Quote from: Eric Diaz on December 24, 2022, 01:42:14 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.

This position is insane.

"I hate the new Rings of Power, they just want to make money with no respect for the IP", "Well, that's capitalism, you can't complain!"

Of course you can criticize the show. It's the "they just want to make money off the IP they own" part which is anti-capitalism. Yes. It's a show. By definition they want to make money off the IP they own. That is the entire point. Hundreds of people are employed around that one goal - to make money off that IP. To make that a focus (not the only focus, but a focus) of ones criticism is to add an anti-capitalist point to your criticism.

And it's OK to be anti-capitalist (I will disagree with you but that shouldn't stop you) but don't pretend it's something else. Don't then turn around and bash other anti-capitalists in topics which don't directly impact you as much but might impact them as much. Just own your anti-capitalism. Don't pretend to be pro-capitalist until it's a topic dear to you and then suddenly decry the profit motive because it's a topic you enjoy.

"My son is in high school, and no one in his school plays D&D. They think it is woke boomer bullshi*."

MerrillWeathermay, that right there is the post of the day.

Quote from: Mistwell on December 24, 2022, 01:55:21 PM

Quote from: Eric Diaz on December 24, 2022, 01:42:14 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.

This position is insane.

"I hate the new Rings of Power, they just want to make money with no respect for the IP", "Well, that's capitalism, you can't complain!"

Of course you can criticize the show. It's the "they just want to make money off the IP they own" part which is anti-capitalism. Yes. It's a show. By definition they want to make money off the IP they own. That is the entire point. Hundreds of people are employed around that one goal - to make money off that IP. To make that a focus (not the only focus, but a focus) of ones criticism is to add an anti-capitalist point to your criticism.

And it's OK to be anti-capitalist (I will disagree with you but that shouldn't stop you) but don't pretend it's something else. Don't then turn around and bash other anti-capitalists in topics which don't directly impact you as much but might impact them as much. Just own your anti-capitalism. Don't pretend to be pro-capitalist until it's a topic dear to you and then suddenly decry the profit motive because it's a topic you enjoy.

Well, not sure that any of this applies to me, as I'm not strictly anti-capitalist or pro-capitalist. I think capitalism is only a useful tool, if somewhat dangerous (I find socialism, OTOH, barbaric and genocidal). But that's another discussion, I think.

However, even defending capitalism, I could give you at least two good motives to complain about this:

- This is a "cash grab" because it favor short-term gain for long term loss, IMO.
- I am a small publisher (or just a consumer of, say, Kobold Press) that uses the OGL and I am concerned with my own financial interests when I feel Hasbro is trying to tighten their restrictions.

I don't like what WotC is doing.

That being said from a moral position it's reprehensible. From a business perspective it makes sense. So I find myself agreeing with Mistwell. They want to make money or get their royalties from those using their rules. I always found what Ryan Dancy did with the OGL somewhat good for the fans though screwing over Wotc.

I also see the hypocrisy on this site when it comes to company making profits. When it's the Woke losing it because companies make money and it's a subject we don't like. We mock them for hating Capitalism. Now if it's something we like suddenly Wotc is being " greedy " and treating the fans unfair.

Again I think it's a mistake on Wotc to do so yet I aKeats expected Wotc to do such a move. Even at the expense of the fans and to not care about losing some. The OGL allowed others to use Wotc rules to profit from them. While Wotc gets nothing in return and in the case of Paizo make their direct competitor.

I haven't really commented on this topic here yet, but it's a good thing I don't consider myself a capitalist and in fact used to consider myself a socialist till I joined the anti-SJW side of the culture war, or apparently I wouldn't be able to tell money grubbing, overreaching corporations to go fuck themselves. Not that I consider the poster bringing this up worthy of consideration or anything but a disingenuous troll without any real arguments or logical positions.

But, yeah...on behalf of everyone else, fuck these capitalist mega corps trying to milk other people's labor and to police their business and finances. Like, who tha fuck do these capitalist pigs think they are? I hope they get another 4e to the knee and get another Pathfinder situation on their hands.

A general comment on the current popularity of D&D, aside from question of the OGL.

Quote from: MerrillWeathermay on December 24, 2022, 01:41:49 PM
this whole strategy by WOTC might work, and lead to record revenues (especially if they crack the Chinese market, which I suspect is one of the primary objectives) but I think it is going to fail. Their product is largely directed towards middle-aged, left-leaning men (despite their claims of a diverse audience). The quality of their product has gone down considerably, especially when compared to offerings from other companies like Free League, Studio Agate, and Cubicle 7, and the huge corporate structure and mandates handcuff them from being innovative or even friendly towards their customers. Their public-relations efforts are some of the worst I've seen from any large company (hiring an ex-porn star to act as a brand ambassador, apologizing for the perceived racism in their own products, getting into public feuds with their employees, etc.)

my son is in high school, and no one in his school plays D&D. They think it is woke boomer bullshi*.

My son is just starting grad school. When he was in middle and high school in the early 2010s, almost no one in his schools were playing D&D - which was the norm for the 1990s and 2000s, from what I could see. However, since 5E was released in 2014, it seems to me that D&Ds popularity has been steadily growing.

My minister's teenage daughter plays it, and when I ran a game at my church retreat, I had 7 players sign up including my minister who was curious about the game his daughter played. I keep running into people who play it in many walks of life - from park rangers to waiters.

As far as I have seen, D&D is now as popular than it has ever been - on par with the peak of popularity it had around 1980. That's not saying that WotC hasn't had big missteps, but they seem to be doing some things right.

Quote from: Omega on December 23, 2022, 09:30:28 PM

Quote from: squirewaldo on December 23, 2022, 10:52:25 AM
It seems to me that WotC are just repeating the errors of TSR. But we will see.

TSR never even remotely went this far off the deep end.

That was "you post it online - we own it" Palladium.
And "You work for us - we own everything you create, even at your home" White Wolf and Games Workshop.

There was a time we all called it "T$R" and said it stood for "They Sue Regularly". Ironically, that was also when a non-gamer woman named Williams was in charge, as there is now.

Quote from: RPGPundit on December 24, 2022, 08:15:55 PM

Quote from: Omega on December 23, 2022, 09:30:28 PM

Quote from: squirewaldo on December 23, 2022, 10:52:25 AM
It seems to me that WotC are just repeating the errors of TSR. But we will see.

TSR never even remotely went this far off the deep end.

That was "you post it online - we own it" Palladium.
And "You work for us - we own everything you create, even at your home" White Wolf and Games Workshop.

There was a time we all called it "T$R" and said it stood for "They Sue Regularly". Ironically, that was also when a non-gamer woman named Williams was in charge, as there is now.

Imagine if through some insane convoluted chain of events, it had been Roberta Williams, not Lorraine Williams, in charge.

I think there is some confusion about "woke" and "capitalism" here. They are not opposites.

Every company wants to make money, no matter how "woke". Disney wears rainbows on the US and remove gay characters when that will make more money in China. People (left and right) will wage foreign wars to make a profit. There is nothing moral about this, in fact it is often immoral.

Fighting for capitalism is a bit ludicrous, because capitalism can be used for good or evil.

Defending your freedom from taxation and persecution, defending your religion or civilization, is one thing, but worshipping capitalism for its own sake is just insane.

And the most destructive part of this idea is "let's make a quick profit now, and let the future be damned!". This is not capitalism working as intended, this is madness.

(I apologize for diverging that far from the actual subject. Also, merry Christmas folks!)

Quote from: Eric Diaz on December 25, 2022, 09:47:14 AM
And the most destructive part of this idea is "let's make a quick profit now, and let the future be damned!". This is not capitalism working as intended, this is madness.

This is US Corporate law which has defined fiduciary responsibility as doing everything possible to maximize short term profits even at the expense of long term viability.

Hasbro is getting hammered because it can't sustain the COVID sales surge and this nonsense with trying to monetize every last dime out of D&D is looking more like a desperation play. They NEED to keep the Covid sales bubble going or they're on the hook to their investors because the predatory capitalists lobbied the lawmakers for just this sort of thing to be the norm (because they'll take their profits, sell and leave thr gutted company holding the bag and do it again to the next company on their list).

It'll get even worse when the upcoming movie inevitably flops (because "offbrand Marvel movie with characters no one cares about while struggling to put food on the table" is a sure fire winner... Chris Pine playing Chris Pine is just icing on the shit cake) and the lure of a carrot is no longer that viable.

I dumped the OGL (I'll use a creative commons license instead) from my project entirely as I have sufficiently different mechanics that my only real concern was sharing some game terms and have since renamed many of those just in case. I think re-examining whether you actually NEED even the OGL1.0a might be worth it for other publishers as I think a desperate enough WotC might go after it and, as I have been reminded in the past, the validity of your claim is far less important than having the money to litigate.

Maybe I'm being paranoid, but desperation brings out the stupids and big corpos have more than their share.

You guys are wrong because you're anti-woke, and woke people are de facto "socialists", which means that anti-woke people are de facto "capitalists". Which means that when a capitalist corporation is driving their company down a cliff in the name of making a quick buck in the short term at the expense of long-term viability, you have to drive down that cliff with them cheering all the way to the bottom. Because you're anti-woke, therefore "capitalists", which means that you should not be able to recognize blatant stupidity or one-sided, predatory contracts and business practices, or have a problem with them, and are supposed to defend them to the very end and never disagree with them or call them out.

This is ironclad logic that you can't refute, meaning that Hasbro/WotC is right and you should be cheering their business acumen. And if you disagree you're a hypocrite, unable to maintain a consistent position, which is to bend yourself like a pretzel to conform to some straw version of "capitalism", since you're anti-woke, and anti-woke means you're supposed to be pro-capitalist--ALWAYS, no matter the specific circumstances. 

Let me try to draw a fine line between "capitalism" and "free market". It is perfectly consistent with capitalism to be anti-monopoly.

The free market makes sense and perhaps works well for standardised widgets - substitutable goods with symmetry & transparency and other features that an economist can enumerate. The free market doesn't make sense for lots of other kinds of goods. For those markets, we (should) impose some form of regulation.

If I were trying to be objective and look at the "capitalism" question, the question I would ask about this is: "Are RPGs substitutable, so if WotC creates a walled garden people are free to seamlessly move to alternate gaming systems? Or is WotC effectively a monopoly, or some other kind of market-power-holder that deserves regulation?"

You can be pro-capitalist, but depending on where you come down on that question can consider the OneDnD license ethical or unethical.

Probably most relevant is the idea of a "platform" - the US and the EU are both moving to regulate Apple and Google app stores, and perhaps Steam. And for the past 30+ years the question of monopoly was usually framed as _consumer_ benefit, but once WotC is operating a DMsGuild/VTT "platform" there's also the lens of undue control over the market defined by that platform.

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).

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

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.