Breach of Compatibility License?

[Brennan Ashby]

If I wanted to design and publish a futuristic campaign setting that used the Pathfinder RPG rule set as its basis, and was granted a compatibility license, what would be the validity of the following alterations? Would these changes breach the compatibility license? And if so, how could I alter them so that they don't breach the license, but keep their integrity?

- Did not use Pathfinder's races, player-classes, feats, or spells (by name), but used some of their mechanics in my own campaign-specific classes, races, feats, and spells? Pathfinder's races, player-classes, and all related feats would not be allowed, used, or referenced in the campaign setting at all, by name at least (i.e. there would be no 'magic' in the campaign setting, so arcane and divine spellcasters, or feats that pertain to abilities of those classes, would not exist, nor could they)?

- Did reference Pathfinder's rules for character creation, or the fact that character creation in my campaign setting used Pathfinder's rules for character creation, but did not reprint them in the campaign setting source books?

- Did create new campaign-specific skills that combined the mechanics of two or more Pathfinder skills (similar to how Stealth combined Hide and Move Silently from 3.5)?

- Changed the name of a skill like "Heal" to something that better fit the flavor of the campaign setting, like "Medical", but kept the skills mechanics?

- Did omit certain Pathfinder skills that did not pertain to the campaign setting, such as "Use Magic Device", "Spellcraft", or "Craft"?

[Liz Courts]

The Pathfinder Compatibility License, much like the Open Gaming License which it is based upon, does allow for derivative works. Eliminating parts of the game system (like spellcasting), altering existing rules systems, or renaming them to suit your campaign setting would be allowed under the Pathfinder Compatibility License.

[Vic Wertz]

Liz is generally correct, but I would like to point out that, to use the Compatibility License, your product does still need to remain compatible with the Pathfinder RPG. Defining "compatible" is a bit difficult. Can you remove magic and still be compatible? Sure. Can you rewrite skills and still be compatible? Yes. Can you throw out all the existing classes and still be compatible? Perhaps. But when you're changing *so many* of those things, the aggregate may well be a game that isn't actually compatible with the Pathfinder RPG. If I pick up one of your sourcebooks, will I feel that I have to change most of the mechanics to make it work for me? If somebody playing your stuff picks up a copy of Ultimate Magic, will it be meaningless to them?

I have a strong suspicion that you've made enough changes that your game should be a standalone product, and not use the Pathfinder RPG Compatibility License. Note that you *can* still access all of the mechanics that we declare as Open Gaming Content under the OGL; giving up the Compatibility License mostly just means that you can't tell people that your products are compatible with the Pathfinder RPG (which it probably isn't, really).

[Brennan Ashby]

Thank you so much for your responses. My game is actually still in its infancy, and is just a hodge-podge of random ideas, rules, and stat blocks at the moment. I just wanted to get a better idea of what I was actually able to do with the game in regards to the Pathfinder rule set that the game is designed around once development becomes more dedicated and structured.

You gave me a lot of useful information, which really helps in the direction that the game's development will take. Again, thank you so much.