Exactly my feelings. It may be cheaper to bundle the PHB and DNG into a single volume but the unwieldiness of that 500 page monstrosity (with its weak binding and easy separating cover!)
This is why gygax gave us ducttape.
This is why gygax gave us ducttape.
Exactly my feelings. It may be cheaper to bundle the PHB and DNG into a single volume but the unwieldiness of that 500 page monstrosity (with its weak binding and easy separating cover!)
And if I was talking about a WotC product you would likely not be nearly so flippant (or forgiving, apparently). Paizo, of course, gets the free pass on shoddy products because...well I don't really know why in this case.
"Players fight the most fearsome monster of all time in an exciting multi-platform gaming experience"
That fearsome monster - "Expectations"
WOTC has been touting this version as the 'One version to rule us all' in that fans of every version of D&D up to now will find something familiar and comfortable in D&D Next to embrace it.
That is a lot of EXPECTATIONS right there. This summer, we find out if they delivered the goods...
And if I was talking about a WotC product you would likely not be nearly so flippant (or forgiving, apparently). Paizo, of course, gets the free pass on shoddy products because...well I don't really know why in this case.This is why gygax gave us ducttape.
Exactly my feelings. It may be cheaper to bundle the PHB and DNG into a single volume but the unwieldiness of that 500 page monstrosity (with its weak binding and easy separating cover!)
He isn't being flippant, as far as I can tell. At some point we had to ducttapped our PHBs, cause we used them so much.
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What were the differences between the OGL and GLS anyway?
(Warning: This is full of legal and technical inaccuracies in the name of getting it into understandable Plain English. Anyone that really understands the licenses can easily pick this apart, but as far as the majority of gamers are concerned this is the basics of OGL/GSL in a nutshell)
The OGL basically opened the entire base D&D 3e (and later 3.5) game rules (a.k.a. "d20") to be reused as you see fit, as long as you attributed them correctly.
To start with, it was used as WotC management expected, to produce support material for D&D 3e and thus sell more D&D PHBs.
Later on (and I suspect a certain Mr. Ryan Dancey knew this all along when he put the thing together, for which we can all be eternally grateful to him), people realized there were more than a few ways to get around what appeared to be restrictions, to build entire new game core rulebooks from the D20 SRD using the OGL (such as Pathfinder, Spycraft, the d20 version of Babylon 5, and many others.) This also resulted in somewhat of a "d20 explosion" as products of varying quality flooded onto the market, many competing directly with D&D rather than supporting it.
The GSL was WotCs 4e response to the OGL allowing people to build entirely new games, and was far more restrictive in order to ensure people only built modules and supplements that could be used with the 4e D&D rules and not make an entirely new game based off it.
Generally, publishers and many gamers were far more excited about the OGL, while the GSL received far more of a "meh" response in general.
What sort of restrictions did the GLS have the OGL didn't have?
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The GSL is based more around references than rules, there's no real "open content", just the right to reference certain terms from 4e, making it near impossible to construct a new game from it. All you can really do is create a module or a set of add-on rules with references back to things in the main D&D rulebooks.
It's also closer to a hybrid of the previous OGL and d20 licenses in that you are tied into putting a "D&D compatible" logo on a licensed product.
I'm not knocking it, because they don't have to allow any kind of license at all. However, given the choice the OGL + d20 SRD seems to be the more attractive option for most 3PPs. For Next to get decent 3PP support it needs to provide an incentive to tempt 3PPs away from the 3.5 ruleset. Maybe that means OGLing Next, or maybe a new type of license. Of course, they could just decide they don't want 3PP support, just like most other non-OGL games.
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I'm really interested to see whether they go back to an OGL. I dont have any great investment in it personally (I'm more a fan of "official content only" in my games), but over the last few years I've formed the view that the large amount of open content is one of the biggest factors in Pathfinder's ongoing success.
The GSL is based more around references than rules, there's no real "open content", just the right to reference certain terms from 4e, making it near impossible to construct a new game from it. All you can really do is create a module or a set of add-on rules with references back to things in the main D&D rulebooks.
It's also closer to a hybrid of the previous OGL and d20 licenses in that you are tied into putting a "D&D compatible" logo on a licensed product.
I'm not knocking it, because they don't have to allow any kind of license at all. However, given the choice the OGL + d20 SRD seems to be the more attractive option for most 3PPs. For Next to get decent 3PP support it needs to provide an incentive to tempt 3PPs away from the 3.5 ruleset. Maybe that means OGLing Next, or maybe a new type of license. Of course, they could just decide they don't want 3PP support, just like most other non-OGL games.
The real misstep was that using the GSL prevented a publisher from continuing to use the OGL IIRC. If WotC had not included that, they could have benefited from having a parallel (although likely smaller) 3PP community around 4e instead of everyone flocking to PF.
I suspect that whatever type of license they come up with for 5e, they probably will learn from their mistake, and not try to kill the OGL again.
I remember when 4e came out that my friends and I played for a while but then grew tired of the (at the time) limited and relatively homogeneous character options. So my entire group moved over to using PF/all our old 3.5 books together and gradually phasing out the 3.5 as more PF material came out. I know that I certainly will not shell out for 5e until there is a good amount of material or unless it truly is modular and backwards compatible and even then only if there is an option to purchase PDFs separate from garbage like DDI.
I'm really interested to see whether they go back to an OGL. I dont have any great investment in it personally (I'm more a fan of "official content only" in my games), but over the last few years I've formed the view that the large amount of open content is one of the biggest factors in Pathfinder's ongoing success.They won't. They haven't said anything that even hints at it. There's no reason to think they would.
One reason would be if they share my opinion.
I dont know that WotC have ever been good at telegraphing what they're going to do. However, you're probably right that silence is more indicative that it wont be designed with the OGL in mind than that it will.
I'm really interested to see whether they go back to an OGL. I dont have any great investment in it personally (I'm more a fan of "official content only" in my games), but over the last few years I've formed the view that the large amount of open content is one of the biggest factors in Pathfinder's ongoing success.They won't. They haven't said anything that even hints at it. There's no reason to think they would.One reason would be if they share my opinion.
I dont know that WotC have ever been good at telegraphing what they're going to do. However, you're probably right that silence is more indicative that it wont be designed with the OGL in mind than that it will.
I have an unsubstantiated feeling the license decision gets made above the sort of level that understands such things :(
Mearls has said they were aware of the problem with the GLS and they will try to do something about it. He does come from the 3PP industry. What Hasbro will decide that remains to be seen.
An open license for some rules would make sense. Enough for 3PP to use, but not enough to make an entire RPG game from it. But again, what VPs at Hasbro will decide...
An open license for some rules would make sense. Enough for 3PP to use, but not enough to make an entire RPG game from it. But again, what VPs at Hasbro will decide...
The problem with that is it leaves your product out in the cold when the inevitable 6th edition hits, while the OGL allowed Paizo to do what they did with Pathfinder. Until there's some way to guarantee the underlying system can survive past it's lifetime with WotC there's good reasons to shy away from supporting it.
Which leaves the dilemma of the larger 3PPs mostly wanting the one thing they probably can't give them, the ability to fork the ruleset.
Still, as you say, it's down to what they decide, and we can just sit and watch and wait :)
It also raises the question as to what Paizo will do in a few years.
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And if I was talking about a WotC product you would likely not be nearly so flippant (or forgiving, apparently).
I have duct tape on books going back to teenage mutant ninja turtles and other strangeness. Its a point of pride that i take the book out at cons and get a "wtf..."
Makes it look like i know the rules :)
Paizo, of course, gets the free pass on shoddy products because...well I don't really know why in this case.
Everyone gets a pass on that for me because most of my books fall apart at some point. I am an agent of entropy.
I would put money down that 5th edition will have no OGL. I think the whole culture of WotC has changed over the past decade, and while there may be some OGL supporters, I'm betting a lot of people there blame the OGL at least in part for 4th edition not being what they expected sales-wise.
The real misstep was that using the GSL prevented a publisher from continuing to use the OGL IIRC. If WotC had not included that, they could have benefited from having a parallel (although likely smaller) 3PP community around 4e instead of everyone flocking to PF.
I believe that got relaxed in the later revision of the GSL, but by then the horse had already left the barn, so to speak.
I think there were other toxic provisions that were objected to as well including one that required a licensee to withdraw/destroy materials that got superseded by WotC releases. For example, if a 3PP thought the first 4e PH left gaps by not having barbarians, bards, druids, and monks and published their own version of one or more of those - once WotC came out with its official version, that 3PP producer was obligated to pull his product. I think a lot of 3PP who actually took pride in their work weren't willing to put their IP to that kind of treatment.
Not to mention their already precarious financial health.
Given that we already see a PHB going to be released for Next, I'm sure that for monsters we're going to see Monster Manuals. I'd be willing to gamble that monster books are some of the most successful products after the core rules, more so than settings and probably more than adventures. I know they are my favorite supplemental books both for their usefulness for the DM and being fun to read with all of the art. WotC has indicated that the new monster entries will be a lot more like the 2E MC entries as well as later 4E monster vault products in that there will be more backstory and ecology type information provided to describe how they fit in the world, their role in a campaign, what other beings they have rivalries with, and so on.
I expect the MM to be released in September if the PHB is August, worst case October.
Now, what I'd like to see as a tool on the DDI is a utility that lets me select monsters from the official list and any modified or original monsters I create and spit out a custom PDF with a page entry that matches the official MM entry (or uses the standard format for homemade stuff) which I can then print and use at the table or transfer to a laptop or tablet. They should also allow me to share monsters I build in their tool with the community. Then they and other users can try out the monsters, use them, vote on their favorites and they could create an official MM book based on the best fan entries.
Given that we already see a PHB going to be released for Next, I'm sure that for monsters we're going to see Monster Manuals. I'd be willing to gamble that monster books are some of the most successful products after the core rules, more so than settings and probably more than adventures. I know they are my favorite supplemental books both for their usefulness for the DM and being fun to read with all of the art. WotC has indicated that the new monster entries will be a lot more like the 2E MC entries as well as later 4E monster vault products in that there will be more backstory and ecology type information provided to describe how they fit in the world, their role in a campaign, what other beings they have rivalries with, and so on.
As a creature fan, I am glad that they are considering going back to earlier approaches for monster manual. My oldest DnD related memory was skimming through the pages of the 2E monster manual and looking at all the crazy creatures and races...had no idea what any of the stats were but enjoyed the art and flavoring.
I remember flipping back through the 4E manuals a few years ago in Hastings and being disappointed in the layout of the monster books and how much information was actually provided beyond stats. Coincidentally that was pretty much how I found Pathfinder...I saw there thick and meaty bestiary and immediately fell in love.
On a related note to this thread, it doesn't surprise me we haven't heard much if anything about any sort of 5E OGL. If I was a company releasing a new product, I would be spending my time hyping the product, and saying "and also other companies can use our rules to make things for you to buy" would not be something I would really want to advertize right away.
It also raises the question as to what Paizo will do in a few years.
It's this reason which has always made me think that any future changes to the core rule set will be pretty incremental.
On a related note to this thread, it doesn't surprise me we haven't heard much if anything about any sort of 5E OGL. If I was a company releasing a new product, I would be spending my time hyping the product, and saying "and also other companies can use our rules to make things for you to buy" would not be something I would really want to advertize right away.
One of the problems with that is that 3PP support isn't going to be there on launch day, as it was with 3e due to advance copies of the OGL, SRD and PHB being available. Still, as has been discussed, it's entirely possible that's exactly what they want to avoid :)
Personally, haven't felt excitement equivalent to that I felt at the 3e launch ever since, and much of that excitement was due to me (as purely a player at the time) liking the idea of the OGL and the d20 SRD.
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There are some 3PP who are working on the closed playtest. They might be under NDAs, but can make compatible products read to be released when 5e comes out.
It also raises the question as to what Paizo will do in a few years.It's this reason which has always made me think that any future changes to the core rule set will be pretty incremental.
Yeah, I think PF 2.0 will be more a 1.5. Like PF is 3.75.
Some backward compatibility seems to be a must.
There are some 3PP who are working on the closed playtest. They might be under NDAs, but can make compatible products read to be released when 5e comes out.
That's interesting to know, I just wish that sort of thing would be more open, even if it's an open "we haven't decided yet" just so we know a little more about what to expect. Then again, it's not like any announcement would make me likely to drop Pathfinder to go back (even if I wanted to, I don't have the time or the money for both so it has to be one or the other, and I have too much invested in this game now to switch for anything short of a free Ferrari with every PHB), it's just plain curiosity on my part :)
There are some 3PP who are working on the closed playtest. They might be under NDAs, but can make compatible products read to be released when 5e comes out.That's interesting to know, I just wish that sort of thing would be more open, even if it's an open "we haven't decided yet" just so we know a little more about what to expect. Then again, it's not like any announcement would make me likely to drop Pathfinder to go back (even if I wanted to, I don't have the time or the money for both so it has to be one or the other, and I have too much invested in this game now to switch for anything short of a free Ferrari with every PHB), it's just plain curiosity on my part :)
I understand waht you mean. A 3PP designer said so on EW and I happened to stumble on the exchange of posts. This was a few months ago, maybe things have changed.
The D&D boat as sailed for me. Too much money invest in PF to start buying and learning a new edition because it is super important to get new versions of the fighter and wizards. The alpha playtest was rather meh, too. Nothing very exiting.
The D&D boat as sailed for me. Too much money invest in PF to start buying and learning a new edition because it is super important to get new versions of the fighter and wizards. The alpha playtest was rather meh, too. Nothing very exiting.
I'll be picking up both PF and DDN. I have my own setting so I don't typically buy setting related material unless it's something I can "plug in" to my own game without issues or it seems really interesting. I don't plan on switching from my 3.x campaign, but it's a possibility. And I enjoy reading RPG material.
Oh, and a starter set, PHB, MM, DMG are confirmed now (at GAMA). Supposedly looks good, but nothing released from the show. First AP in Forgotten Realms called "Tyranny of Dragons". I could skip the starter set and the AP, but it's nice to know the big three. Apparently only 1 PHB this time with all the core goodies, the MM to have all the iconic monsters, and magic items etc. to be in the DMG. Source: EN World, right on the front of the news, no link provided, much speculation follows... :)
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This part particularly worries me: "The “guiding light” through the design of 5e has been “What would Gary and Dave do?”"
from http://newbiedm.com/2014/03/19/dd-news-out-of-gama-trade-show/
What does that mean exactly? Does it mean that they will leave half of the game design process up to DMs and include many subsystems that contradict each other and have no math behind them or do they mean something entirely different?
I'd say it just means that, since Gary and Dave created the game we all know and love, those two are pretty excellent minds to try and tap into when creating a new edition of D&D.
Oh, and a starter set, PHB, MM, DMG are confirmed now (at GAMA). Supposedly looks good, but nothing released from the show. First AP in Forgotten Realms called "Tyranny of Dragons". I could skip the starter set and the AP, but it's nice to know the big three. Apparently only 1 PHB this time with all the core goodies, the MM to have all the iconic monsters, and magic items etc. to be in the DMG. Source: EN World, right on the front of the news, no link provided, much speculation follows... :)
This part particularly worries me: "The “guiding light” through the design of 5e has been “What would Gary and Dave do?”"
from http://newbiedm.com/2014/03/19/dd-news-out-of-gama-trade-show/
What does that mean exactly? Does it mean that they will leave half of the game design process up to DMs and include many subsystems that contradict each other and have no math behind them or do they mean something entirely different?
WOW...some people have no respect.
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WOW...some people have no respect.Oh, and a starter set, PHB, MM, DMG are confirmed now (at GAMA). Supposedly looks good, but nothing released from the show. First AP in Forgotten Realms called "Tyranny of Dragons". I could skip the starter set and the AP, but it's nice to know the big three. Apparently only 1 PHB this time with all the core goodies, the MM to have all the iconic monsters, and magic items etc. to be in the DMG. Source: EN World, right on the front of the news, no link provided, much speculation follows... :)
This part particularly worries me: "The “guiding light” through the design of 5e has been “What would Gary and Dave do?”"
from http://newbiedm.com/2014/03/19/dd-news-out-of-gama-trade-show/
What does that mean exactly? Does it mean that they will leave half of the game design process up to DMs and include many subsystems that contradict each other and have no math behind them or do they mean something entirely different?
So we should ignore that many of the rules systems in early D&D editions are terrible, because to question their wisdom would be disrespectful?
Come on.
I don't always agree with lokiare, but Gygax and Arneson were visionary because of their game concept, not their rules design. Taking inspiration from them is fine, as long as that inspiration doesn't include some of the more laughable rules systems they came up with.
Is it possible the "Gary and Dave" thing was just PR talk?
I'd say it's probably just this. As for Gygax and Arneson they built from scratch. Considerably more difficult job than current designers have. If you look at it from that point of view it makes more sense to wonder what they would do with it now. If you have a copy of Dangerous Journeys around you can see Gygax's progression as a designer. It's a different game entirely.
Is it possible the "Gary and Dave" thing was just PR talk?
I'd say it's not just possible - it's almost certain.