Meh, simply don't participate then. I don't have any problems with their clauses because I hope they take my feedback and use it directly. I don't expect to be compensated for that nor do I want to try to pawn what they're making as something of my own (or sell, etc..)
Really, WotC ninjas aren't going to be at your house, in your bushes, or hinding in your roof to make sure your group of friends all sign the thing. And they know this. Sheesh.
I hear you, Stereofm. As a freelance author, I know I'm not comfortable agreeing to WotC's terms without first consulting an attorney to make sure I'm not jeopardizing future work-for-hire contracts.
And since I'm not going to waste my time and money consulting an attorney just to safely participate in a playtest...
I'm a freelance author and an attorney. I'm participating in the playtest. I find the terms and conditions to be well within the realm of expected and reasonable. I don't believe I'm jeopardizing any future work-for-hire contracts I enter into as a writer, and I don't believe anyone I hire for freelance work for my own gaming company will be jeopardized if they are playtesting for WotC.
You're welcome to think otherwise, but I think you're being overly cautious.
As part of your participation as a D&D Next playtester, you will receive Playtest Materials that are proprietary and highly confidential to Wizards.So this "public" playtest does not involve any publicly-available content.
This sounds just like making themselves appear important.
Feedback submitted by you to Wizards via any medium is deemed a work-made-for hire as defined in the Copyright Act (17 U.S.C. §201) and owned by Wizards.So in order to playtest, I have to agree to a work-for-hire contract.
...Wizards may execute the aforementioned documents as your attorney in fact, which appointment will be irrevocable for this sole purpose.So in order to playtest, I have to grant Wizards of the Coast the right to act as my attorney.
You are welcome to run the D&D Next playtest at home. However, all members of the group must follow the official sign-up process at DNDNext.com and agree to the terms and conditions for playtesting.So I can't run a playtest with an in-person group unless I convince them to sign a work-for-hire contract letting WotC act as their attorney.
No way around that. They can't do anything different than that. It really just means that you can't later sue them for using your creative work and your ideas without paying you royalties.
You can. Just not on forums where moderators and admins are around to read your group-only threads. Setting up your own private forums or using skype or anything is okay.you may not run an online game on third parties sites at this timeSo I can't run the playtest with an online group at all.
...playtesting is not permitted at conventions unless run by Wizards of the Coast.So I can't run a playtest at Paizocon at all.
Yes, you can't.
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I'm a freelance author and an attorney. I'm participating in the playtest. I find the terms and conditions to be well within the realm of expected and reasonable.
Welby, I'd like to reward your reasoned thinking by reading your book. Are you published?
And while we're comparing WotC's beta model with Paizo's, I wonder how much of Paizo's beta scheme was impacted by the rules SRD already being publicly available.
D&D Next Playtest Agreement wrote:
As part of your participation as a D&D Next playtester, you will receive Playtest Materials that are proprietary and highly confidential to Wizards.
So this "public" playtest does not involve any publicly-available content.
It is public in the sense that it is both open to anyone who wants in, and you can discuss your experiences with the playtest publicly. That makes it public. What you're saying doesn't even really matter at all.
So in order to playtest, I have to agree to a work-for-hire contract.
You have to agree that your feedback is something you are providing to WotC, and that you can't later go and pretend that they stole your ideas by using the feedback you gave them.
So in order to playtest, I have to grant Wizards of the Coast the right to act as my attorney.
Only in as far as they would need to hold you to the agreement you already made with them, which is as outlined above. Again, nothing horrific. You're making a mountain out of a legal molehill.
So I can't run a playtest with an in-person group unless I convince them to sign a work-for-hire contract letting WotC act as their attorney.
No, you just can't run a playtest unless all your friends agree to a fairly standard and almost utterly inoffensive contract.
So I can't run the playtest with an online group at all.
That's correct, and probably for any number of good reasons (for instance, it may be that they want only feedback on how the game plays around a table in real-life, at the moment. If you can't play in real life, don't participate in the playtest yet. You can still download the materials and share your thoughts.
So I can't run the playtest with a VTT at all.
See above.
So I can't run a playtest at Paizocon at all.
That's correct.
I get the feeling that you're trying to make this into a big deal over the idea that this playtest is somehow not public. I'll be clear: this is a public playtest. It is accessible by anyone, it's free, and you can talk about it all you want. "Public" does not mean no strings attached.
Basically what this is is the standard conditions of a closed playtest. In short in return for letting you participate, they don't want you spilling the details before they let it go public.
That is absolutely not the case. As specified by the contract, you are explicitly allowed to share your experiences and thoughts on the playtest.
What WOTC is asking for is nothing unusual, nor unreasonable for a CLOSED beta test.
If you were prevented from talking about the playtest with those who are not participating, that would make it a closed, restricted playtest. But this playtest allows anyone to sign up, and allows you to talk about your experiences freely.
A closed beta test typically refers to one where the pool of participants is purposefully limited somehow, and where some sort of embargo on the sharing of details exists.
An open beta test is one where sign-ups are unrestricted, and where the game can be discussed freely.
This is the latter. There is no question about it.
That's the kind of thing you do for a closed beta, not a public play test. Hasbro has too many lawyers.
Yep.
WotC just doesn't get it.
Bella Sara Charter Superscriber
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That's the kind of thing you do for a closed beta, not a public play test. Hasbro has too many lawyers.
Impossible. You can never have too many lawyers.
(WelbyBumpus has it right, this isn't unreasonable or non-standard from a legal perspective. If you own a cell phone or piece of software, you're already party to a contract with crazy one-sided terms that make this look Iike a Christmas present.)
I remember back when Monte left over some type of professional disagreement. I wonder if this lawyer crap was it.
My money's on yes.
My money is on No. This interference by lawyers is pretty bush league. I won't say that it wasn't some lawyerly shenanigans like with licensing plans, but legalese in the play test agreement? That's pretty much nothing.
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Yeah, to clarify, I actually meant "lawyer crap" in a more broad sense - to wit, I'll bet he disagreed with a mandate from Legal, on some matter or another. Oh well, we'll never know.
Also, apologies to Sebastian. Lawyers get a bad rap. One of my best friends is a lawyer.
I would, however, posit that in a cell phone contract (and to an increasing extent a software purchase) it's assumed that money has changed hands and will likely continue to change hands in some sort of way that needs to be agreed-upon. I have no problems with any of that. This is not that. This is being billed as a public playtest, but is actually a playtest for a subset of the public that enters into an agreement with WotC. Those two things aren't equivalent.
Measure the absurdity of the agreement by the fact that there is a thread in this very forum section that is speaking so hesitantly about the things in the playtest that it's impossible to derive any details from the thread whatsoever. Based on the agreement, that sort of discussion in a non-WotC forum amongst people who both have and have not entered into the agreement should be fine.
This is being billed as a public playtest, but is actually a playtest for a subset of the public that enters into an agreement with WotC. Those two things aren't equivalent.
That doesn't make it suddenly not public. For instance, most games' public betas involve an agreement that must be entered into before the individual can participate. It's like saying, "It's billed as a public park, but it's really only for a subset of the public that agrees to pick up any poop their dogs might leave behind! How dare they call it public!" It seems like some of you are trying to purposefully redefine the meaning of the word "public" as it applies to playtests in an effort to make it look like WotC has somehow lied to you. They haven't, and it's sad that some of you are trying to twist it into that. You don't need to be constant haters just to maintain your gamer cred. We won't think less of you.
Measure the absurdity of the agreement by the fact that there is a thread in this very forum section that is speaking so hesitantly about the things in the playtest that it's impossible to derive any details from the thread whatsoever. Based on the agreement, that sort of discussion in a non-WotC forum amongst people who both have and have not entered into the agreement should be fine.
It is fine. People are losing their crap at the mere shadow of a legal agreement, and I'm really not sure why. They enter into agreements all the time. They've probably entered into more onerous agreements on this very website when purchasing material from Paizo, or opting into a Community Use License. But it's WotC, and people seem to enjoy finding new and exciting ways to flip out every time WotC exhales.
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That was the public beta test. I'm fairly sure that prior to each of those betas, Paizo ran a closed beta among a select group of people who also signed NDAs. Which included agreements not to talk about them.
Nope, we never ran a closed test with NDA's. It was always open to anyone.
-Lisa
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And while we're comparing WotC's beta model with Paizo's, I wonder how much of Paizo's beta scheme was impacted by the rules SRD already being publicly available.
None. We never entertained a closed beta and have not done so for any of the new systems that we have playtested subsequently.
-Lisa
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Huzzah! Lisa to the... rescue? Thanks for telling us. Does the lady care to weigh-in on the reasonable/unreasonable debate?
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It's probably worth mentioning that the legal situation with respect to the playtests for PF and 5e are different - PF was done under the aegis of the OGL so I'm not sure whether they would have been in a position to treat the rules as their own so much, and anyway why bother when the basic system (3.5) was already available to all. 5e is much more proprietary property for WotC right now. I don't have the legal background to go further on this but it is probably a pertinent difference. And anyway, "open playtest" doesn't equal "and feel free to copy what you want from our IP".
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Don't you have to be a DDI subscriber to participate?
No, you just have to create a logon ID for their messageboards. (Which is free.)
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I get the feeling that you're trying to make this into a big deal over the idea that this playtest is somehow not public. I'll be clear: this is a public playtest. It is accessible by anyone, it's free, and you can talk about it all you want. "Public" does not mean no strings attached.Don't you have to be a DDI subscriber to participate?
Nope. You just have to set up an account at Wizards.com - same situation with the alpha/beta downloads here at Paizo.
Unfortunately, it seems that a lot of people (myself included) found issues with the WotC site and its capabilities.
As someone who took part in the Paizo open beta, one of the most amazing experiences that came from that for me was when I next went to my gaming club.
Everyone was talking about Pathfinder, what they liked, what they didn't, the grey middle ground got thrashed and smashed, and it was glorious fun - resulting in a game that is beautiful and tight and so far has remained so.
What I see happening with the DnD Next current beta is that, yes, we can discuss on special forums, but there is that subtle don't spill the beans about it... That will mean that groups in the gaming clubs might not reveal what they are doing or their experiences in such an open and vibrant manner as occurred with Pathfinder. Specifics may not get discussed so openly and so there is the potential for good feedback to get lost or unheard.
That's the big miss for the current DnD Next Beta - it may open up later, but by then some things will be in stone. Paizo had the open-ness right from the start and whether it was imposed by the open games licence or not, they won big time and gave us an amazing gaming system.
We can only hope and pray that DnD next follows in those footsteps with similar results.
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I live with a Venture Lieutennant. If I recall correctly, there are things that you make your folks sign NDA's for. Although I could be thinking of something else. But then again much of your rules set is open, whereas everything of WOTC's is closed IP. So your operating conditions are different.
Oh, don't get me wrong, we have lots of NDAs and such. For instance, Venture Captains and Lieutenants have to sign NDAs because we have a private forum where we talk to them about confidential issues. Authors and artists sign NDAs when they sign their contracts because we don't want them talking about our plans before we are ready to announce it ourselves. Employees have NDAs so they don't do the same. Companies use NDAs all the time. I have signed my share in the course of my career. I just wanted to clarify that we never have done it in the area of playtesting. Some folks made the assumption that we did and I wanted to clarify. That is all. :)
-Lisa
RPG Superstar 2009 Top 32, 2010 Top 8
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I think part of Meepo's* concerns are what he sees might have impact on parallel development.
For example, let's say I'm working on a Donna's Dozens for 'new uses for old skills'** I sign up for the play test and lo and behold, some of the stuff there lines up nicely with my current work. How do I show that the 'Donna's Dozens' wasn't inspired by the playtest? Heck if I'm a successful freelancer and not just some guy putting PDFs up for download (links in my profile) how does this impact a project I'm working on and getting paid for?
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What I see happening with the DnD Next current beta is that, yes, we can discuss on special forums,
You can discuss the D&D Next playtest wherever you want. There are no "special forums" that you're restricted to.
but there is that subtle don't spill the beans about it...
If you're being "subtle don't spill the beans about it" you have no one to blame but yourself. There are people discussing the particulars of Advantage/Disadvantage on Twitter right now.
That will mean that groups in the gaming clubs might not reveal what they are doing or their experiences in such an open and vibrant manner as occurred with Pathfinder. Specifics may not get discussed so openly and so there is the potential for good feedback to get lost or unheard.
And it would be silly to blame WotC for this, if it did happen. The playtest can be discussed freely. Unfortunately, there are a handful of rather paranoid individuals (who also don't do close readings of the legal documents they are prompted to agree to) who come up with outlandish conclusions about what you can and can't do, and they're currently in the process of poisoning the well. Once again, the gaming community is its own worst enemy.
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To be honest, these strikes me as typical silly stuff that you find on this board. The comparison with the PF playtest is moot when it was a tinkering with an existing system which was already freely available through the OGL, so there wasn't much to hide, nor do Paizo rely on sales of the system anyway for revenue. The situation is different for WotC. And you are still allowed to talk about it, you just can't reproduce their IP nor pretend that by participating in a playtest you somehow are entitled to royalties on the finished product. I'm failing to see what there is to "not get". There's theorietical risk that something you produce independently might look like something in 5e but that's probably unlikely and, well, just bad luck.
People seem to think the OGL is the norm, and it isn't. Nor, in the end, was it a successful experiment for WotC, so a "let it all hang out" playtest was always incredibly unlikely.
RPG Superstar 2015 Top 32
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Does the lady care to weigh-in on the reasonable/unreasonable debate?Nope. :) I'll leave that to the rest of y'all...
-Lisa
Smart CEO! ^_^
I'm hoping to be able to get into the Playtest, as the legalese, while it seems a bit excessive, doesn't really affect me as I am neither a writer, nor game designer.
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RPG Superstar 2010 Top 16, 2011 Top 32
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I'm hoping to be able to get into the Playtest, as the legalese, while it seems a bit excessive, doesn't really affect me as I am neither a writer, nor game designer.
I'm in the same boat; I'm curious as to the direction WotC is going, but not really enough to care one way or the other about the legalese. Frankly, while I would love other publishers to follow the Paizo model, it isn't going to happen. I don't think you could use the toilet at WotC without signing some sort of legal contract; they're just indoctrinated into a legal model set out by Hasbro. And of course, the fact that Paizo does things openly and without a lot of unnecessary legalese just makes me like them more.
It was successful up the the point where they decided to throw it away. ^^