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However, that’s much trickier with Paizo, as everything on their store needs to conform to the OGL.
I found your post very interesting, thanks for sharing. However, I'm not sure that the quoted portion (above) is true. Can you cite a source for that? Paizo is free to sell non-OGL stuff on its webstore as far as I know. For instance, you can still buy back-issues of Dragon/Dungeon Magazines (print copies, no less).
AFAIK—and please correct me if I'm wrong—PF2 is not going to be part of the OGL.
If I'm wrong, and PF2 is in fact an OGL game, then I do see your point.
As others, like Gorbacz, have said, anything for Pathfinder (1 or 2) needs to conform to the OGL. It needs to cite referenced books and use legal monsters. Which is tricky to guarantee.
WotC doesn't need to vete anything on the Guild and approval is automatic. But for a Paizo store, things would need to be checked to make sure beholders aren’t slipping in.They could certainly have a clear FAQ and automatically generate a OGL page (possibly based on a form fillable application, but it’s another area of complexity.
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Way I understand it, DM's Guild is a way for WOTC to make money from IPs they own but will not invest in. Always better to gather dollar than dust on these oldies you do not particularly care about but others do.
Paizo has no similar trove of IPs in its attic
Welll... there are a dozen regions of Golarion that have never been touched. Meanwhile, we’re on our third Runelord adventure and sixth set in Varisia.
With two APs a year, it will be at least six years before some regions get covered. If not longer.
There’s lots of room for fan adventures filling in the gaps until the designers can get to Nex or Galt or Nidal.
Let alone Tian Xia. Paizo could easily let the fans go nuts and play around in Tian Xia, setting adventures there and selling them.
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No there isn't, which undercuts your original idea that DM's Guild is just a way for WotC to cynically milk its unused, unloved IPs for spare change.
Or, from a different perspective, it confirms it. They're not exactly cranking out books or setting support material, they're just kind of dribbling out campaign settings from the IP catalogue and then letting other people do the work of supporting each one with adventures. It's a zero risk proposition for them and each time a new campaign setting book drops they get a surge in shared profits a few months later as everyone jumps on the wagon of finally releasing that Ravenloft/Forgotten Realms/Eberron/etc. adventure they wrote. It's exactly the business model I'd use if I had a bunch of IP that used to be very popular but which I had no interest in spending time and money supporting anymore. Each time one IP starts flagging, you drop the next one, then you sit on it until the 3pp support dries up and the money stops coming in, so you drop the next beloved property from someone's childhood and go back to watching the money pour in.
Outside of the Forgotten Realms, which supplanted Greyhawk as the core setting back in 4E, each of the campaign setting books they've released has been largely a standalone product, which immediately became available to DM's Guild. That is virtually the definition of milking money from unused IPS.
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No there isn't, which undercuts your original idea that DM's Guild is just a way for WotC to cynically milk its unused, unloved IPs for spare change. Be that as it may, I have this overwhelming sense that no matter what the facts are, you're going to spin them to suggest WotC is nothing but a soulless, evil, money-grubbing corporate empire...
I mean, you're not wrong that WotC wants to make money. So does Paizo. But in my opinion, WotC's strategy with 5e and the DM's Guild makes not only good business sense, but also makes for great gaming. I've had a lot of fun with 5e, just as I used to with Pathfinder 1E, and I look forward to having tonnes of fun with PF2 as well!
Uh...I dunno where you're getting the implication that people are saying WotC are especially cynical or what they're doing is inappropriate. I tend to think the Raven Black and Ssalarn are absolutely right about what WotC are doing...but I also don't blame WotC for that and think that you're likely right that it makes for great gaming.
This post just comes off as accusing people of hostility I'm not at all sure they really feel. I mean, I guess they could feel that way, but their posts don't seem super hostile to me.
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I'm afraid you've understood it wrong. In fact, it works in precisely the opposite way: WotC only opens up a setting on DM's Guild AFTER they publish official 5E material in that setting. So Forgotten Realms, Ravenloft, Eberron, and Ravnica (the new kid on the block) are the only settings currently open for use on DM's Guild. Dragonlance, Greyhawk, Dark Sun, Planescape et al. are off limits, gathering dust.
Way I understand it, DM's Guild is a way for WOTC to make money from IPs they own but will not invest in. Always better to gather dollar than dust on these oldies you do not particularly care about but others do.Paizo has no similar trove of IPs in its attic
I guess that if you want to get people eager about 5e, you indeed need to put some 5e version of your setting out before opening it. I guess that these other IPs you mention might be opened too once they get the 5e basic treatment.
Is there a setting which is both WOTC IP and using 5e rules but that has not been opened to DM's Guild ?
No there isn't, which undercuts your original idea that DM's Guild is just a way for WotC to cynically milk its unused, unloved IPs for spare change. Be that as it may, I have this overwhelming sense that no matter what the facts are, you're going to spin them to suggest WotC is nothing but a soulless, evil, money-grubbing corporate empire...
I mean, you're not wrong that WotC wants to make money. So does Paizo. But in my opinion, WotC's strategy with 5e and the DM's Guild makes not only good business sense, but also makes for great gaming. I've had a lot of fun with 5e, just as I used to with Pathfinder 1E, and I look forward to having tonnes of fun with PF2 as well!
I do not see it as cynical to want to make money out of IPs that would otherwise gather dust and end up being forgotten. In fact it seems to be a pretty win-win situation where the company gets money, some freelancers get some too and the players rediscover the setting. The biggest drawback from what I see is the higher probability of a loss of consistency for the setting itself.
My question aimed at assessing WOTC's strategy. Do they have a main setting which the protect from outside interference because it is the one they invest in ? Or do they use all their IPs in the same way, which means they rely far more on the 5e system itself than on any one setting ?
Which can be a very appropriate strategy BTW but which is obviously not the strategy of Paizo, since PF2 is far more married to the setting than PF1 is.
Way I see it, if a setting is a central part of a company's strategy, they will avoid weakening its consistency. Which is more reason IMO why I think Paizo will not follow in WOTC's footsteps here.
Uh...I dunno where you're getting the implication that people are saying WotC are especially cynical or what they're doing is inappropriate. I tend to think the Raven Black and Ssalarn are absolutely right about what WotC are doing...but I also don't blame WotC for that and think that you're likely right that it makes for great gaming.This post just comes off as accusing people of hostility I'm not at all sure they really feel. I mean, I guess they could feel that way, but their posts don't seem super hostile to me.
Against a person, not against people, just to be clear. My perception was that Raven Black implied bad faith on the part of WotC based on an assumed set of facts, and then when the facts turned out to be almost exactly opposite to what they presumed, they nonetheless took that to be evidence of their preconceived opinion of WotC . My assessment of their intentions could have been incorrect, it's true.
Although—just to be clear—"hostility" is taking things too far. If Raven Black does indeed hate WotC with an irrational burning passion, I'm not offended! I don't need to defend WotC's honour! I just also don't need to argue about it, so I just wanted to get that aspect of things out in the open and out of the way.
I guess if you aren't gorbacz, it's harder to get away with a little snark?
My question aimed at assessing WOTC's strategy. Do they have a main setting which the protect from outside interference because it is the one they invest in ? Or do they use all their IPs in the same way, which means they rely far more on the 5e system itself than on any one setting ?
They have a favoured setting: Forgotten Realms, in which 90% of their official products are set. That is also the setting that is most used by authors on the DM's Guild. So they don't treat all their settings the same, nor do they rely on "the system" at the expense of the "setting". Everything is a little more fluid than you're imagining. Most of their products are large, single book adventures each of which is probably 3/4 of an AP in length. The rest of the non-core books are all hybrid splat/setting/monster books, each of which is tied to a single setting (mostly Forgotten Realms, but also Eberron and Ravnica).
Af far as consistency in the setting goes, there's definitely very little of that, given how old most of these settings are. They also don't support their settings with regular supplements like Paizo does, but they do write great adventures which incorporate a lot more setting material directly into them. Most of their large adventures have extensive sandbox components that serve almost as a mini-setting guide.
Hope that helps answer some of your questions.
Will the World Guides be OGL?
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I guess if you aren't gorbacz, it's harder to get away with a little snark?
Well, it is, because none of you is as smooth as I am. Also, few of you have a degree and professional experience in inciting emotional response and getting away with it.
But I take any imitations as the highest form of flattery, thank you.
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Against a person, not against people, just to be clear. My perception was that Raven Black implied bad faith on the part of WotC based on an assumed set of facts, and then when the facts turned out to be almost exactly opposite to what they presumed, they nonetheless took that to be evidence of their preconceived opinion of WotC . My assessment of their intentions could have been incorrect, it's true.
I was mostly responding to the seemingly combative tone rather than this general argument. It looked to me like you thought at least The Raven Black was angry at WotC, which I thought was probably not the case.
If I was in error about your intended tone, you have my sincere apologies.
Although—just to be clear—"hostility" is taking things too far. If Raven Black does indeed hate WotC with an irrational burning passion, I'm not offended! I don't need to defend WotC's honour! I just also don't need to argue about it, so I just wanted to get that aspect of things out in the open and out of the way.
To be clear, I was saying that, IMO, you thought The Raven Black was hostile, not that you were being hostile per se. I just disagreed with that assessment.
I guess if you aren't gorbacz, it's harder to get away with a little snark?
Tone is hard to gauge on the internet. We know Gorbacz is being snarky mostly from experience. :)
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I don't expect Paizo to open Golarian up for third-party use.
That said, I've been slowly developing a campaign for several years that I would love to explore publishing at some point in time. Since that's been in the back of my mind, I've tried to make it as setting-neutral as possible. This leads to needing to do some amount of world building, but its world building that I expect most people to replace (either slotting it into their own homebrew, or Golarian, or other existing campaign setting). This tends to dampen my enthusiasm every time I get to parts of the campaign that feel like they need world-building to support.
However that, to me at least, is exactly why I think Paizo will keep Golarian closed -- their APs (their stories/theiry campaigns) have always been one of their primary draws. Their authors can tell those stories because they have a rich, varied, and defined world to draw on. Its a competitive advantage for them.
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Hope that helps answer some of your questions.
It does. Thank you
BTW I do not hate WOTC with a fiery passion. I did not care that much about them when they released 3 and 3.5. And not at all after 4 came out and my group switched to PF.
I find it interesting to understand what their strategy is, even if I remain convinced that it would not fit Paizo for reasons I and others have already mentioned
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I do not hate WOTC with a fiery passion. I did not care that much about them when they released 3 and 3.5. And not at all after 4 came out and my group switched to PF.
Hating WotC is always going to be a tricky proposition. Because they're not a dude you can just hate: they're a company.
And the WotC of 2019 is very different from the WotC of 2008 and 4e. Different CEO (who is a computer guy and gamer rather than a Hasbro suit), and the head of D&D is different, and the tone of the D&D team is different.I find it interesting to understand what their strategy is, even if I remain convinced that it would not fit Paizo for reasons I and others have already mentioned
The strategy is pretty simple.
They have a LOT of settings, but releasing big hardcovers for them all is a losing proposition. In part because the vast majority of their fanbase doesn't give an eff about specific settings. And publishing lots of different settings just fractures the audience. There's no way to support all the IP created by TSR, but they don't just want to ignore it.
By putting them on the Guild, the fans can support them while making money for WotC, while the hardcovers are free to do other things.
Meanwhile the Guild supports fan homebrew, without requiring knowledge of the OGL. People can create without the legal hoop of knowing how the licence works, which is a pretty big barrier to entry.
And, as a bonus, it consolidates all the homebrew in one location rather than spread out over the entire internet.
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I guess if you aren't gorbacz, it's harder to get away with a little snark?Well, it is, because none of you is as smooth as I am. Also, few of you have a degree and professional experience in inciting emotional response and getting away with it.
But I take any imitations as the highest form of flattery, thank you.
You’re most welcome, you smooth bastard! BTW, I too have a law degree, for what it’s worth (not much, in my case!). I suppose that makes the perceived imitation even more fitting? Should I change my handle to Lil’ Gorbacz?