D&D For Sale

 Waiting for more details and confirmation, but rumors are that Hasbro/Wizards of the Coast are in talks to sell the Dungeons and Dragons IP to Tencent. 

One Year Ago the OGL Scandal Broke.

 January 4th of 2023 delivered the news of what Wizbro was up to in the way of trying to revoke the irrevocable Open Game License. The backlash was immediate and huge. It eventually led to them walking things back and putting 5e into a Creative Commons license by way of apology.

You can easily find a wealth of information about the matter on YouTube and elsewhere so I won't belabor the point in this post.

OGL 1.2's Obscene Morality Clause

Give this a view. It points out the problems letting someone have the sole discretion over what is obscene, etc.  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xXFVhAGcK5g

They want the power to police not only what you write, but your personal behavior and you cannot challenge their decisions. That's too much undefined power to grant anyone.

OMG! OGL 1.2 Draft is INSIDEOUS!

If you thought version 1.1 was bad you'd be right. I believe it was that way on purpose. Nobody with a lick of sense would sign it and I think that is what Wizards of the Coast wanted. That would drive everyone out of their market space and anyone foolish enough to sign would quickly find it untenable and stop publishing under the 1.1 license.

Here's where things get worse. Draft version 1.2 drops the outrageous royalties and the horrendous license-back (we can steal your stuff) clause (more on this later), but it continues to try to deauthorize version 1.0(a), and far worse.

NOTE: I am not a lawyer, but I have been listening to lawyers doing breakdowns of the draft.

If you publish anything they give permission to use (other than the game mechanics) it effectively is your involuntary signature and acceptance of 1.2 and relinquishing of the right to use 1.0(a).

Despite adding the word irrevocable to it, they also include a number of ways that they can revoke 1.2 with little or no notice. 

If you violate their morality clause, which they have the sole authority to determine. they can revoke your use of the license.

If you copy any of their intellectual property they can yank your license.

And here's the big one I expect they set up to have happen - If it is determined that any provision within 1.2 is unenforceable (and several are vague enough to likely qualify) they can revoke the entire license for everybody.

Further treachery includes a way to steal a creator's work without calling it a license back provision. They left in the option for a creator to sue for monetary damages if you can prove they deliberately stole your stuff, but you give up the right to injunctive relief meaning you can't stop them from continuing to sell it and profit from the work as if they own it.

Then there's the Virtual Table Top section which is so vague it seems arranged to prevent anyone from competing with their own pending VTT in even the slightest way.

There's more to examine, but if this isn't enough to drive away 3rd party publishers from their market space I don't know what will until they yank the entire rug out from under everyone.

Maybe There's Bullshit Running Upstream As Well

Some insight about some rumors.

Give it a view.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t54ABfzbm5o

Wizards of the Fuckery's Nefarious Plans Exposed!

For those that thought the very nasty changes in the Open Game License were the whole of their chicanery, buckle up.

When WotC President Cynthia Williams told investors that they were planning to create a recurring revenue model for D&D what she meant is that they would drive out any competition within the D&D community (3rd party publishers) and then make it so that anyone wanting to play or DM had to go through them via D&D Beyond.

The plan began with the egregiously horrible OGL version 1.1 that no sane company or creator would ever agree to. Now it is moving on to eventually jacking up D&D Beyond pricing by outrageous amounts.

It appears, via leaked info, that the top tier access will cost $30/month and free accounts are likely a thing of the past. Micro-transactions will be a regular part of the equation with both DMs and Players forking over cash for simple stuff like fancier character model skins, clothes, armor, weapons, continuing on to attribute buffs, etc.

It wouldn't surprise me if in the future they stopped publishing D&D in book form and went entirely online. No more gathering around the table and playing for free, they want you logged in and spending.

This whole thing sounds like one would imagine the largest drug gang in a city might operate when they decide to have all of the revenue mainlined into their pockets. 

Step one - drive out or absorb the other drug gangs and small-time dealers. 

Step two - raise prices.

Step three - ensure the addicts have no other means to get their fix.

Step four - keep jacking up prices.

The only problem with this operating model is they're leaving out the means to create new addicts, and gradually through kicking the habit, overdosing, or getting jailed while stealing to support the habit (caught pirating), the pool of paying junkies will decline.

Wizbro is going to kill the brand.

Did Elon Musk Secretly Buy Hasbro/Wizards of the Coast?

While out visiting game stores with my brother on the weekend we were talking about the ongoing OGL fuck-up by Wizbro and he asked me the title question.

All you have to do is watch or read the news to know what a mess things have become at Twitter since he bought it and started making some really crazy decisions. Tesla stock is also going down the tubes because investors are concerned about his seeming inattention to the company during the insanity at Twitter.

You can see why the question was asked. Of course it was tongue-in-cheek, but still. You have to wonder.

Elon Musk

@elonmusk

Replying to

@WorldAndScience

Wow, they played D&D in D&D

1:55 PM · Nov 27, 2017

1,316

Retweets

64

Quote Tweets

12K

Likes

Fuck the D&D Community, signed WotC

Give this a listen.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mr9WDUCK5aQ

Dicky Blenders 2: Electric Fucka-You

As the OGL fiasco goes on, the player base stepped in and got Wizbro's attention in the only language big corporations understand: money. 

The call went out on social media for people to protest the mess by cancelling their paid subscriptions to D&D Beyond and people responded by at least tens of thousands. After the link went down (or was shut down) for cancelling subs, it then became necessary to file a trouble ticket with DDB's recently downsized support team. 

Wizbro had been silent during the uproar till this point and cancelled a planned twitch stream. Then, on the day the new "O"GL was supposed to take effect, ta-da! Wizbro put out a fake apology in which they claimed to have rolled a 1 (dudes, your die only has negative numbers you rolled so low).

Why do I call the apology fake? Because they continued lying. They said the leaked OGL 1.1 was just a draft to get feedback. False. They sent out contracts along with it for publishers to sign to accept it. You don't do that for a draft.

Now a consortium of 3rd party publishers has arisen to have a new Open RPG Content License (ORC) put together and handled by a neutral legal firm and to be held by a non-profit set up for that purpose. This will prevent any single company from doing the same thing Wizbro has done.

The WotC CEO said that D&D was under-monetized. If you thought it was under-monetized before, wait till you see the long-term effects of your fuckery on the bottom line. 

Wizbro need to fire the ass-hats that are responsible for this bad decision and announce it loudly and widely.

Are WotC Sticking Their Dicks in a Blender with the new OGL?

With the leak of what might be the new not quite Open Game License version 1.1, Wizards of the Coast appear to be trying to force the genie back into the bottle. 

At this link you can read the full text, and hopefully you'll have enough legal knowledge to pick through it without straining you eyes or brain. http://ogl.battlezoo.com/

If you want to here some perspective from a contract lawyer check this out on Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MDuHjpwx5Q4

Among the things controversial about the leaked OGL 1.1 are WotC's attempt to retroactively invalidate earlier versions. I'm no lawyer, but this sounds like a very difficult, if not a legally enforceable trick to pull off. Were they to call the next edition 6th edition and applied the new license to it and any editions going forward, it would likely work without a problem, but they aren't planning to call 6th edition 6th edition.

Further, they reserve the right to take a creator's material and resell it themselves without compensating the creator, who also is on the hook for destroying existing inventory. If you crowd-funded the project and are about to ship to backers when that letter arrives, you and your backers are fucked in so many ways.

Then there are royalty tiers that are damned expensive. Most creators don't have a profit margin even approaching the 20 to 25 percent cut WotC is asking for.

They have VTTs (virtual table tops) in their sights as well. Now that they are building their own after acquiring D&D Beyond, they are going to interfere with what these other VTTs can use of the game. Since I use Vorpal Board with my Dwarven Forge terrain while I DM, this won't impact me unless I play in someone else's game.

We already have some idea where Kobold Press stand on the issue. They announced today that they will be developing their own Fantasy TTRPG system. https://koboldpress.com/raising-our-flag/

I can't wait to find out what WotC told Critical Role regarding profiting from D&D. What CR says back could be even more interesting. Critical Role can be directly credited with driving some of the increased popularity of D&D over the past few years, as well as Stranger Things (will they go after the show as well?). Trying to cut a leg off of a cash cow that it still producing is a damned fool idea.

Since the launch of 5th edition Wizards of the Coast have generated a hell of a lot of good will among the public and fan base. Now they're looking to piss in everyone's cereal bowl. That's a dick move Wizards. There's a very good chance it will hurt rather than help your bottom line.

Prop Dusting - Wizards of the Coast Monster Cards

Another recent purchase for the game was all of the Monster Cards produced by Wizards of the Coast for D&D 5e.

These have already come in very handy. If you plan out the majority of your encounters in advance you can have the cards ready at the table and avoid having to flip through the large Monster Manual in front of you when trying to manage the game. For my own use, I have a Vault X 4 pocket binder to take the selected cards for the session to the table. I can have everything I need behind the DM screen and still have extra space which did not happen with the Monster Manual in the way.

For storage I went with the Forged Dice Co Curiosities Cache Monster Card & Spell Card Organizer Binder with Pages (Mimic Edition). At the time I bought them the Mimic Edition was on sale for $10 less than the plain unadorned cover version. I bought four of them. I'm still sorting and alphabetizing the cards into the binders, but this makes locating what you want easier without spilling a pile of cards. The binders come with two types of pockets, normal for the regular sized cards and a two pocket version for the larger cards.

The one drawback is the Epic Monster cards. These things are huge, which is necessary to hold all the relevant information, but it does make it a requirement to use a single page of the two pocket type to hold a single card. Did I mention the Epic cards are huge?

The cards and the Forged Dice Binders are costly, but not prohibitively so. For the ease and convenience they provide I feel the investment is worth it.

Prop Dusting - Wizards of the Coast Spell Cards

I recently acquired a bunch of the arcane and cleric spell cards produced by Wizards of the Coast for D&D 5e. Along with those I picked up a number of smaller 4 pocket page, side loading binders from Vault X, to use as spell books/prayer books for the players in my campaign.

It is very early into use, but it appears to be a handy resource to have at the table. Instead of leafing through the Players Handbook to find their spell information, their individual known spells are conveniently at their fingertips. 

Also bought was the deck containing spells from Xanathar's Guide to Everything. Those spells will be trickled into play when discovered as scrolls or when sought from other spellcasters.

Some reviews on Amazon have noted that there may be some spells missing from the deck. I have not taken the time to sit down and go through to verify this for myself, but from a quick flip through the cards I believe that is a misunderstanding. I suspect that the "missing spells" are in other decks like the Ranger, and Warlock specific decks for example.

Though the cards are expensive when you need to buy multiples to have a deck for each spellcaster in your group (when you have a large group like I do), they could very well prove worthwhile. The binders are surprisingly affordable for as nice as they are and have plenty of space.

If the players were to buy their own decks it would relieve the DM of the cost, but this was my idea and we do have casualties resulting in changes to the classes of characters in play meaning it is more efficient for me to buy the decks and keep them available for the group. Fortunately I have a filing cabinet to store a bunch of gaming stuff like these cards.

D&D Direct April 21, 2022

 

Wizards of the Coast announced a host of new products and projects coming out over the remainder of 2022 and into 2023. 

Spelljammer Adventures in Space, the updated Spelljammer setting has been confirmed.

Initially the setting will consist of three books and a DM screen in a slipcase. The books will be 64 pages each. Fair warning for those with coulrophobia, the monster book also includes Space Clowns.

Due in August, but in July prequel adventure

Wizkids will also be producing a series of miniature figures for Spelljammer. 

Balder's Gate 3 computer game will be releasing in 2023.

They displayed a brief look at the game and it looks beautiful. There were however no details given about game play.

Journeys Through the Radiant Citadel is coming on June 21st of this year.

The book contains 13 adventures and many locations. It is written by a team of diverse creators drawing on elements from their lives for inspiration. 

Adventures cover levels 1 -14.

Wizards also announced Campaign Cases. These two products are ideal for the travelling DM.

The first contains customizable creature tokens with three different sized disks that reusable monster clings can be attached to and removed from repeatedly.

The terrain case contains an assortment of two dimensional terrain boards that can connect together in multiple ways.

These are due to arrive in July of this year.

The D&D Movie Honor Among Thieves takes place in the Sword Coast of the Forgotten Realms.

Planned release is in March 2023.

A New D&D Starter Set containing a new adventure is slated for this Oct 4th.

It will come with access to digital tools.

Also in the pipeline is a new D&D digital library.

There will be a new Digital Monsters Compendium.

You will be able to collect groups of monsters over time. No mention if there is an associated cost.

MMO Neverwinter expansion is coming in June.

Legends of the Multi-verse was mentioned, coming April 27th. I need to research this one. Not sure if it's an animated show or live streaming play of a campaign.When I Googled the name I was taken to a site with a bunch of anime like Dragonball Z.

It will be available on YouTube and Twitch. 

Wizkids is producing Onslaught, a miniatures skirmish game. It is due this October.

A Dragonlance adventure book and battle game is coming. I didn't catch the date.

Follow-up on XP in Escrow

Here's the thing, as a DM, I wouldn't give full experience for the Lich and Death Knights in the latest example. They would have an xp value as challenges when the situation is overcome unless actually engaged, and creative solutions (or funny ones) would earn a bonus. Regardless, the 5E advancement is off-the-charts too rapid.

I seem to recall Mike Mearls or one of his team at Wizards of the Coast, mentioning alternate charts that would be in the DMG. They have since stated that quite a bit had to be cut from the book before release, and I can only surmise the alternate charts were cut.

I imagine working out an experience advancement table wouldn't be that hard to do, it's the getting the pacing right that is the tougher part. And if I really wanted to as DM, I could just tell the players when to level. I much prefer tables, probably for the sense of reward I get from it as player and DM.

When I return to running Ptolus, I expect to have put together an advancement table more to my liking, that gives everyone time to explore the setting before being too powerful for almost everything.

Keeping the change simple is important. Considerations include changing just the advancement table; reducing the experience awarded for combat; figuring out a way to convert to xp for treasure with drastic reductions in creature xp value, etc. I'm currently leaning toward just the first option. This is something the players will be consulted with for input and ideas.

More time is still needed DMing the game before I feel ready to offer up additional house rules.