harmful, discriminatory, illegal, obscene, or harassing. We have the sole right to decide what conduct or content is hateful, and you covenant that you will not contest any such determination via any suit or other legal action.

        Quite a clause there. So any content containing "harmful" or "illegal" actions can be hit with a big ol' cease and desist (with no legal recourse) at any time by WotC. Assault, murder, manslaughter, etc are all illegal actions. Actions that tend to take place in a D&D game.

        Just to highlight that, the Ranger class is itself discriminatory. I don't have the 5e books, but D&D Beyond's description [dndbeyond.com] says (emphasis is mine):

        Warriors of the wilderness, rangers specialize in hunting the monsters that threaten the edges of civilization—humanoid raiders, rampaging beasts and monstrosities, terrible giants, and deadly dragons. They learn to track their quarry as a predator does, moving stealthily through the wilds and hiding themselves in brush and rubble. Rangers focus their combat training on techniques that are particularly useful against their specific favored foes.

        More broadly, D&D is about good versus evil. You can go genocidal and slaughter all the goblins you want. Cast Detect Evil and now you're justified. The best TTRPG campaigns I've played have been those that challenge these stereotypes, that go into the shades of gray. Oops, that princess we "rescued" is now back under her abusive father's control. The gui

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by jsepeta ( 412566 )

        The slavers' series (modules A1-A4) dealt with slavery and emancipation. I can imagine a far right retelling where the slaves are all elves, or gay, or women, or black. So I applaud WotC's efforts to make the game more inclusive by adding language to restrict the use of troubling topics.

    • There are some real pieces of shit publishing in the d20 and retro RPG scene. It's almost a full time job on the various RPG forums maintaining the list of who is canceled and why. (if you run a forum and don't want to promote products made by blatant white supremist, then yeah you kind of are stuck doing this crap). The so-called Old-School Renaissance (OSR) mostly brings out people who are nostalgic for the games they played as youngers, but it also attracts knuckle draggers that are trying to relive some

      • Most of the modern d20/OGL publishers I know of are very progressive and have a liberal bent. Look at Paizo's Wrath of the Righteous, for example. Anevia lol.

        • If you think those guys are liberal you'd probably recoil in terror if you met any of the people I hang out with. LOL. Most of the publishers are running a business and trying to get their game, art, etc out without a lot of backlash. The people on the far-left and far-right try to make everything into some kind of political last stand and they get really upset when their business doesn't work out for them. Turns out being in the center is the safe bet for business, has been for a long time. A business can'

          • Um

            Have you even gone through that module at all? Or are you just making generic statements to make generic statements?

            • Which Spelljammer or Mystara? The spelljammer issue was quite famously reported on. For Mystara it's the main setting I use in my own games.

              As for someone having a "liberal bent" for admitting the existence of a transgender person? yea. that's a bizarre take. Have fun with your weird views.

  • So, does this permit the resurrection of the original Rogue?

  • Deauthorizing OGL 1.0a (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Local ID10T ( 790134 ) <ID10T.L.USER@gmail.com> on Thursday January 19, 2023 @09:00PM (#63223674) Homepage

    Do they have the rights to revoke/modify the existing licenses?

    When a license was issued under OGL 1.0a (or whatever) was there a clause that allowed for the revocation of that license? What are the conditions for the revocation? Have those conditions been met?

    If it was not specified originally, they may just be up a proverbial creek without a paddle...

    • No. (Score:4, Insightful)

      by rsilvergun ( 571051 ) on Thursday January 19, 2023 @09:52PM (#63223756)
      Or at least, they shouldn't. The guy who wrote the OGL is on record saying it's irrevocable. But it was poorly written and our courts are _nuts_ so anything's possible.

      If the OGL dies D&D goes with it. D&D needs the OGL so that companies will produce content for it. It's not the rule books that make D&D what it is, it's the massive amount of professionally made tools, modules and content. All those creators are in the process of getting as far away from D&D as they can and they're gonna take the players with them. D&D isn't like a video game or even Warhammer. There's not nearly as much lock in.

      WOTC is still in the bargaining phase. If the community keeps the pressure up we can fix this. Keep Hasbro from killing themselves. 72% of Hasbro's profits are from D&D (it's just plain that profitable). We need to make it crystal clear that if they don't do a complete 180 then it's over, they lose everything.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by DarkOx ( 621550 )

        That is not how that will play out at all. The public will keep playing D&D because that is the name people know, that is the materials the own, that is what draws in new friends to play with.

        If anything Hasbro would probably gain in the long term from killing the after market. Its not really that hard to invent this stuff if you have the talent for it - which they can hire or have something like chatGPT and DALL-E do it (because if were honest AI can probably do the job fine). The hard part is the p

      • If the OGL dies D&D goes with it. D&D needs the OGL so that companies will produce content for it.

        You realize that third-party content existed long before the OGL, right? The OGL wasn't introduced until 2000. I started playing with AD&D 1st Ed. back in the early 80s and there was plenty of third-party content being published at the time. If the OGL didn't exist, WotC or Hasbro might try to sue third parties, but if those third parties stay away from reprinting copyrighted material and inappropri

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by nagora ( 177841 )

      Do they have the rights to revoke/modify the existing licenses?

      When a license was issued under OGL 1.0a (or whatever) was there a clause that allowed for the revocation of that license? What are the conditions for the revocation? Have those conditions been met?

      If it was not specified originally, they may just be up a proverbial creek without a paddle...

      Maybe, no, none given, no.

      There is a school of thought that "perpetual" means something different for lawyers than for human beings. However, given the time, the public assurances by WotC/Hasbro officials working in an official capacity, and the fact that the OGL was aimed specifically at normal people doing essentially cottage/hobby work I think it would be reasonable to claim that the term should have been defined in the text if it was not to have its normal meaning.

      But this is the biggest question mark.

      O

    • Probably WotC cannot unilaterally revoke OGL under WA law at least according to a pretty credible discussion of https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/... [eff.org]

      But the entire THING about OGL was that it really didn't give anyone anything they didn't already have in general copyright law, it was more like a promise of accepting some constraints in excess of what was legally required in exchange for a promise by WotC not to sue you over that stuff anyway, which would cost you (mr indie developer) a ruinous amount of legal f

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by suutar ( 1860506 )

      The OGL 1.0a doesn't say they can revoke the license on existing works (unless you violate the terms and don't fix it). But it does say that a new work can only use authorized versions of the OGL, so by de-authorizing 1.0a they're saying "if you published it already it's still licensed under 1.0, but new stuff can't be; use 2.0 instead".

  • The feedback is a lie (Score:3)

    by rsilvergun ( 571051 ) on Thursday January 19, 2023 @09:48PM (#63223750)
    it's leaked that the only reason they solicit the feedback is that they found people who send feedback are less likely to post their anger & frustration to social media. It's a trick to lull the community and get them to stop talking about it. It's apparently a very common PR trick I'd never heard of before this (shows what I know).

    Point is, keep the pressure up. Keep posting how pissed off your are and boosting anyone complaining about it or covering the leaks. They're not done. They want a closed ecosystem like the iPhone but with every single player paying $30/mo to play D&D and 30% of every penny made by creators.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by xevioso ( 598654 )

      So, as someone who actually monitors daily feedback emails for a large corporation, I can tell you this isn't necessarily true. It's true that many "Contact Us" emails are ignored, but that's because the vast majority are spam, gobbledygook, hilariously perverse, irrelevant, or phishing attempts.

      There's no proof or even insider info, as far as I know, that WOTC is asking people to send feedback because they want to quell the social media outrage. That may be a positive side effect for them, but it may *al

  • It's a trap (Score:5, Informative)

    by Misanthrope ( 49269 ) on Thursday January 19, 2023 @09:58PM (#63223764)

    The "it's a trap" moment for me:

            You acknowledge that we and our licensees, as content creators ourselves, might independently come up with content similar to something you create. If you have a claim that we breached this provision, or that one of our licensees did in connection with content they licensed from us:

            (a) Any such claim will be brought only as a lawsuit for breach of contract, and only for money damages. You expressly agree that money damages are an adequate remedy for such a breach, and that you will not seek or be entitled to injunctive relief.

            (b) In any such lawsuit, you must show that we knowingly and intentionally copied your Licensed Work. Access and substantial similarity will not be enough to prove a breach of this Section 3.

    This basically says "We can still steal your work and sell it without giving you a dime, but if you want to object to that then you can't say so on social media or in the news, you have to do it in court (and in a particular way), and if you don't have the cash to take us on then you need to shut the hell up or it's going to be YOU that's in breach of contract and we can pull our permission for you to use the license."

    • but if you want to object to that then you can't say so on social media or in the news

      Where are you getting that from? It's certainly limiting your legal claims, ie would presumably mean you can't make a copyright claim, but doesn't seem to be saying anything about you talking about it anywhere.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by Erioll ( 229536 )

        There's overloading of the word "claim" here, as a legal claim, or your "claim" that they're doing bad things. This could only be referencing the legal one, or they could be saying "you can only claim we're stealing from you in a legal claim. If you claim that we're stealing somewhere not in a legal claim, you're violating this." Lots of ambiguity that WotC will surely exploit.

        I won't give WotC and D&D any more of my money until Hasbro sells them, or something equally showing (not just words) that i

    • Re:It's a trap (Score:4, Insightful)

      by Angry Coward ( 6165972 ) on Friday January 20, 2023 @01:42AM (#63224176)
      Nah the real its a trap moment is elsewhere. The section you cite is actually somewhat improved from the leaked original, if still not to the point I would be comfortable agreeing to it without consulting a well qualified Washington State lawyer. This is the trap

      7.(b)(i) We may immediately terminate your license if you infringe any of our intellectual property;bring an action challenging our ownership of Our Licensed Content, trademarks, or patents; violate any law in relation to your activities under this license; or violate Section 6(f)
      6.(f) No hateful Content or Conduct. You will not include content in Your Licensed Works that is harmful, discriminatory, illegal, obscene, or harassing, or engage in conduct that is harmful, discriminatory, illegal, obscene, or harassing. We have the sole right to decide what conduct or content is hateful, and you covenant that you will not contest any such determination via any suit or other legal action.

      In more plain language wotc reserves the right to revoke your license at any time for no reason and you have recourse.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by Mitreya ( 579078 )

        You will not include content in Your Licensed Works that is harmful, discriminatory, illegal, obscene, or harassing, or engage in conduct that is harmful, discriminatory, illegal, obscene, or harassing. We have the sole right to decide what conduct or content is hateful, and you covenant that you will not contest any such determination via any suit or other legal action.

        Wow. So, basically, if there is some non-tasteful nudity in your content, that may be enough?

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by swilver ( 617741 )

          Worse, as WotC decides what is any of those, and you can't contest it, they can decide the use of the word "twenty" is discriminatory.

          • Re: (Score:2)

            by suutar ( 1860506 )

            Limited only by their willingness to accept the public backlash for making that stupid a call, yep

        • Worse, you go streaking across a football field at a local college game, and they can revoke your license to produce D&D content. Anything you do in your life can be used to revoke your license, and you're not allowed to question it.

    • That's not what it says at all. What it does say is in many ways worse. 1) You can't sue for copyright violations which don't require damages to be proven just that the violation happened, and you can't stop them from selling the content at issue while the trial goes on. 2) You have to show with either a video or audio recording, a written document, or a witness who directly worked on the project at issue that we copied your content. It doesn't matter how close to your content and whether we saw it prior to

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by suutar ( 1860506 )

      and even if you win (which means you can prove infringement _and_ damages) you just get money, we don't have to stop publishing it

  • What about ORCS (Score:3)

    by xevioso ( 598654 ) on Thursday January 19, 2023 @10:25PM (#63223822)

    So the issue now is, presumably Paizo will still go through with their own License that is "open source", essentially. Regardless of what WOTC has done people's trust has been betrayed, so they will move away from the OGL to the ORC, which is supposed to be released in Feb.

    So, here's what happens. Paizo releases it, and multiple people sign on to it. WOTC sues Paizo and the Azora Law Firm. And the issues are such that this could easily go to the supreme court because there are a ton of grey areas here. We are sadly heading into a very contentious period.

    WOTC, you need to reach out to Paizo *NOW* before they move publicly to pull people into their new license. The only other option is a lot of sadness and anger on both sides. Reach out to them, even though they are a competitor. Because if you don't, you may win a legal battle, but when people abandon you for other gaming systems en masse, you will lose the war.

    • What exactly would wotc and Paizo sue each other over? Having different licenses for their own content? What constitutional issue do you think the Supreme Court will need to resolve?

      • What constitutional issue do you think the Supreme Court will need to resolve?

        What do "constitutional issues" have to do with anything?

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by xevioso ( 598654 )

        OK. If Paizo goes ahead and creates the ORC, an "open source" irrevocabale license, and that license uses things like the D20 system, stats like ST, IN, DE, WI, and CH, and uses things like feats, skills and other things that WOTC claims to be able to license with their OGL, and works with their law firm, Azora Law, to make this license available, then the following things will happen:
        1) Azora Law, who is making this license available, will be sued. WOTC would make a claim like, "You can't create an open

      • Intellectual property and contract law.

        Paizo's Pathfinder version 1 was functionally WotC's D&D 3.5 with a super balance patch and a new art style for the rule books. There isn't a legal line in the sand of who owns and is entitled to what because everything under the old OGL was built on the foundations of previous works; it also sucks as a contract, its very short, vague, and probably wont hold up to real legal scrutiny.

        Here is a hypothetical that I think we may see some legal arguments made about.

        • One point. In US contract law (licenses are a subset of contracts) ambiguity MUST be interpreted in favor of the party that did not originate the contract. It is the legal version of "If that is what you meant, why didn't you say that?"

          Vague terms in WotCs license would by statute be interpreted in favor of Paizo.

  • One thing I've dug up is an interview [youtube.com] with one of the creators of the OGL 1.0a, Ryan Dancey. With this new license, WotC opens themselves up to compatible game systems that work with DnD that WotC has no legal control over.

    A company that puts out content not using the OGL, without permission and says they are "Compatible with" Dungeons and Dragons, and win in court. Since game systems aren't copyrightable this is likely something WotC would lose

    Right now companies can use the OGL, but if they want to use th

  • Damage has already been done (Score:3)

    by DrXym ( 126579 ) on Friday January 20, 2023 @06:56AM (#63224584)
    Nobody will trust them any more, constantly dissecting and second guessing what the carousel of ever-changing terms & conditions actually mean. Even if they CCL the core rules (by which I assume they mean the written description of the game mechanics), it probably doesn't help with other content. And I assume they'll start ensuring over time that more and more rules and content fall outside the core ruleset where they can do what they like with impunity. So I think they can still expect their revenue to fall off a cliff. I wonder how long before presidents & vice presidents of this calamitous change get booted.
  • Not that the original author will see this, but the phrase should be "pore over", meaning "to study carefully".
    • I ignore misspellings and alliterations like this. Some very smart people type fast, and fall victim to autocorrect. And when people mispronounce words, itâ(TM)s commonly because they read a lot and never heard the word spoken out loud.

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