Obstacles to Releasing Open Games

[Sanglorian]

[Rob Lang]

I'm glad you're championing this, Sanglorian. CC is not close enough to my heart for me to have a stab at a good discussion of the salient points. You also sit in the opposite camp from me, which is absolutely neccessary to have a productive debate!

What still fills me with dread is picking up a book labelling itself as an setting to find poor graphics and writing. I don't want them calling that Icar. When people pick up something with Icar on it, I want to make absolutely sure they are reading something I have personally edited.

Sadly, OGL does not mean that Icar's brand would remain intact. I would have to make so much of it 'Product Identity' that it would leave nothing to build upon. There are d20 OGL books that are trash, hurriedly put together and given an expensively painted front cover. The insides are still poorly written and thought out. I know of a couple of chaps that have been burnt this way. Trusting the d20 brand. The OGL does not give me the ability to read every new book and have the right to deny it being published. It only ensures that I can say what is mine and what is not.

If I believed that the quality of Free RPG writers out there was sufficiently high that these concerns would be pithy and unfounded, then I'd retract and open to all. However, that isn't the case. Free RPG writers write as a hobby backup to actual gaming. They do not want to spend money (or many hours of effort) to produce beautiful graphics and to ensure that the book is proof read professionally, or , or laid out correctly, or typeset, or with indexes, or sense checked or... etc etc.

A free RPG writer creates in a , ideas spewing forth from every orafice. A free thinking anarchy growing on a substrate of gaming. And that is why , because they are , , , , or just damn . They are not, with a , of a high quality.

I know that a GM will never play the game exactly as intended and that any given roleplaying game is really an inspiration seed. I understand that the campaign settings I provide won't ever be played to the letter. That's ok. As long as the PDF (or book in the future) that they are holding is the very best I can produce, I'm happy.

[Sanglorian]

[Chainsaw Aardvark]

[kumakami]

in truth there is little use for OGL in free games...mainly because OGL is a matter of allowing other to make profit on your Product. In the end its about money. There is nothing stopping me from making an Icar supplement with out telling Rob about it. Once posted all references to the original will still yield traffic to its site for download. I will end up having to say "this is for the game Icar, you can find it at..." There is no money changing hands. And In accordance with Creative Commons If I try to make a profit off of Rob's game through my supplement I could as long as the site and author of the base game was mentioned in my book....

The minute Rob prints and sells Icar is the Minute some one has to worry about OGL.

Just my 1.98 cents.

[Sanglorian]