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The new Dungeons & Dragons Open Gaming License, a document which allows a vast group of independent publishers to use the basic game rules created by D&D owner Wizards of the Coast, significantly restricts the kind of content allowed and requires anyone making money under the license to report their products to Wizards of the Coast directly, according to an analysis of a leaked draft of the document, dated mid-December.
Despite reassurances from Wizards of the Coast last month, the original OGL will become an "unauthorized" agreement, and it appears no new content will be permitted to be created under the original license.
The original OGL is what many contemporary tabletop publishers use to create their products within the boundaries of D&D's reproducible content. Much of the original OGL is dedicated to the System Resource Document, and includes character species, classes, equipment, and, most importantly, general gameplay structures, including combat, spells, and creatures.
[...] One of the biggest changes to the document is that it updates the previously available OGL 1.0 to state it is "no longer an authorized license agreement." By ending the original OGL, many licensed publishers will have to completely overhaul their products and distribution in order to comply with the updated rules. Large publishers who focus almost exclusively on products based on the original OGL, including Paizo, Kobold Press, and Green Ronin, will be under pressure to update their business model incredibly fast.
[...] This sentiment is reiterated later in the document: The "OGL wasn't intended to fund major competitors and it wasn't intended to allow people to make D&D apps, videos, or anything other than printed (or printable) materials for use while gaming. We are updating the OGL in part to make that very clear."
[...] While there is plenty more to parse, the main takeaway from the leaked OGL 1.1 draft document is that WotC is keeping power close at hand. There is no mention of perpetual, worldwide rights given to creators (which was present in section 4 of the original OGL), and one of the caveats is that the company "can modify or terminate this agreement for any reason whatsoever, provided We give thirty (30) days' notice."
[...] Wizards of the Coast is clearly expecting these OGL changes to be met with some resistance. The document does note that if the company oversteps, they are aware that they "will receive community pushback and bad PR, and We're more than open to being convinced that We made a wrong decision."
WOTC takes a dump on the D&D OGL community.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by bzipitidoo on Wednesday January 11 2023, @07:37PM (3 children)
> I haven't played D&D for many editions now.
Same. The heyday was 2nd and earlier editions. Tried 3rd, 4th, and 5th, but circumstances had changed so much that we could no longer sustain a campaign. When you live on a college campus, there are interested people within 5 minutes walking distance. Outside of that, players live too far away, and we all have too many other things to do, both necessities and fun. Not least was MMORPGs. Perhaps now, we could run a campaign virtually, using tech only for video conferencing, rather than the still completely mechanistic dungeon mastering of the typical MMORPG. Human DMs, good ones, roll with innovative thinking. MMORPGs nerf it.
> large amount of content
I got schooled on the use of "modules", that is, pre-made adventures. Turned out that the players were all too familiar with them. You could dismiss as lucky one or two instances of looking in just the right place, but when it happened every time, and they all knew exactly what was behind every door and around every corner, it was painfully obvious I couldn't rely on pre-made stuff. Had to make my own content. Perhaps now "large" is large enough to avoid that?
(Score: 2, Insightful) by GloomMower on Wednesday January 11 2023, @08:17PM (2 children)
> Perhaps now "large" is large enough to avoid that?
I don't think there is any avoiding a player taking the initiative to look it up. I think that might be more common. No matter how large, it is easy to download whatever pre-made you are doing and read it ahead of time.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Wednesday January 11 2023, @11:58PM
(Score: 2) by Mykl on Monday January 23 2023, @03:03AM
Any player who actually wants to have fun will not look up the material ahead of playing. There are no prizes for "Winning" - the actual enjoyment is the gameplay itself.
Who am I kidding - this is 2023.