Quote from: David Johansen on January 09, 2023, 12:03:51 AM
But skills are concrete and backgrounds are abstract.  I have a deep and abiding hate of DM fiat.

I on the other hand don't

on a different subject, save roll/throw changed to:

Avert/Avoid roll/throw/play/check

Or

Luck roll/throw/play/check

At least if you're using only one like White Box FMAG the last one works.

If you want more than one then:

Mind = INT + CHA /2 round up
Body = STR + DEX /2 round up
Spirit? = WIS + CHA /2 round up

Quote from: David Johansen on January 08, 2023, 11:35:34 PM
Chris24601 that's a big post to quote   My answer is simply this: I'm not suggesting a system.  Sure a system is there to describe what things do rather than directly equating them to potentially proprietary terms.  What I am suggesting is a set of public domain non-proprietary terms.  I'm really open to suggestions because every time I start writing a clone it takes on too many of my own preferences.  I'd also love to hear from any publishers even if they laugh in my face because, while my time isn't particularly valuable, it is my time and I value it so if this is a futile waste I'd like to know that before I sink too much effort into it.  Right now it's mainly a fun thought experiment.  It may be it's too late, it may always have been too late, but I'd hate to see things go forward in a splintered and scattered manner when the oportunity to grasp at a little compatability seems to be here right now.

My point though is that such generic non-proprietary terms aren't terribly useful to anyone with enough a creative vision to build a non-OGL game system.

I already know what my Elves are. I have an eight page entry covering game stats, their cultures and societies and psychology and artwork for visual inspiration. I know what my Dwarves are. They have six pages of the same (they're also much less alien than the elves relative to humans so need far less verbiage to describe them). I know if you wanna play something like a halfling then pick human and say they're one of the Pygmy peoples because I don't want such a clear D&D-ism in my default setting.

I don't want to standardize my elves with whatever you want your Alfar to be because my vision for my elves is clear. Most other creator's will be too.

I know my Kinds (I never particularly liked races once I had so many that didn't even qualify as demi-humans) are humans, beastmen, dwarves, eldritch, elves, fetches, gnomes, golems, malfeans and mutants (and optional astral servitors if you play in a cosmology where those have enough free will to qualify as a PC). My Kind section runs 84 pages (only about 12 of which are mechanics).

I know my Backgrounds are Arcanist, Aristocrat, Artisan, Barbarian, Commoner, Entertainer, Military, Outlaw, Religious and Traveler. They have 60 pages of specific mechanics (they're basically the non-combat half of a D&D style class) to back them up.

I know my Classes are Fighter, Mastermind, Mechanist, Mystic, Theurge and Wizard (and optional Diabolist and Necromancer if you're playing in a cosmology where those don't utterly destroy your free will making them NPC only). 54 more pages of mechanics and magic lore including Fighting Paths (used by Fighters and Masterminds) of Brigand, Captain, Defender, Disabler, Ravager, Sentinel and Striker and Spellcasting Paths (used by Mechanists, Mystics, Theurges and Wizards) of Abjurer, Benedictor, Empowered, Interdictor, Maledictor, Manifester and Summoner.

I know my attributes are Strength, Endurance, Reflexes, Wits, Intellect and Presence. I know my abilities are Acrobatics, Arcana, Culture, Deceit, Engineering, Fitness, Insight, Intimidate, Medicine, Nature, Persuade and Stealth. I know my defense modifiers are Armor, Dodge, Fortitude and Willpower. I know my character resources consist of Edge, Focus and Reserves. I know my action economy is built around Main and Minor actions interspersed with Paces of movement.

I know my Opponents section includes about 350 entries with their own from scratch fluff text and setting lore.

I have a unique cosmology, calendar and multiple religions. I have full trap/hazard, affliction (injuries, curses and diseases), vehicle, structure, and monster building rules... along with adventure and conflict building guidelines, rules for larger battles, a host of optional rules for tweaking the game to run more like other systems, step-by-step world building tools and advice on how to set the desired tone of your campaign (serious to silly, linear vs. sandbox, heroic vs. horror... dark ages, classic fantasy, post-apocalyptic or science fantasy) for new GMs.

All of those things have specific meanings and contexts and rules mechanics for my setting. And all of these things? All the decisions I made in creating them? I'm pretty damnably certain most every other serious content creator has already made similar decisions.

Go and create what inspires you, but people only remain stunned for so long by bad news before they go to work finding a path forward. That's already well underway. I consider myself in very good shape only because I've spent years building my system to be OGL independent and just happened to be nearly finished with my project. But, I've also seen A. Macris' announcement that he's moving ahead with an ACKS2.0 that will be 100% divested of any OGL content and I doubt he'll be very far behind me and might even lap me (I'm just a lone operator so I move at the speed of one man).

My own games, The Arcane Confabulation and Galaxies In Shadow are already set up how I want them.  I'm not doing this for my own creative endeavors but because it seems there's a need.

Quite honestly I'm generally a D&D hater and I've come to despise 5th edition through running thousands of hours of it.

I honestly don't care if a single word I write is in the final document I'm proposing.  I don't want to glorify myself with it.  I wouldn't mind being credited for any work I do but even that's pretty much irrelevant to me.

But I do believe that a unified core structure and terminology would be of great benefit to the OSR and I think it is long past time the hobby divested itself of the chains held by its corporate masters.

The opportunity is too great to pass up.

Quote from: David Johansen on January 09, 2023, 12:44:36 AM
My own games, The Arcane Confabulation and Galaxies In Shadow are already set up how I want them.  I'm not doing this for my own creative endeavors but because it seems there's a need.

Quite honestly I'm generally a D&D hater and I've come to despise 5th edition through running thousands of hours of it.

I honestly don't care if a single word I write is in the final document I'm proposing.  I don't want to glorify myself with it.  I wouldn't mind being credited for any work I do but even that's pretty much irrelevant to me.

But I do believe that a unified core structure and terminology would be of great benefit to the OSR and I think it is long past time the hobby divested itself of the chains held by its corporate masters.

The opportunity is too great to pass up.

Preach it dude!

It's gonna be fine, guys.

I thought the language was a little different than this (maybe I was thinking of an earlier version), but from 1.0 OGL:

Quote9. Updating the License: Wizards or its designated Agents may publish updated versions of this License. You may use any authorized version of this License to copy, modify and distribute any Open Game Content originally distributed under any version of this License.

IANAL, but it sure looks to me like anything originally loicensed under 1.0 can continued to be used under 1.0.  The existing SRDs, etc etc, will stay the same. 

So even if the new stuff isn't 3rd-party friendly, who cares?  It'll just be a bunch of woke garbage we won't want to mess with anyway. 

Let WotC burn, keep calm, and carry on.

And if they rattle about a bunk lawsuit anyway?  Some OGL-friendly lawyer will seize the opportunity and start some kind of group action.  It'll be WotC vs a coalition of a bunch of other game writers.  WotC is big, but they aren't that big.

Quote from: Lee on January 09, 2023, 01:29:05 AM
It's gonna be fine, guys.

I thought the language was a little different than this (maybe I was thinking of an earlier version), but from 1.0 OGL:

Quote9. Updating the License: Wizards or its designated Agents may publish updated versions of this License. You may use any authorized version of this License to copy, modify and distribute any Open Game Content originally distributed under any version of this License.

IANAL, but it sure looks to me like anything originally loicensed under 1.0 can continued to be used under 1.0.  The existing SRDs, etc etc, will stay the same.

I added bold around the words "authorized version" above. The concern that many people have expressed is that Wizards could say that version 1.0a is no longer authorized, because that was exactly the language used in leaked documents, although not WotC has not officially said so.

It is possible that they will not go through with attempting to claim this, and it could even be a ploy so that people are more satisfied if they back down and make OGL 1.1 "opt in".

People trying to make their own game that is like D&D but not D&D using different terms and such is basically what they used to call at TBP, a "fantasy heartbreaker".

No one but the creator cares about them, because they'd rather play D&D.

The thing with retro-clones is while they were people's house ruled D&D, they were still D&D.  You could borrow material from one and use it in another.

Unless you've built up an audience for your game/brand over the years, no one is really going to be interested in the new, D&D less version.

Quote from: jhkim on January 09, 2023, 01:58:05 AM

Quote from: Lee on January 09, 2023, 01:29:05 AM
It's gonna be fine, guys.

I thought the language was a little different than this (maybe I was thinking of an earlier version), but from 1.0 OGL:

Quote9. Updating the License: Wizards or its designated Agents may publish updated versions of this License. You may use any authorized version of this License to copy, modify and distribute any Open Game Content originally distributed under any version of this License.

IANAL, but it sure looks to me like anything originally loicensed under 1.0 can continued to be used under 1.0.  The existing SRDs, etc etc, will stay the same.

I added bold around the words "authorized version" above. The concern that many people have expressed is that Wizards could say that version 1.0a is no longer authorized, because that was exactly the language used in leaked documents, although not WotC has not officially said so.

It is possible that they will not go through with attempting to claim this, and it could even be a ploy so that people are more satisfied if they back down and make OGL 1.1 "opt in".

Again, IANAL, although I have been peripherally involved in some licensing disputes before outside of the gaming world. A license isn't a single discrete thing. You can't just arbitrarily "deauthorize" one collectively by "deauthorizing" the... platonic form of that license, or something. It effectively comes into existence every time you distribute something under that license... before then it's just an idea. You could (and I'm sure WotC will) write terms into to a new version of the license to demand that anyone who wants to use your new one has to agree to cease using the old one, and it would... probably hold up, legally. But if you don't care about using anything released under the new one, or having a tacit business arrangement with WotC to use some of their branding, you're basically clear. WotC can't go out into the world and stamp "invalid" on the OGL pages in all the old 3.x PHBs and DMGs and stuff.

That's the "danger" with open licenses.

Hell, this argument is old. It was fought and hashed out twenty+ years ago when the OGL first came on the scene.

A few things everyone needs to understand:

1. Under US copyright law, game mechanics and systems cannot be copyrighted.
2. general terms used in game systems such as "elf", "dexterity", "hit dice", etc. that are commonly used within and outside of the game community fall under the same category as #1. They cannot be copyrighted. So please stop trying to rename things that are common terms. You look like your panicking.
3. the new OGL is intended to control those who wish to create products for the new version of D&D when it comes out, and in doing so you revoke your privileges to publish anything else under the older OGL. BUT if a publisher doesn't want to publish material under the new OGL for One D&D, the older OGL is still valid. you just can't produce material with the new version of D&D. Paizo for example can still use OGL v1.0a for Pathfinder.
4. We're still at least a year away from the latest version of D&D to come out. AFAICT, that's the same for OGL v1.1. A lot can change between now and then. If enough of the right people make a big stink about this, they may ease back on a few things.

Quote from: blackstone on January 09, 2023, 07:31:16 AM
A few things everyone needs to understand:

1. Under US copyright law, game mechanics and systems cannot be copyrighted.
2. general terms used in game systems such as "elf", "dexterity", "hit dice", etc. that are commonly used within and outside of the game community fall under the same category as #1. They cannot be copyrighted. So please stop trying to rename things that are common terms. You look like your panicking.
3. the new OGL is intended to control those who wish to create products for the new version of D&D when it comes out, and in doing so you revoke your privileges to publish anything else under the older OGL. BUT if a publisher doesn't want to publish material under the new OGL for One D&D, the older OGL is still valid. you just can't produce material with the new version of D&D. Paizo for example can still use OGL v1.0a for Pathfinder.
4. We're still at least a year away from the latest version of D&D to come out. AFAICT, that's the same for OGL v1.1. A lot can change between now and then. If enough of the right people make a big stink about this, they may ease back on a few things.

  1 and 2 are correct, but WotC seems to be claiming the right to negate the older OGL either entirely or for any new product, and the original draft was going to go into effect Friday, January 13, 2023. Hence the concern.

Quote from: Armchair Gamer on January 09, 2023, 07:38:41 AM
  1 and 2 are correct, but WotC seems to be claiming the right to negate the older OGL either entirely or for any new product, and the original draft was going to go into effect Friday, January 13, 2023. Hence the concern.

Yes. They don't seem to have any good legal basis for this claim given the structure of OGL 1.0, but they have put many many game authors & publishers into a panic. This might conceivably result in many or even most OSR games vanishing.

I'd love to comment in more detail here but I'll hold off for now so just let me say this.

The version that is being leaked isn't some mere draft, it's what WotC has envisioned as the final (or at least the current) version. This is evidenced by the fact that actual creators and companies have been sent contracts to sign functionally include it as part of the binding terms. Thus far, I'm not aware of anyone who actually ACCEPTED said contracts but that doesn't change the fact that they have already been trying to get authors and publishers to agree to the version that is being previewed, warts and all.

I feel like they're gonna take out as many folks as they can using courtroom money draining tactics. So I guess the question is roughly, who can survive that?

Quote from: jhkim on January 09, 2023, 01:58:05 AM

Quote from: Lee on January 09, 2023, 01:29:05 AM
It's gonna be fine, guys.

I thought the language was a little different than this (maybe I was thinking of an earlier version), but from 1.0 OGL:

Quote9. Updating the License: Wizards or its designated Agents may publish updated versions of this License. You may use any authorized version of this License to copy, modify and distribute any Open Game Content originally distributed under any version of this License.

IANAL, but it sure looks to me like anything originally loicensed under 1.0 can continued to be used under 1.0.  The existing SRDs, etc etc, will stay the same.

I added bold around the words "authorized version" above. The concern that many people have expressed is that Wizards could say that version 1.0a is no longer authorized, because that was exactly the language used in leaked documents, although not WotC has not officially said so.

It is possible that they will not go through with attempting to claim this, and it could even be a ploy so that people are more satisfied if they back down and make OGL 1.1 "opt in".

The 1.1 was sent out and its even crazier than anyone suspected.
The old OGL is no longer authorized and the new one takes its place and jeebus the restrictions are heavy. They are going after just about everything they can.

Full text can be found here: http://ogl.battlezoo.com/