I'm not sure if this has been covered before, but can we expect to see content from the Dragon Compendium grace the pages of Pathfinder APs or Game Mastery modules? I was thrilled when I saw all the class variants used in J1, and I'm wondering what other non-WotC "new" stuff we'll be seeing.
Hmmm... Let's pretend I only vaguely understand the OGL. If Paizo published it, why couldn't they use it? Can Paizo change the non-OGL of the Compendium since it's their product? Are my dreams of seeing Varisian battle dancers dashed forever? I've noticed that other books (Tome of Horrors, the Advanced Beastiary) are utilized in the Pathfinder AP, does something special make them OGL, or is it simply "Yeah, we want this to be open material"?
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Hmmm... Let's pretend I only vaguely understand the OGL. If Paizo published it, why couldn't they use it? Can Paizo change the non-OGL of the Compendium since it's their product? Are my dreams of seeing Varisian battle dancers dashed forever? I've noticed that other books (Tome of Horrors, the Advanced Beastiary) are utilized in the Pathfinder AP, does something special make them OGL, or is it simply "Yeah, we want this to be open material"?
Paizo published the Dragon Compendium under license from Wizards of the Coast. The content was Wizard's IP, they licensed Paizo to collect and publish it. The content is not OGL because it was not declared to be so (this desicion would have been up to WotC, not Paizo). Paizo cannot retroactively declare it to be OGL because the material is WotC IP.
The other books you listed are declared OGL by the publisher and are therefore open for use by others.
Hmmm... Let's pretend I only vaguely understand the OGL. If Paizo published it, why couldn't they use it? Can Paizo change the non-OGL of the Compendium since it's their product? Are my dreams of seeing Varisian battle dancers dashed forever? I've noticed that other books (Tome of Horrors, the Advanced Beastiary) are utilized in the Pathfinder AP, does something special make them OGL, or is it simply "Yeah, we want this to be open material"?
Truthfully, I don't always understand OGL myself, so don't feel bad.
My guess at what is happening in this case is that the Compendium was written by Paizo for WOTC under contract. WOTC then could have chosen to specify it as OGL, but elected not to do so.
WOTC doesn't need to make a whole lot of products OGL because the market defaults to them anyway. They only made the Core Books OGL so that the third party market has something to work with. Beyond that, they keep their toys to themselves.
In the case of Tome of Horrors and the Advanced Beastiary, they were specifically designated by their publishers as OGL. And unlike WOTC, it serves their best interest anyway, because when their books are referred to in other companies books, they get a little free advertising to generate more sales. WOTC could care less, because they're so big.
EDIT: Ungoded replied more succiently before I did. :D
I still need to find a copy of Tome of Horrors, myself. Preferably a print copy.
If you run 3.5 I would recommend the PDF version, as its been updated to the current rules, whereas the original print version is for 3.0.
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If you run 3.5 I would recommend the PDF version, as its been updated to the current rules, whereas the original print version is for 3.0.
Quite true, but I understand the desire of many to have the book. Printing out just 1 page from a PDF does make for lighter travel loads when going out of the house to game but for prep time, books still dominate IMHO.
Are my dreams of seeing Varisian battle dancers dashed forever?
Well, yes. But only in the "official" sense. I don't know about you, but I translate "official" into "diddely-poop". You can go nuts with all the varisian battle dancers your little role playing heart desires!
I promise.
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If you run 3.5 I would recommend the PDF version, as its been updated to the current rules, whereas the original print version is for 3.0.Quite true, but I understand the desire of many to have the book. Printing out just 1 page from a PDF does make for lighter travel loads when going out of the house to game but for prep time, books still dominate IMHO.
There are places that will turn your pdfs into hardback books (for a price). A friend of mine did that with his 3.5 Iron Heroes pdf - i'll quiz him, and if he got good service i'll post a link.
Look how many people ran out and bought Tome of Horrors and Book of Fiends because Pathfinder 1 used them once each and Advanced Beastiary because of the Dreads in Pathfinder 2.
Why, I wonder? I felt no urge to buy the FF or MM3, 4 or 5 when monsters from those books appeared in Dungeon. Odd.
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Look how many people ran out and bought Tome of Horrors and Book of Fiends because Pathfinder 1 used them once each and Advanced Beastiary because of the Dreads in Pathfinder 2.Why, I wonder? I felt no urge to buy the FF or MM3, 4 or 5 when monsters from those books appeared in Dungeon. Odd.
If you enjoy the creature that is in the book, you might want to look at it and see if you are going to enjoy the other things in it. Once you find authors/publishers you trust to do a good job, it may just snowball and you find yourself picking up $90 worth of stuff in the paizo holiday sale... its all a conspiracy I tell you
Printing out just 1 page from a PDF does make for lighter travel loads when going out of the house to game but for prep time, books still dominate IMHO.
Take it to staples, kinkos, etc and have them print it out and bind it. It'll cost ~$15, but then you have a physical copy. Also, if something happens to your copy (rain soaked, spilled drink, etc), no worries. YOu can go right back to staples and use the same pdf and print out the same copy.
About OGL vs. WotC licence, think of it like this: everything with the "Official Licenced Product" logo on it (Dungeon, Dragon, Dragonlance, Ravenloft, etc) are owned by WotC, but other companies are allowed to make money off of it for a time. Everything those companies put out using those licences are owned by WotC, even if WotC didn't lift a finger to help in its creation.