Game makers stage mass exodus from <em>Dungeons & Dragons</em>’ “open” license
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Only thing missing from that roll up is that the WotC Vp for the 1.0 license came out this week and said when they created the license, they specifically left.out any revocation method, because of future asshats doing shit like this. There is some very legal questions if WotC Hasbro can do anything under the old license because it's specifically in perpetuity without a revocation method.
(Doesn't stop new thing from going under 2.0 though:/ )
I'll be back for an edit with the source interview when I did it out oy my history.
Not the one I was looking for but relevant anyways:
"Unlike a bare license without consideration, an offer to contract like this cannot be revoked unilaterally once it has been accepted, under the law of Washington (where they are located) and other states."
That's from EFF analysis posted by another here in this thread.
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I'd have taken a different approach, but his/her larger point is that many people use that graduate-level degree to good effect, in the same way not all lawyers should be lined up against a wall. Tarring all people who hold a certain qualification with the same brush is a dubious practice. That some people make self-serving leadership decisions is a reflection on them, not their degree. Okay, it may also reflect on the institution granting them their degree...
Full disclosure: I have an MBA, along with other advanced degrees. My wife has an MBA, along with advanced certifications in her field, and my daughter is both a lawyer in the US and a registered solicitor in the UK. None of us are, in the words of Rhomann Dey, 100% a dick.
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There is such a thing as "more than I have a rational use for," and that's before I get the programmable light-up dice I kickstarted. Or the ones included in the games I have, such as Marvel Dice Throne or Star Wars Destiny, or even Yahtzee...
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Logged in specifically to downvote this. Edit: decided to be less snarky. Yeah, not all MBAs. Just like not all software developers are hackers. But this isn't about the MBAs, this is about the D&D fans and players and DMs.
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Not sure that using Mythic Adventures is a good image to decorate Paizo's point. That's a Pathfinder 1e book, and while Paizo argues that Pathfinder 2e is distinct enough to not fall under the OGL in the first place, they're not doing that for Pathfinder 1e (and for good reasons, since Pathfinder 1e is very recognizable still very D&D 3.5-ish).
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You do realise saying that whataboutism isn't a valid defence.
Also unlike characteristics one is born with such as race, or sex, or gender preference. Getting an MBA is a choice, and the reputation of MBAs isn't a new thing. Choices have consequences, and if you belong to a group who values money over people, don't be surprised about backlash from those people. Likewise those who chose a Fine Arts degree are known for asking would you like fries with that. Not all reputations are justified. But MBAs have dug their own ethical pit, and others have jumped in to keep digging despite all the examples.
Maybe if we saw MBAs valiantly stopping corporate capture, standing up for truth, justice and culture they might get a better rap.
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Checking out a new RPG certainly can be a fun experience and if that is what your group wants to do than by all means go for it. That said there are plenty of already 5E compatible material that exist so your group doesn't have to jump systems if they don't want but still add in new material to have what feels like a new game. Kobold Press certainly deserves a shout out with their supplementary material as well as Ultramodern 5e: Redux as well as Carbon: 2185. A lot of these 3rd party devs especially the smaller ones are a little worried about the recent developments and what it means for their future and certainly can use all the support they can get at the moment.
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Your list of other degrees indicate you are not the architype MBA people are implying when they call out the behavior of 'MBAs'.
But there is a trend where people get a MBA not to help them in business together with their other degrees, but to land a job in finance with no other degree.
Which in itself isn't a problem.
But unlike you (i.e disperate degrees), they lack broader knowledge, and tends to only see the bottom line. This is the person everybody loves to hate.
I've been called a nerd my whole life. I know what it feels like to be castigated. I've learnt to own it. Let your successes speak for itself, and people who know you have a MBA degree won't hold you in the same regard as 'those damn MBAs'.
Still, damn it would be a great world where people stop insulting others based on labels.
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Honestly, if you read the previous article(in short it was a leak of a open(meaning anyone could use it within rules) "gaming" license to possibly come for future iterations of D&D and other game systems that use THAT OGL and was very anti-open, greedy, and potentially 3rd party businesses that were built on it could be greatly damaged) you'd see it never ACTUALLY went through, but 3rd party publishers are now seeing WotC as a potential future liability to their business.
I personally don't use their digital services and only would if I could reasonably buy or pirate their digital content. If they chose to make books again, then I am willing to probably buy those as I lately have been. I've been wanting personally to convert all the 3rd/3.5ed content into 5ed anyway, so soon might be a great opportunity!
To me, D&D has decades of lore built into it that no other game system I've found has. D&D also has gone through a at least 1 Dark Age since I've been playing and even if it sinks now... I'll return to it perhaps in version 7 or 8 or 9 or X!
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Certainly WotC will be rolling with disadvantage from now on and lost all it's Charisma points.
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I don't really get the notion that the TTRPG industry is "flourishing". If I read the statements of a lot of smaller scale publishers that came out over the last few weeks I get the distinct impression that the opposite is true and that a lot of companies are actually floundering and struggling to make ends meet.
The only two companies that are in a reasonably good position in this space are Paizo and WotC and Paizo is still small time and WotC makes most of its money from Magic the Gathering and not D&D.
Everyone that is not Paizo or WotC seems to struggle a lot. Most have moved to crowd funding on Kickstarter or Indiegogo (even Ulysses which at one time was a pretty significant player in the space because of Das Schwarze Auge/The Dark Eye is now crowd funding new material) or they moved towards board games or selling of minis and merchandise as a main way to make money.
Fantasy Flight games even stated - if I remember correctly - that they do TTRPGs "as a hobby" and that they don't make a significant amount of money from publishing RPG material.
For me the whole move by WotC to go subscription only and to shut out 3rd parties from their eco system seems to point in the same direction in that WotC wants a better revenue stream than selling one dungeon master's guide and a few player's handbooks per group of players every 8 - 10 years until a new edition rolls around.
There's a lot of buzz surrounding TTRPGs and the amount of crowd funding in that space and the prominent media presence surrounding it because of halo projects like critical role and people streaming it on Twitch or Youtube might give people the impression that it's a booming segment.
Going by what I can see from companies that operate in this space though it seems more like a segment that is shrinking where the customer base is ageing and where it's hard to make any money.
For me the move from WotC looks like a move to try and consolidate and grab a bigger share of market that is no longer growing.
The only two companies that are in a reasonably good position in this space are Paizo and WotC and Paizo is still small time and WotC makes most of its money from Magic the Gathering and not D&D.
Everyone that is not Paizo or WotC seems to struggle a lot. Most have moved to crowd funding on Kickstarter or Indiegogo (even Ulysses which at one time was a pretty significant player in the space because of Das Schwarze Auge/The Dark Eye is now crowd funding new material) or they moved towards board games or selling of minis and merchandise as a main way to make money.
Fantasy Flight games even stated - if I remember correctly - that they do TTRPGs "as a hobby" and that they don't make a significant amount of money from publishing RPG material.
For me the whole move by WotC to go subscription only and to shut out 3rd parties from their eco system seems to point in the same direction in that WotC wants a better revenue stream than selling one dungeon master's guide and a few player's handbooks per group of players every 8 - 10 years until a new edition rolls around.
There's a lot of buzz surrounding TTRPGs and the amount of crowd funding in that space and the prominent media presence surrounding it because of halo projects like critical role and people streaming it on Twitch or Youtube might give people the impression that it's a booming segment.
Going by what I can see from companies that operate in this space though it seems more like a segment that is shrinking where the customer base is ageing and where it's hard to make any money.
For me the move from WotC looks like a move to try and consolidate and grab a bigger share of market that is no longer growing.
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The movie is coming out. They're prepared to make gangbusters on it. The goodwill they'll lose by making an "Open" Gaming License 2.0 which solidifies their hold on their little chunk of the TTRPG market would be completely negated by how much money they're going to make on their IP with the movie. So what if they piss off the most vocal aspects of the community and destroy their reputation - they're going to get more butts in seats with their other media sources that will replace those people when they finalize OneDnD...
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@Kyle Orland Great article, just 1 comment, while WotC and by proxy Hasbro have been busy banging the drum that it was a leaked draft... but last time I checked, leaked drafts do not come with contracts to sign for those creators that received copies.
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Many of those small publishers are really small, and can't just cover the cost to layout and print a new book without some assistance, crowdfunding is ideal for that. And those very small publishers have been publishing books quite frequently through that model. Many of them making more niche games too.
Nerdburger Games is a pretty good example of one such company.
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I get that but when even (reasonably) big players in this space move from outright publishing material to crowdfunding thier flagship products it tells me that there's not a lot of money in publishing RPG material anymore.
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There never was, though.
So yeah: it's true, TSR and WotC are the ones really making the money. Paizo does okay too, at least in terms of gross revenue and making slightly more money than you could expect to earn by working for a wage.
But the deeper you dig, the thinner the margins, and it's always been that way. WotC has for a long time had a habit of hiring big guns to develop their systems and then laying them off because they can't afford to keep them after they get their Player's Handbook out on shelves. They're finally keeping staff longer-term now, as far as I can tell, so there's some improvement there. Paizo's business practices are in part a response to that, but their staff are paid terribly and work long hours, a situation which has only started to be remedied in the past year or so. (It wasn't the only or even the main thing driving their recent unionization, but it sounds like it was a factor.) 5e being a bigger factor has reduced their revenue ceiling, so they're not great, but they really diversified and built a subscription-based model around their adventures that gives them an ability to project revenue in a way that almost nobody else has in the market.
Old-school third-party publishing was always desperately hanging on by a thread; nowadays, some of those shops actually have full-time employees (gasp!) but not many of them, because they're not making that much money. A lot of them are still just one or two dudes (and yeah, it's mostly dudes) working on things in their free time and throwing stuff at RPG Now. There's a small army of freelancers who get paid a couple hundred bucks per "work" who still keep their day jobs, but they get paid a lot more than they used to, and you have more full-time RPG artists than you used to even as the quality is going up. (Interestingly enough, Magic the Gathering has been a huge opportunity for mid-career fantasy artists.)
Other systems go through phases where they release a new system and can keep people for a while and then they run out of steam, lay everyone off, and sell their system to another publishing house. Look at how many hands Shadowrun has passed through! Or World of Darkness! And those are big. There aren't too many Paizos or Chaosiums out there who maintain control of their own IP over the long term, and that's mostly because of money. But they're in a situation now where they're a lot more professional now than they used to be; gone are the days when you would go and pick up a major release that had been printed on 8.5x11 at the local print shop and bound with staples. And there are more of them!
But yeah, RPGs are still not a way to make money. It's like board gaming: a passion industry full of broken dreams and empty wallets.
(edit: I'm tired, wrote more.)
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Depends are they going to make Marvel astronomical levels of money or DC pocket change levels?
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True, but even if there was, there would be a couple arguments in favor of crowdfunding.
First, it shifts revenue forward. Under a trad pub system, all of the costs are up front and revenue comes on the back end. If you don't have significant cash reserves (and see "there's not a lot of money in publishing RPG material"), that means borrowing money to cover costs and paying it back out of receipts later. With crowdfunding, a portion of the revenue comes in up front, so there's cash on hand to cover the costs of production. The platform takes a cut, but the publisher may still come out ahead compared to borrowing, and the certainty makes production less risky.
Second, it allows the publisher to gauge interest before production. A failed crowdfunding campaign means you don't produce something that doesn't have a market. A failed trad pub product can mean you get distributors returning unsold books for reimbursement and have to scramble to come up with the loan payments that the failed book was supposed to pay for. That can kill a company - it's what did in GDW back in the 1990s.
So, even if traditional publishing is an option for a company, they may still choose crowdfunding for the additional stability/security it provides on the financial end of the business.
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I get the joke that people are trying to make ("WotC rolled a natural 1"), but it's a bad analogy. Rolling a 1 is a tough break when one attempts an action at which one might succeed: "I swing my longsword +1 at the ogre... Oh, no! Critical fail!" In that case, you tried something sensible and had bad luck.
Hasbro/WotC isn't having bad luck. They made a catastrophically bad decision and then lied about it. In game terms, they told the DM that they wanted to hit the key support pillars of their stronghold with wrecking balls +5, and when the stronghold started to collapse, they tried to reassure everyone that they were just remodeling.
Note that WotC itself is trying to play the "Whoopsy-daisy! Rolled a 1! Happens to everyone, right?" card, but the rest of the party knows lawful evil when they see it. Our characters weren't rolled up yesterday.
Hasbro/WotC isn't having bad luck. They made a catastrophically bad decision and then lied about it. In game terms, they told the DM that they wanted to hit the key support pillars of their stronghold with wrecking balls +5, and when the stronghold started to collapse, they tried to reassure everyone that they were just remodeling.
Note that WotC itself is trying to play the "Whoopsy-daisy! Rolled a 1! Happens to everyone, right?" card, but the rest of the party knows lawful evil when they see it. Our characters weren't rolled up yesterday.
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Might have been mentioned but your timelines are wrong. WOTC purchased TSR in 1997 I still remember it happening. In turn WOTC was acquired by Hasbro in 1999. The OGL was originally put in place by Hasbro not WOTC.
People keep acting like Hasbro is relatively new to DND/MTG. They have owned the brand for over 20 years now.
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I still have that manual somewhere, cover separated from contents. I am not sure about the dice. IIRC, those dice wore really quickly compared to later dice I purchased.
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Hack-n-Slash
Ars Legatus Legionis
Well, that depends. The 'vocal aspects' are beating on that drum as well.
https://gamerant.com/dungeons-and-dragons-movie-boycott/
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Basic/Expert D&D is still better imo than anything that came after, including AD&D 1/2, D&D 3/4/5 (really AD&D, they just dropped the A), Pathfinder...
Labyrinth Lord is one of many compatible modern games - "retroclones" as it were. Maybe give it a shot, you can still use your old books.
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Doesn't look like anyone posted this take yet:
View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MkIg7MHMRn0
tl;dw:
Hasbro is betting big on their new virtual table top (VTT) platform for 6th edition, aka One D&D. At the same time, they are changing license terms to give themselves a larger cut of the DLC pie.
In other news, leaks yesterday indicate that Hasbro also plans to jack up the price of D&D Beyond.
View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MkIg7MHMRn0
tl;dw:
Hasbro is betting big on their new virtual table top (VTT) platform for 6th edition, aka One D&D. At the same time, they are changing license terms to give themselves a larger cut of the DLC pie.
In other news, leaks yesterday indicate that Hasbro also plans to jack up the price of D&D Beyond.
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You really tried to pass yourself off as being every bit the victim as actually oppressed minority groups, and you don't understand how vile that was?
MBAs suck. Period. There has never been an MBA that done anything but make the world worse.
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One thing that jumped out at me shopping yesterday... The majority of Hasbro action figures on the shelves were reissues. There was a "MCU Legacy" Marvel Legends series that was entirely previously released Black Panther figures, and a batch of Star Wars Black Series figures that were all repackaged "anniversary" Empire Strikes Back characters.
In and of themselves, action figure reissues aren't unusual or bad, but in conjunction with no new product and all of the other bad press Hasbro has going on...it was an interesting picture.
(And, admittedly, sample size of one store, but still...)
In and of themselves, action figure reissues aren't unusual or bad, but in conjunction with no new product and all of the other bad press Hasbro has going on...it was an interesting picture.
(And, admittedly, sample size of one store, but still...)
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and while they found a few instances of infringing in almost all cases it was found not too
and the issue more or less in scrabble is it is so basic a game that almost all expressions you can come up wiht will be seen as a derivitive copyrighted work
start adding some actual complexity to things and you can find ways to make the expressions differant enough
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wrong they announced there will be a 2.0 ogl NOT 1.1 nice to update you on several parts of where you have been wrong
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This is what happens when MBAs take over a business. They don't understand the relationship of the business to its customers and they don't understand the nature of the "product". The MBAs failed to understand the symbiotic nature of the relationship between D&D and its content creators and only saw a potential source of revenue they could tap.
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What's interesting about your analogy is what Bethesda has done with mods - something Hasbro/WotC could have learned from. First, they found a way to make a subset of mods available on console (first XBox, then PS). That included Creators Club content, which could be free or paid for. Then most recently they released a special anniversary edition of the game that rolled in access to many mods. And people have been buying it, even though the core is now a 12-year old game. IOW they found a way to monetize the work of content creators without alienating those creators.
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