#ogl 1.0a

[dungeonmastersconsortium]

I'M TENTATIVELY FUCKING STOKED AT THE OFFICIAL ANNOUNCEMENT

[leidensygdom]

D&D Beyond on Twitter

“Over the past few weeks you, the community, have made your voices heard. And we’ve listened. OGL 1.0a will remain untouched AND the entire SRD 5.1 is now available under a Creative Commons license.🧵 https://t.co/hJTm2Rgruo”

[Image ID: A tweet by D&D Beyond (blue checkmark) @/DndBeyond, posted during January 27, that reads: Your feedback in the OGL 1.2 survey is already clear and we are acting on it:

-62% are satisfied with adding the SRD to Creative Commons & those dissatisfied want more in CC

-89% are dissatisfied with deauthorizing OGL 1.0a

-88% do not want to publish content under OGL 1.2. End ID]

Well! This was just posted. The overwhelming negative feedback about the new OGL, people making their voices heard, third parties cutting ties with WOTC and moving to other places (including the competition) as well as the boycotting seem to have given some results. 

I am posting this very shortly after the announcement, so I am currently unaware if there may be some secret caveat here (Pardon me for being overly wary, WOTC has made a lot of shady moves lately), but this sounds quite promising. (Let’s remember the OGL 1.0a was irrevocable to start with, so there’s no need to paint them as saviours for not doing something that was probably illegal, but...) All in all, the community made it clear the new OGL was bad, and WOTC lost the trust of quite a lot of people on the way. I don’t think they will completely recover their image from this, as they’ve shown what they’re truly after, but this is a good backstep still.

(For the record, OneDnD may be based on a different OGL. This is fine. If they do, they may just repeat what happened with 4e if it’s particularly bad.)

I’ll keep updating if something comes up about this announcement. I want to tell everyone a massive thank you for keeping up with me during all the OGL talk, and for people to have voiced and pushed against the new OGL, for participating in the surveys and partaking in the boycott. All of that has been crucial to make our voices heard- And as a creator, it’s reassuring to see this is finally looking better.

[dianalucifera]

this is a reminder that all officially released content for pathfinder 2e is available here on archives of nethys, an officially sanctioned (and free!) database! that means it is literally everything you need to play! there is no reason to continue giving wizards and hasbro your money. if you find that you like the system enough to support it then by all means purchase some content of course but there is absolutely no investment of money necessary to play this game. please stop giving wizards your money for a mediocre system

[saturnfulcrum]

Since it's well known that Hasbro/WOTC doesn't read survey results, we should all ask them to do something silly in the new OGL survey. Something like:

"To regain my trust - and to prove that you care about my opinion - please make a new post on the official WOTC website (NOT DDB) that only says the word "shnuffle-fluff". Thank you.

[robothyenawasteland]

I think a contributing factor to this ongoing OGL mess is Hasbro/WotC higher-ups conflating “dnd” with “Dungeons & Dragons.”

We’re really talking about two things here. There’s one thing: a tabletop roleplaying rules system for playing out fantasy-themed scenarios with dice, figurines, and character sheets.

And then there is THE FORGOTTEN REALMS©, a proprietary fantasy setting featuring creatures like beholders©, Githyanki©, and the dreaded mind flayers©, not to mention fan-favorite characters like Drizzt Do’Urden©! THE FORGOTTEN REALMS takes place on the continent of Faerûn©, on the planet Toril©, which used to be called Abeir-Toril©, which was the case until the dreaded Spellplague©--

You get the idea. From the perspective of ‘the suits,’ they’ve watched DnD take off since the advent of 5th edition, as the game expanded beyond what was previously thought possible. What triggered it? The OGL, certainly, allowing people to make third-party content for the game (most of it not Forgotten Realms). Critical Role (also not Forgotten Realms) played a part. Probably, to a certain extent, sheer intertia. DnD, it turns out, is pretty good for playing fantasy-themed scenarios with dice, figurines, and character sheets. Incidentially, people sometimes pick-and-choose pieces of the Forgotten Realms(©) to include in their games. Sometimes people even use WotC’s first-party adventure books and tweak them to suit their needs. 

My sneaking suspicion is that the people at the top don’t really see it that way. To them, the visuals, the details, especially the Named Characters and Things, are one in the same with the rules system. The rules system is, indeed, quite secondary! Why, after all, would people be buying all these little WizKids DnD figurines, signing up for DnDBeyond, if they were not having canon-appropriate adventures in The Forgotten Realms©, in cities like Waterdeep© and Baldur’s Gate©?

To them, the OGL constitutes people being able to muck about and muddy the waters in their pond. Why, they might do things that cut against canon, possibly confusing readers who happen across them! This could be dreadful. This could damage the brand. And the brand is the Forgotten Realms and the characters, creatures, spells, and scenarios therein, all of which are ripe for further use in movies, novels, video games, comic books, NFTs, and other stuff.

You might say, “How does OGL content conflict with Hasbro/WotC’s official releases? It’s not like a third-party is going to release a competing film, or something that could challenge their market dominance.” You aren’t thinking like a corpo (that’s from Cyberpunk). Consider Nintendo’s highly litigious stamping-out of fan content. Disney’s ironclad control over images of the Mouse. Neither have anything like the OGL, of course, but similar logic animates the DnD situation: things which could pose a problem should be stymied before they can ever become a problem. An unsecure (from their perspective) OGL is a time bomb waiting to blow, with the potential for someone to make a lot of money using their rules (rules which, remember, exist in subservience to their copyrighted settings) in a way that undermines their careful image management.

So, I think that’s why they want to corral the OGL into something more secure, from their perspective. Why risk it, when the thing you want more than anything is a customer base that sees it the way you do, a rules-system and setting that cannot be unspooled from one another?

(If you want my other opinion, its that Hasbro is a publicly-traded company, and DnD is now a significant chunk of their revenue, and that means Line Must Go Up, or Investors Get Mad.)

[aspencrown]

OneD&D, the OGL 1.1 Leak, and the Grim Future of Dungeons & Dragons

Hey folks, long time no talk. While I know that this account is more or less a place for me to put up pretty pictures or to comment on political issues nowadays, I figured I may as well rant talk about a topic I'm pretty passionate about: D&D and tabletop roleplaying in general. Or to be more precise, the changes looming in the distance.

On the chance that this is the first time you (the reader) have heard about this OGL 1.1 stuff, I'll try to sum up what's been happening in the world of D&D and its Open Game License. In short? It's bad. Very bad.

What's Going On?

Over the past month or so, after a rather unnerving article published by Dicebreaker about D&D execs feeling the hobby was "under-monetized", there's been a lot of tension building about the future of D&D. It eventually came to a head with rumors floating around Twitter and YouTube about OneD&D was going to do something to the existing OGL and that the new license would be hyper-predatory. This prompted WotC to publish a reply, which was rife with the usual corporate soft-speak that made it clear that they weren't being entirely truthful. But it did what it was meant to and calmed some of the concerned fans.

Then on January 5th, the leaked 1.1 OGL was revealed via an article on Gizmodo and was found to be a 9,000 word document with contracts attached (which, for reference, is 10 times that of the current OGL -- which has far more friendly 900 words). Whoever leaked it to Gizmodo apparently did so under breach of NDA (Though there are theories about it being intentionally leaked) and it appears that WotC was initially intending to launch a shock-and-awe scorched earth campaign against all third-party content creators, big and small, by moving to revoke the long-standing OGL 1.0a.

Why is the OGL 1.1 Bad?

The easier question to answer is what's good about it, which are new protections against publishing creations that contain hatespeech, racism, transphobia, and so on -- on top of protecting the property from NFTs and such.

Though to put it very briefly (and bluntly) on what's awful about OGL 1.1, it seeks to make D&D inhospitable (or outright toxic) to any and all third-party content creators; drive out competition in virtual tabletops like Foundry and Alchemy RPG *; doing away with non-official virtual tools (Kobold Fight Club comes to mind); potentially harm streamers and YouTube content creators; claim ownership over creations from both non-commercial and commercial homebrew; demanding exorbitant royalties based not off of profit, but revenue; and expect creators to report their finances and earnings to them like they're the IRS.

If this OGL is made official, not only will it kill the vibrant homebrew community D&D has, but it will also go after other TTRPGs that utilize the OGL 1.0a out of good faith over these past 23 years. This means Pathfinder 1 & 2, Fate, Mutants and Masterminds, and many more are now in WotC/Hasbro's crosshairs.

Solasta: Crown of the Magister, and other video games like it, is also at risk as it uses elements from D&D's OGL.

Big name streamers like Critical Role and Dimension 20 might also be affected by this, but as they have currently not made any official stance on the matter it is unknown if they will stand with fans or broker some sort of agreement with WotC/Hasbro. (Note: This is not meant as a jab, caution over one's IP and livelihood is always important.)

There's a lot more that's scary about it that others listed below have covered, but know that the verbiage in the new OGL as it stands is belligerent and harmful to everyone. *Roll20 and Fantasy Grounds will likely be safe, as they already have contracts with WotC.

What Can You Do About it?

Honestly, be loud. Don't threaten or curse, of course, but make your displeasure known. Go fill out OneD&D's survey (decline to review the Cleric changes) and voice your concern. Cancel your D&D Beyond subscription, if you have one. Go on Twitter and join in on #opendnd. Sign this petition perhaps.

Remain vigilant to whatever may change, because it's only a matter of time until Wizards does their staged apology to deflect.

Aside from it being a typical tactic when adjusting the Overton Window, it even says in the document that they "will receive community pushback and bad PR" and that "[They're] more than open to being convinced that [They] made a wrong decision."

Keep the pressure on, because whatever changes they will so "graciously" give us will surely still be terrible.

Relevant Reading / Viewing

Dungeons & Dragons executives think 'the brand is really under monetized'

OGLs, SRDs, & One D&D (WotC's milquetoast reply to December's circulating rumors)

Dungeons & Dragons’ New License Tightens Its Grip on Competition (This is where the OGL 1.1 was leaked)

Let’s Take A Minute To Talk About D&D’s Open Gaming License (OGL) (An explanation from an IP lawyer with experience in gaming licenses.)

The Rules Lawyer's commentary and explanation (Video)

Roll of Law's commentary (Video)

Scintilla Studio's OGL 1.1 and the Extinction of D&D (Video)

Closing Thoughts

I'm a relative newcomer to the world of D&D and TTRPGs. I've always wanted to try it, but the idea of playing at a table with random people terrified me. It wasn't until the semi-recent (okay, maybe not so recent anymore) advent of virtual tabletops was I given hope. So when a kind pigeon gave me a spot in her game, I was hooked from then on.

I dove into the world of TTRPGs and haven't looked back since. Though over the past year or so, I've been getting a little disenchanted with WotC as their last couple of publishings have been very lackluster and disappointing. The last one I enjoyed was Van Richten's Guide to Ravenloft, but even then I wished they did more with it. And don't get me started over the recent Mordenkainen's and Spelljammer...

Third-party content, everything from little up-and-comers on the /r/Unearthed Arcana subreddit, to @the-griffons-saddlebag, to big Kickstarters like Heliana's and Steinhardt's were the things that have kept the hobby vibrant for me. I'll always support them over a corporation, especially greedy and vicious ones like WotC-Hasbro. So even if they dial back what has been leaked to something more "tolerable". Hell, even if they leave the OGL 1.0a alone after all, they made their choice with trying to pull the rug out from under us with this.

While my love for D&D will not die, I can certainly promise that WotC will not see another cent from me from here on out.

[abislwise]

HOLY SHIT, WE WON https://www.dndbeyond.com/posts/1439-ogl-1-0a-creative-commons

[hyliandude]