I'm working on "A Thing(TM)(R)(C)," which isn't yet ready for public examination but is almost baked enough for collaboration. I want to refine the idea privately and ensure everything is well-armored, relevant, and persuasive before I go public. I plan to release a video series laying out all the arguments in bite-sized pieces alongside some merch someone could use to show their support. I may or may not donate the proceeds to charity, assuming one on the merch vendor's list is appropriate. I think YouTube and possibly Rumble (depending on how easy that is), but I am open to input. I mainly want the message out.
The core idea is this - WotC has had a year to make things right with the community. They haven't. Here is a list of reasons why you should give your money and time to other creators.
It will be timed to coincide with the 1st anniversary of the attempted murder of OGL 1.0a...
As for the venue, I'm open to whatever as well. Discord seems appropriate. I have one, or I would happily join one. Here would work if it were private enough (but I don't think it is.) I'd think surprise is a factor here, as their marketing department is more extensive than mine...
TL,DR - Please let me know if you'd like to help refine a persuasive argument to quit D&D.
The timing is really bad for me to get involved but I wish you luck.
The whole white men need no longer play thing pissed me off so much I boxed up all my WOTC 5e stuff and mailed it back to WOTC and asked for a refund. Of course I didn't get one but I feel it was worth it. Now imagine several hundred guys doing it all at once.
They never did walk that back, did they?
One can quit WOTC and still enjoy D&D. There was plenty of D&D goodness before WOTC came along and it is still good. So as I crack open my AD&D tomes, I can can simply enjoy without giving a thought, or a dime to WOTC. That is the Staples Easy Button of quitting.
Quote from: mcbobbo on November 29, 2023, 05:17:13 PM
They never did walk that back, did they?
Nope.
At this point I'm hoping Hasbro goes into receivership in the next couple of years.
Quote from: Exploderwizard on November 29, 2023, 08:33:02 PM
One can quit WOTC and still enjoy D&D. There was plenty of D&D goodness before WOTC came along and it is still good. So as I crack open my AD&D tomes, I can can simply enjoy without giving a thought, or a dime to WOTC. That is the Staples Easy Button of quitting.
How does one quit a lifestyle brand by continuing to contribute to its zeitgeist?
Quote from: mcbobbo on November 30, 2023, 07:42:22 AM
How does one quit a lifestyle brand by continuing to contribute to its zeitgeist?
I wonder if there is a single zeitgeist or a set of branching ones. Continuing to play TSR's B/X or AD&D doesn't feel like a contribution to the modern WoTC 5e ecosystem to me.
I know some folks who own Studebakers, but they don't consider themselves AMC nor Chrysler fans.
Quote from: JackFS4 on November 30, 2023, 09:03:08 AMI know some folks who own Studebakers, but they don't consider themselves AMC nor Chrysler fans.
But would AMC or Chrysler count them among their happy customers? That, I think, is the issue with continuing to associate with D&D lineage games. Chris Cox will include you when he reports strong brand performance to his shareholders. Particularly when you're buying DMsGuild PDFs, used products on Mercari, licensed shirts, etc. Either you're supporting competitors or you're building the brand through association.
Each of us gets to decide if association is still appropriate while WotC benefits from the good will it generates. If you'd like to poke holes in the framing I will use to make this case, you're in the right thread.
Define D&D.
Are OSE, OSRIC, and Swords & Wizardry D&D?
Quote from: mcbobbo on November 30, 2023, 12:17:06 PM
But would AMC or Chrysler count them among their happy customers? That, I think, is the issue with continuing to associate with D&D lineage games. Chris Cox will include you when he reports strong brand performance to his shareholders. Particularly when you're buying DMsGuild PDFs, used products on Mercari, licensed shirts, etc. Either you're supporting competitors or you're building the brand through association.
Does WotC count Pathfinder customers as 'loyal customers'?
Buying WotC-owned or licensed products definitely feeds the brand, but I have a hard time believing that supporting a game that simply has a common ancestry does the same. And the OSR material that deliberately reaches out to association with nostalgia for the D&D IP seems to become a smaller and smaller part of the movement each year. (Troll Lords is leveraging the Gygax stuff again, but Gygax has been pretty soundly disassociated from the Current D&D Brand for nearly forty years at this point.)
Quote from: rytrasmi on November 30, 2023, 01:00:37 PM
Are OSE, OSRIC, and Swords & Wizardry D&D?
Quote from: Armchair Gamer on November 30, 2023, 01:19:32 PMDoes WotC count Pathfinder customers as 'loyal customers'?
These waters are muddy in the first instance. "D&D" is best defined as a collection of ideas that Gygax took (some say stole) from other games to make a marketable product. There's never going to be a clear lineage to a game that uses ship combat statistics as a measurement of health. So let's not go down rabbit holes.
The answer to the both of you is the same, and it's in two parts:
1) Does WotC see the money you're spending as competitive, and
2) Does the public see what you are doing as a market alternative to what WotC sells?
(The permission granted by the OGL could also be a factor here, but that's its own topic so I'm setting it aside.)
Is OSR competitive to D&D? Yes. Brand-wise, "OSR" has pretty much gotten there. People know what it is, and the brand has enough demand for outsiders to seek to take it over on places like reddit. So that's a 'yes' for both tests there. Few are looking at Knave and thinking it's the same game as 5e.
Pathfinder is a 'yes' in the first test for me, for sure, but the second is less clear. Books like Battlezoo can print for both, so that doesn't seem like something the public would see as distinct to me.
A major theme for me in this is individual choice. I'm not here to tell you what to 'do', even if I make suggestions. I see my mission more as giving you things to think about so you can make a decision. But I very much want each person to decide what they are comfortable with, after having considered it.
And I suspect that many if not most in the industry and/or on YouTube cannot hear my message at all. As Upton Sinclair is often quoted, "It is difficult to get a man to understand something when his salary depends upon his not understanding it." And this was *before* algorithmic engagement in the online world. It's certainly more difficult now.
I recommend your argument be unequivocal as to what "D&D" means for purposes of the argument. It doesn't have to be unassailable, but it should be clear. Otherwise people with a different definition of D&D will tune out. Same for "OSR". Probably best to avoid that term because it means wildly different things to different people.
Your goal is to help people to decide to stop giving WotC more money, correct? So, OSE, OSRIC, etc should be fine, as should used TSR products and stuff like that. Delving into the realm of things that might be perceived by the public as "D&D" is a waste of time IMO because nobody knows the public's mind but everyone thinks they do. In fact, any game that used or still uses the OGL should be fine because they were the direct targets of WotC's attack or at very least they were acceptable collateral damage.
For the purpose of the argument I define D&D in the same way WotC does:
The all-encompassing under monetized lifestyle brand.
If we reject only the books that were printed after a certain date without also rejecting the TV shows, the movies, the cookbook, and Baldur's Gate 3, then I humbly submit we will utterly fail in getting a point across.
Also if you reject only that which is easy to reject because it held no interest for you anyway, are you actually doing anything at all?
Quote from: mcbobbo on November 30, 2023, 03:23:33 PM
For the purpose of the argument I define D&D in the same way WotC does:
The all-encompassing under monetized lifestyle brand.
If we reject only the books that were printed after a certain date without also rejecting the TV shows, the movies, the cookbook, and Baldur's Gate 3, then I humbly submit we will utterly fail in getting a point across.
I think the confusion was that you started this subthread by reacting against Exploderwizard's suggestion to use pre-WotC material. Now, I do think there's potential for that to feed into the brand, but only in the most minute or remote ways--if someone purchases or encourages (explicitly or implicitly) others to purchase the PDFs or reprints from DriveThru/DMGuild, or otherwise feeds attention into the current product. But that's very much an edge case, IMO.
Quote
Also if you reject only that which is easy to reject because it held no interest for you anyway, are you actually doing anything at all?
Good point. Since I have no interest in anything related to D&D anymore aside from some old 2E or OGL material, I should probably absent myself from this discussion.
Quote from: Armchair Gamer on November 30, 2023, 03:36:58 PMI think the confusion was that you started this subthread by reacting against Exploderwizard's suggestion to use pre-WotC material. Now, I do think there's potential for that to feed into the brand, but only in the most minute or remote ways--if someone purchases or encourages (explicitly or implicitly) others to purchase the PDFs or reprints from DriveThru/DMGuild, or otherwise feeds attention into the current product. But that's very much an edge case, IMO.
Let's try a context shift.
Assuming this position: "I wish to disassociate myself from Star Wars because I don't support what Disney is doing with the brand."
Is it consistent to buy and wear a shirt promoting A New Hope?
And, optionally, would a member of the public see you wearing that shirt and understand your position on what Disney is doing with the brand? Seems to me they would assume the opposite.
Finally, same position but a Star Trek shirt. The issues go away, right?
Not quite clear why this is hard, unless there's a desire to exclude the things labeled "D&D" at the top center of their front cover that you happen to like.
Personally, I think the best was to send a huge Fuck You to WotC is to take the CC srd, make a vastly superior game with it that doesn't inject their activism nonsense into it, and then overtake D&D much like pathfinder did back in the day.
5e imo is a great system at its core that has been underutilized and advanced upon by WotC so they can retain their geek tourists which infected the hobby. Critical Role and Stranger Things setback the hobby by decades imo.
Going the YouTube route seems pointless imo. All the WotC shills who feigned outrage when the ogl shit hit the fan have all gone back to giving WotC hickies on its taint. He'll just today Ghostfire games and the Dungeon Dudes agreed to sell their products directly on D&D beyond. So the "in" crowd on YT will continue to kiss the WotC ring and either ignore your video or, if you do start to gain traction, they'll just call you an alt incel.
Quote from: Monero on November 30, 2023, 06:10:03 PM
Personally, I think the best was to send a huge Fuck You to WotC is to take the CC srd, make a vastly superior game with it that doesn't inject their activism nonsense into it, and then overtake D&D much like pathfinder did back in the day.
Go for it, but don't be surprised when WotC claims credit for it, like they have claimed credit for BG3 (which they had nothing to do with other than granting permission.)
Quote from: Monero on November 30, 2023, 06:10:03 PM
Going the YouTube route seems pointless imo. All the WotC shills who feigned outrage when the ogl shit hit the fan have all gone back to giving WotC hickies on its taint. He'll just today Ghostfire games and the Dungeon Dudes agreed to sell their products directly on D&D beyond. So the "in" crowd on YT will continue to kiss the WotC ring and either ignore your video or, if you do start to gain traction, they'll just call you an alt incel.
You may have missed the Sinclair quote above, but I agree. They cannot hear me. Their brains simply won't process the dissonance unless they're very, very intelligent.
My target is their audience, who isn't getting paid to support D&D like they are.
Quote from: Monero on November 30, 2023, 06:10:03 PM
Personally, I think the best was to send a huge Fuck You to WotC is to take the CC srd, make a vastly superior game with it that doesn't inject their activism nonsense into it, and then overtake D&D much like pathfinder did back in the day.
5e imo is a great system at its core that has been underutilized and advanced upon by WotC so they can retain their geek tourists which infected the hobby. Critical Role and Stranger Things setback the hobby by decades imo.
Going the YouTube route seems pointless imo. All the WotC shills who feigned outrage when the ogl shit hit the fan have all gone back to giving WotC hickies on its taint. He'll just today Ghostfire games and the Dungeon Dudes agreed to sell their products directly on D&D beyond. So the "in" crowd on YT will continue to kiss the WotC ring and either ignore your video or, if you do start to gain traction, they'll just call you an alt incel.
I agree. 5e has two main issues, too many PC options piled on it and too much HP growth. Other than that, the game mechanics are solid and easily usable for all kinds of things.
Quote from: mcbobbo on November 30, 2023, 06:14:28 PM
Go for it, but don't be surprised when WotC claims credit for it, like they have claimed credit for BG3 (which they had nothing to do with other than granting permission.)
That's just idiotic as a standard.
If the bar is "WotC might try to claim credit for it" we may as well get out of playing RPGs entirely, because WotC has claimed all RPGs only exist because D&D paved the way.
They claim some credit for RPGs in their entirety.
Savage Worlds? Palladium Books? GURPS? WotC can claim credit because it wouldn't exist without D&D.
No.
Your net is too broad for your own claims to hold merit with average people. Find some more reasonable position than what "WotC might try to claim."
The argument "well if you aren't giving something up are you really sacrificing?" is similar idiocy. If someone isn't purchasing anything from WotC they're already 100% doing what you want. Demanding extra on top as a show of loyalty to you (they're already in line with the cause... and were in line before your campaign even reached them) is just going to alienate them.
Your whole attitude feels more like a cry for attention and "me, me, me" than a genuine attempt at anything meaningful (if it were just about WotC, then people already not buying from them would be enough... but you demand a performance from them as a sign they're loyal to you specifically... not to the broader goal).
So try again with something more reasonable.
You're strawmanning me, and I can't quite determine why from your reply.
Quote from: Chris24601 on December 04, 2023, 09:11:41 AM
That's just idiotic as a standard.
Good thing it isn't a standard. The standard is "don't build the brand".
Where did I claim it was a standard?
Quote from: Chris24601 on December 04, 2023, 09:11:41 AM
Savage Worlds? Palladium Books? GURPS? WotC can claim credit because it wouldn't exist without D&D.
This is debatable by the facts (the game type existed before Gary sought to make it profitable.) It is also unthinkable that WotC would name another successful, competitive brand as an example of their success. Anyone who hasn't accepted a license from them and hasn't created a derivative of their work could likely sue.
Where did I claim WotC would try to take credit for Savage Worlds?
Quote from: Chris24601 on December 04, 2023, 09:11:41 AM
Your net is too broad for your own claims to hold merit with average people. Find some more reasonable position than what "WotC might try to claim."
Again, the position is "do not build the brand". I've already said that OSR seems distinct enough, so how did you feel confident enough to twist my position to this quote?
Quote from: Chris24601 on December 04, 2023, 09:11:41 AM
The argument "well if you aren't giving something up are you really sacrificing?" is similar idiocy. If someone isn't purchasing anything from WotC they're already 100% doing what you want. Demanding extra on top as a show of loyalty to you (they're already in line with the cause... and were in line before your campaign even reached them) is just going to alienate them.
There is no "me" in this, period.
The message isn't intended to reach Paizo loyalists, True Savages, and the like. It's intended for D&D players.
My comment had a simple context: If you're not a D&D player, you're not the target for the message.
How did you miss that?
Quote from: Chris24601 on December 04, 2023, 09:11:41 AM
Your whole attitude feels more like a cry for attention and "me, me, me" than a genuine attempt at anything meaningful (if it were just about WotC, then people already not buying from them would be enough... but you demand a performance from them as a sign they're loyal to you specifically... not to the broader goal).
Please demonstrate some evidence that this is true, because it feels pretty libelous, honestly.
Quote from: Chris24601 on December 04, 2023, 09:11:41 AM
So try again with something more reasonable.
I owe you no such duty, as you're not interested in participating beyond attacking me (for whatever reason), and that's not the point of this topic - it's intended to find collaborators.
Quote from: rytrasmi on November 30, 2023, 01:00:37 PM
Define D&D.
Are OSE, OSRIC, and Swords & Wizardry D&D?
Close enough, for the rest of our lives.
You're going to donate proceeds from an argument?
Quote from: Domina on December 05, 2023, 09:53:01 AM
You're going to donate proceeds from an argument?
I have merch. It has Fivr art and a catchy slogan. I'm considering letting all the profit from that go to charity.
Quote from: mcbobbo on December 05, 2023, 10:09:34 AM
Quote from: Domina on December 05, 2023, 09:53:01 AM
You're going to donate proceeds from an argument?
I have merch. It has Fivr art and a catchy slogan. I'm considering letting all the profit from that go to charity.
I wouldn't know how practical this would be but it would be nice if you used the money to actually print some of the cool games that are open licensed and trade them for 5e books at tables. Then make a show of burning the books on a bon fire on youtube.
Edit: Burn the 5e books I mean, not the cool ones.
Quote from: BadApple on December 05, 2023, 10:19:05 AM
I wouldn't know how practical this would be but it would be nice if you used the money to actually print some of the cool games that are open licensed and trade them for 5e books at tables. Then make a show of burning the books on a bon fire on youtube.
Edit: Burn the 5e books I mean, not the cool ones.
It's incredibly easy. I've been using threadless.com for the few company t-shirts I've had made over the years. You just click "Causes and Charities" on the design, select the one you want, and the level you want to donate. They handle the rest.
The only hard part would be picking a charity that isn't SUPER lefty:
https://www.threadless.com/causes/
EDIT: Donating is easy, but you're limited to what's on the list.
Quote from: mcbobbo on December 05, 2023, 10:37:41 AM
Quote from: BadApple on December 05, 2023, 10:19:05 AM
I wouldn't know how practical this would be but it would be nice if you used the money to actually print some of the cool games that are open licensed and trade them for 5e books at tables. Then make a show of burning the books on a bon fire on youtube.
Edit: Burn the 5e books I mean, not the cool ones.
It's incredibly easy. I've been using threadless.com for the few company t-shirts I've had made over the years. You just click "Causes and Charities" on the design, select the one you want, and the level you want to donate. They handle the rest.
The only hard part would be picking a charity that isn't SUPER lefty:
https://www.threadless.com/causes/
EDIT: Donating is easy, but you're limited to what's on the list.
Ah I think I was unclear.
Step one: sell merch
Step two: use merch profits to print or buy good games with WOTC BAD logo on cover somewhere
Step three: find players using WOTC 5e and trade them for good games that were printed
Step four: pile up 5e books and use them as a bon fire that is recorded and posted on youtube
Step five bask in the glow and laugh at WOTC
Quote from: BadApple on December 05, 2023, 11:18:24 AM
Ah I think I was unclear.
Step one: sell merch
Step two: use merch profits to print or buy good games with WOTC BAD logo on cover somewhere
Step three: find players using WOTC 5e and trade them for good games that were printed
Step four: pile up 5e books and use them as a bon fire that is recorded and posted on youtube
Step five bask in the glow and laugh at WOTC
I would wholeheartedly endorse something like that, but need to focus my energies on taking a lot of fire from when I get over target...