Quote from: SHARK on December 25, 2022, 08:28:12 PM

Quote from: Sacrificial Lamb on December 25, 2022, 06:42:30 PM

Quote from: Mistwell on December 24, 2022, 01:05:10 PM
Here come all the "I'm not a socialist I just play one on message boards when it's about a capitalist RPG company doing ordinary capitalist things" people.

Which, in this case, includes Pundit. Whose position is much more towards the socialist/marxist end of the spectrum than it would be about a non-RPG topic. Corporation does things to make more money should not be a "money-grab = bad!" position for an actual capitalist.

But the whole anti-marxist thing was always for show.

WOTC will either make products and services people want to spend money on and will make more money, or they will not and will fail. That's ordinary capitalism.

If they make a VTT people want and like, people will buy it and if not they won't and it will fail to their competition.

If they make a rules system so popular and modable that other companies want to use and expand on and sell products from and report their income on and pay a royalty if it gets big then they will. If it's not to their liking enough those companies will instead write their own rules system or use a cheaper competing rules system.

This is all ordinary capitalism and not a "money-grab." The purpose of a corporation is to make money. The purpose of a public company like Hasbro is to make money for their shareholders. This is the whole point and anyone bashing it all as a "moneygrab" is a socialist at heart who has just been hiding their socialism because it was about topics that didn't impact their interests. The moment it's something THEY like and use suddenly the socialism/marxist comes out and it's wankery about evil corporations trying to be "greedy" and "grab" people's money like it's friggen Scrooge McDuck.

We don't have "ordinary" capitalism in America; we have monopoly capitalism. The whole point of "monopoly capitalism" is to have the government outsource tyranny through the giant mega-corporations. This is at least partially facilitated through massive amounts of NWO bribe money, in the form of ESG investment capital. Hasbro receives ESG investment capital from ultra-destructive giant investment firms like BlackRock and Vanguard. Don't you ever dare insinuate that there's anything "ordinary" about this.

"It's just capitalism, man. What? Do you hate capitalism or something?" (herp, derp) 

During the lockdowns for the fake pandemic, we had armed jackboot police officer thugs in America deliberately shutting down small and privately-owned hardware stores that were right down the street from Lowe's Home Improvement (giant mega-corporate ESG-funded hardware stores), which remained open. These small private hardware stores sold the same products as Lowe's, but they did not receive ESG investment capital like Lowe's does. It's not too hard to figure out what happened.

What I don't want is having all gamers consigned to a digital ghetto. That would be horrible. Thankfully, we have the original OGL....so only a complete retard would ever use this new shit-flecked closed license.

For the record, I am neither a capitalist nor am I a socialist. Either approach can be used as a life-destroying weapon or as a tool. Both capitalism and socialism are used as WEAPONS by the men who control ultra-giant monopolistic asset managers like BlackRock and Vanguard, which control Hasbro.

And frankly, since we are now beginning to live in the age of "rolling blackouts", it behooves people to start finding ways of gaming without the incessant use of electronics. Hasbro has ZERO interest in maximizing the face-to-face gaming experience, and you certainly don't do that by staring at glowing pixelated images on a screen. Hasbro/WoTC has learned absolutely no useful lessons whatsoever from the board game industry, and that weakness can be used to compete with them....no matter how much fiat currency they have artificially injected into their company. However, it won't be Paizo who successfully learns and implements lessons from the board game industry into the tabletop RPG industry. Paizo is just too mentally stuck to truly innovate and then compete with Hasbro. For such a thing to happen, it would have to be facilitated by somebody else who doesn't actually loathe their customers (like Hasbro).

Greetings!

Very well said, Sacrificial Lamb. Spot on!

Oh. And also, I hope you are having a Merry Christmas!

Semper Fidelis,

SHARK

Thank you, my friend. Much obliged.

Quote from: Eirikrautha on December 25, 2022, 11:15:35 PM
People, stop it!  Mistwell spent several other threads on this topic defending WotC and claiming that the press releases didn't say what they clearly said.  Now that his original line of argument is completely indefensible,  he's changed his argument to this bogus capitalism straw man.   It's a stupid argument on its face, and doesn't even deserve to be addressed.   No one has argued that WotC can't do this.  We've argued that this tactic will both fail to realize the financial results they hope, while the changes will hurt the consumer.  This has nothing to do with capitalism.   Its Mistwell screaming loudly to distract and confuse.  He doesn't have the facts or law, so he's pounding the table.   Ignore him and his bullshit distraction.  It's a bad-faith attempt to distract; don't help him.

Exactly. Corpos gonna corpo. The only question is whether you want to participate or not.

If you don't then you need to decide what options are best for you. My suggestion is that, even beyond sticking with the OGL1.0a, does your product even NEED the OGL at all?

I'd actually argue that the core OSR doesn't need it. Everyone is building towards the unstated standard of compatibility with TSR era D&D and the numbers are close enough that a B/X adventure could be run for an AD&D party or an AD&D adventure run for a B/X party. The individual product identities (specific settings, specific NPCs, etc.) are already covered by general copyright law and the compatibility with B/1e standard keeps everything else interoperable with no further license needed.

My feeling is that when WotC gets desperate (because this idea of theirs is going to flop*) they're going to come after the OGL; probably on the grounds you "have" to update to the latest license with the understanding that it wouldn't survive in court, but that few could afford to get it to that point. Better to not even have that as a point of contention and create the higher burden that trying to sue a straight competitor like Palladium or GURPS or Savage Worlds (vs. someone competing via a license, open or not, from the suing company).

* It's going to flop because ultimately it won't provide what true ttrpg players are seeking (face-to-face social connection with others... VTTs are mainly a substitute for those who can't be face-to-face) while, even with people from Microsoft involved, the VTT is never going to match the experience of a AAA multiplayer video game like WoW or ESO and so many others if they're hoping to keep the adventure content canned to maximize the microtransactions.

Basically, the freedom to create by the GM's basically IS the value of tabletop gaming. Rulebooks are just handy tools so a GM doesn't have to create all the rules from scratch each time; they're basically blueprints the GM uses as a foundation for them to create their own worlds.

No matter how WotC will try to push it, you can't monetize what a GM builds. At best they can supply raw materials to go along with the blueprints they supply. They can't force a carpenter to follow their blueprints to the letter. They can't charge a carpenter's kids for every swing they take on the swingset he built even if he used those plans. And if they seriously tried they'd be competing with actual professional theme parks in terms of value per dollar and don't stand a chance in that market.

So, yeah, DnDone is a desperation pipe dream and everyone should be making plans based on what desperate corpos typically do when their schemes collapse.

Quote from: Chris24601 on December 26, 2022, 09:09:16 AM
My suggestion is that, even beyond sticking with the OGL1.0a, does your product even NEED the OGL at all?

I'd actually argue that the core OSR doesn't need it. Everyone is building towards the unstated standard of compatibility with TSR era D&D and the numbers are close enough that a B/X adventure could be run for an AD&D party or an AD&D adventure run for a B/X party. The individual product identities (specific settings, specific NPCs, etc.) are already covered by general copyright law and the compatibility with B/1e standard keeps everything else interoperable with no further license needed.

I'm not a lawyer, but I suspect that retro-clones are vulnerable to a copyright lawsuit if they don't use the OGL.

However, any of the games with significant differences probably aren't. Many of the OSR products have less resemblance to the SRD than many pre-2002 RPGs that were similar to D&D but never sued. I was reading over Pundit's Arrows of Indra, for example, and as far as I can see, it uses almost nothing from the SRD, to the point where I don't see why it would cite that.

Quote from: Chris24601 on December 26, 2022, 09:09:16 AM
Basically, the freedom to create by the GM's basically IS the value of tabletop gaming. Rulebooks are just handy tools so a GM doesn't have to create all the rules from scratch each time; they're basically blueprints the GM uses as a foundation for them to create their own worlds.

No matter how WotC will try to push it, you can't monetize what a GM builds. At best they can supply raw materials to go along with the blueprints they supply. They can't force a carpenter to follow their blueprints to the letter.

I think it's possible to monetize GMing by expanding the paid GM market. In most tabletop RPGs, it usually seems there are more players willing to play than GMs willing to run for free. That doesn't mean WotC would necessarily benefit - but it's possible they could get in on it, such as by making a service that hooks up GMs-for-pay to players. But others could easily create rival services.

In the end, freedom in truth wins, but there will be blood on the floor before then.

This is going to explode in their faces worse than 4th Edition did.

WOTC is practically unrecognizable these days. They've gone off the deep end. I kind of hope they lose market share over this. Not that they'd bother to reevaluate their overall strategy and position, unfortunately.

Also, I kind of feel like poorly thought out get rich quick schemes like this aren't really great for consumers, corporations, or the economy. And the competition and productivity they seem to seek to stifle is a core piece to real capitalism.

Quote from: Chris24601 on December 26, 2022, 09:09:16 AM
* It's going to flop because ultimately it won't provide what true ttrpg players are seeking (face-to-face social connection with others... VTTs are mainly a substitute for those who can't be face-to-face) while, even with people from Microsoft involved, the VTT is never going to match the experience of a AAA multiplayer video game like WoW or ESO and so many others if they're hoping to keep the adventure content canned to maximize the microtransactions.

WotC doesn't cares what true ttrpg players want. They care for money. they are hoping enough people are out there that want to give it a try but have been unable to play (because they are jerks, or because of live to far from groups, fear of perceived starting costs, or fear of being branded a nerd of a newbie or whatever.) They provide a solution to all that for a small fee, and will sell you a bad-arse avatar for a little more, and if you don't want ads on screen it'll only be slightly more, and if you are a newbie maybe they'll sell you criticals on 19-20 instead of just 20. Maybe you can pay more to play in a game run by a 5-star DM or celebrity DM.

In the mean-time the desktop will continue as before with a new edition of books that blends the different ones into the core books and makes the wording a bit more woke and this will be 5.5e.

Having said all that... The big problem with computer game RPGs is that you only have the options the software folks though of ahead of time, or that they could squeeze into the code. TTRPG don't have this problem, and there is a reasonable chance the OneD&D will bridge this gap somewhat and might be a lot of fun. Especially if the Coastal Wizards have a number of ongoing games you can join. People are likely to clan up or have a group of friends join the same game to recapture some of that commeradery. It'll be different than TTRPG but it might not be as terrible as some have predicted.

There might also be a nice system for creative DMs to make a dungeon using the new virtual world. Yeah Wizards might take 50% or more of the profit but initially when they are short of adventures there might be a decent amount of money to make if you make a good one. I can see an entire new ecosystem if the virtual tools are easy enough to learn and use to create. Again not a replacement for TTRPG but something new that could be fun if they don't screw it up.s

Quote from: Ruprecht on December 27, 2022, 09:49:06 AM

Quote from: Chris24601 on December 26, 2022, 09:09:16 AM
* It's going to flop because ultimately it won't provide what true ttrpg players are seeking (face-to-face social connection with others... VTTs are mainly a substitute for those who can't be face-to-face) while, even with people from Microsoft involved, the VTT is never going to match the experience of a AAA multiplayer video game like WoW or ESO and so many others if they're hoping to keep the adventure content canned to maximize the microtransactions.

WotC doesn't cares what true ttrpg players want. They care for money. they are hoping enough people are out there that want to give it a try but have been unable to play (because they are jerks, or because of live to far from groups, fear of perceived starting costs, or fear of being branded a nerd of a newbie or whatever.) They provide a solution to all that for a small fee, and will sell you a bad-arse avatar for a little more, and if you don't want ads on screen it'll only be slightly more, and if you are a newbie maybe they'll sell you criticals on 19-20 instead of just 20. Maybe you can pay more to play in a game run by a 5-star DM or celebrity DM.

In the mean-time the desktop will continue as before with a new edition of books that blends the different ones into the core books and makes the wording a bit more woke and this will be 5.5e.

I'm not arguing what they're going to offer. I'm arguing it's going to flop because the market for what they're offering (that isn't better served by better products) isn't as big as they think it is.

Basically, a new physical books edition isn't going to get them the monetization they need because it's the same 20% of the users as they're complaining about now.

Anyone looking for primarily online play will find better graphics, smoother play and a larger community for less money with any of the AAA MMO's out there (many of which has a F2P level and have immense libraries of cosmetic options to make your character unique).

That basically leaves the slice of people who want a more personal/custom experience than an MMO can provide, but can't meet for face-to-face games... and it requires that enough of this pool of people to be DM's so everyone signed up has a "table" to play at. Either that or you're going to need a paid staff of roughly 10-20% of concurrent users to be GMs for the audience (i.e. if you have 2000 people online at the same time, you need at least 200-400 GMs to run games for them... that's a lot of paychecks if you don't have enough volunteers) and expecting $3-5/hour from customers to cover that would be a hard sell (because if you have to accept an AI GM you may as well go play that MMO with better graphics/smoother play).

In short, this whole structure looks like something someone utterly unfamiliar with how TTRPGs actually work would come up with. On paper it makes perfect sense... in practice it's just not gonna be workable.

Quote from: Eirikrautha on December 25, 2022, 11:15:35 PM
People, stop it!  Mistwell spent several other threads on this topic defending WotC and claiming that the press releases didn't say what they clearly said.  Now that his original line of argument is completely indefensible,  he's changed his argument to this bogus capitalism straw man.   It's a stupid argument on its face, and doesn't even deserve to be addressed.   No one has argued that WotC can't do this.  We've argued that this tactic will both fail to realize the financial results they hope, while the changes will hurt the consumer.  This has nothing to do with capitalism.   Its Mistwell screaming loudly to distract and confuse.  He doesn't have the facts or law, so he's pounding the table.   Ignore him and his bullshit distraction.  It's a bad-faith attempt to distract; don't help him.

Agreed. I interacted with him on a few posts and I realize he is not a sincere or honest person. Having a discussion or debate with someone like that benefits no one. The only thing that remains is a curiosity concerning why he is trolling this group? Ultimately, I have other more interesting things to concern myself with. It is easy enough to just ignore him and people like him. I will leave the cause for his behavior to his therapist.

I don't think any of my products need to have the OGL on them. However, a lot of my publishers want to have it there.

A: 1.1 isn't an Open Gaming License. The new terms are an attempt to catch and shoot the OGL horses after they've escaped, multiplied, and thrived. "We're not making money off of OGL products!" is the thinking here.

B: Whomever is doing this doesn't realize the industry they're in. The recent trend by corporations has been to lock everything down—to control as much as possible—so they can coerce customers into giving them more money, just like Ma Bell used to. Printer cartridges, John Deere tractors, corporate FPS servers instead of open servers, charging annual licensing fees to use hardware present in the car, etc. This is very profitable, at the cost of making some percentage of your customers angry.

D&DOne is an attempt to establish this level of control over the TTRPG market, which is impossible. TTRPGs cannot be controlled that way.

WE ARE A HOBBY OF NOTEPADS, PENCILS, AND DICE. We don't need VTTs, we don't even really need rulebooks. We have a glut of games published now we can play, plus games going back to 1974, and can mix and match at our leisure.

C: They're apparently betting D&D can be controlled that way because of VTTs and if they succeed well enough, other companies will follow. They will all chase the dollars, that's how corruption works. It's contagious.

Better hope D&Done fails, because "ShadowrunOne", "PathfinderOne", "WorldOfDarknessOne", and others will all be next. Central servers and control will become the future.

D: Ryan Dancy future-proofed D&D against all kinds of shenanigans, including this, 22 years ago. Interested to see how Hasbro's coming anti-OGL lawsuits seeking to legally invalidate 1.0a will go.

(THAT LAST SENTENCE WAS AN INSULT NOT A PREDICTION, CUT ME SOME SLACK HERE. THOUGH I ALSO WOULD NOT BE SURPRISED.)

I predicted the same thing; that as an act of desperation WotC would try to go after the prior versions of the OGL in an effort to force everyone onto the new "owes us royalties" and "license grant dependent on content" FauxGL1.1.

I don't think it will succeed or they would have smashed Pathfinder back in '08, but Lawfare and judgeshopping have gotten more refined in the last decade and deep pockets have usually trumped being legally correct for awhile now.

I do think the more ways your system deviates from DnDone (and possibly prior versions of D&D in general) the better off you'll be (I think Palladium is an excellent example that you can still use d20 checks, saving throws and rolled damage while still being fundamentally different enough to be WotC-proof).

In my case I'm banking on different attributes with a different attribute scale (-1 to 5 at creation, improve to as high as 7 through leveling), different skills (or abilities as they're called in my system), different kinds (races), different character build structure, different magic systems, different action economy, different resource (edge, focus and reserves) and roll structure (players generally roll everything vs. static monster values) and going back to the original myths and legends or my own unique ideas in place of any D&D lore and writing the whole thing from scratch... then following that up with a different open license... as being sufficiently different to make any claims not worth pursuing (even if it will play a LOT like D&D at the table everything that gets you there is different).

Quote from: Daddy Warpig on December 28, 2022, 06:09:23 PM
A: 1.1 isn't an Open Gaming License. The new terms are an attempt to catch and shoot the OGL horses after they've escaped, multiplied, and thrived. "We're not making money off of OGL products!" is the thinking here.

B: Whomever is doing this doesn't realize the industry they're in. The recent trend by corporations has been to lock everything down—to control as much as possible—so they can coerce customers into giving them more money, just like Ma Bell used to. Printer cartridges, John Deere tractors, corporate FPS servers instead of open servers, charging annual licensing fees to use hardware present in the car, etc. This is very profitable, at the cost of making some percentage of your customers angry.

D&DOne is an attempt to establish this level of control over the TTRPG market, which is impossible. TTRPGs cannot be controlled that way.

WE ARE A HOBBY OF NOTEPADS, PENCILS, AND DICE. We don't need VTTs, we don't even really need rulebooks. We have a glut of games published now we can play, plus games going back to 1974, and can mix and match at our leisure.

C: They're apparently betting D&D can be controlled that way because of VTTs and if they succeed well enough, other companies will follow. They will all chase the dollars, that's how corruption works. It's contagious.

Better hope D&Done fails, because "ShadowrunOne", "PathfinderOne", "WhiteWolfOne", and others will all be next. Central servers and control will become the future.

Ryan Dancy future-proofed D&D against all kinds of shenanigans, including this, 22 years ago. Interested to see how Hasbro's coming anti-OGL lawsuits seeking to legally invalidate 1.0a will go.

(THAT LAST SENTENCE WAS AN INSULT NOT A PREDICTION, CUT ME SOME SLACK HERE. THOUGH I ALSO WOULD NOT BE SURPRISED.)

Well, there's a name I've not heard in a long time. Howdy, D.W.

But yeah, I fully expect Hasbro/WotC to do something stupid. Time will tell how badly it'll damage the hobby.

Quote from: Ghostmaker on December 28, 2022, 08:17:06 PM
Well, there's a name I've not heard in a long time. Howdy, D.W.

Hey! Thanks for rememberin'.