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Wizards of the Coast Is Gaslighting D&D Players
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- Опубліковано 13 січ 2023
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So there was some errors in the text animations. Not as much of a goof as that official statement though.
ill give at least THIS to whoever made this decision, they have put fire into a new DnD style game renaissance, because people ARE working on replacements once DnD is done burning to ash there will be many new systems.
who cares about typos lol, we like your stuff anyways
Perhaps the best way to look at this is to go back and listen to a podcast All Games Considered, episode 68 from November of 2007. There is a segment called Random Thoughts about Gaming, and while that deals with issues with D&D 4e, is message still applies. Gaming is not WOTC, Hasbro, Gencon, Warhammer, or any other company or individual game, is about a community,. And if even every company disappeared today, there are so many games out there the community would survive and thrive, enjoy the massive amount of material already written. It not like books ever stop working.
Please watch the latest episode of LegalEagle - and perhaps also give the podcast he mention a listen.
(Opening Arguments episode 675)
Again, I saw we keep canceling our dnd beyond subscriptions. Don't buy any more products from them. Don't buy from anyone who stands with them. Till the current CEO, and other department leaders step down.
Their defense is literally "our lawyers didn't think about the legal implications"
"Are you sure you want to do that...?" xD
And we know lies when we hear them.
@@Awol991 how could ANY business trust this? not even us as fans but paycheck filling businesses could lose everything
All I can think of is that chidi meme from the good place: "Okay but thats worse. You get how thats worse right?"
Unfortunately, saying that would have actually been a better response than what they gave which was the usual par for the course lie, lie, lie, lie, lie, well, we're sorry but actually you misunderstood us (which is also a lie because we knew what it meant before and we know that they're lying now). While still a lie, at least saying that their lawyers didn't think about the legal implication would have gotten them some points for voluntarily walking to the corner with the dunce cap. The truth is that they got greedy. They're only sorry they got caught and backhanded for it. The best response is "We're sorry. Please don't leave us. We recognize that the community is more than capable of growing competitors faster than weeds. We're enshrining the original OGL with an effective constitution that cannot be modified or revoked." And then fire a bunch of people.
+
Wizards: "I cast charm person!"
Community: "Frenzy makes us immune to charm dumb dumb"
More like, "Can I even BE Charmed when I am Enraged?" aka The Travis Willingham Response.
Community: We can't be Charmed while we're Raging
Love this!
Wizards: C- counter spell..?
They used to have Friends cast on us, unfortunately after the spell ends, we know that they used charm magic on us, and it's not gonna fucking work again
"Let's put out a weasel-worded statement late on a Friday".....to a group that spends their weekends picking apart rulings. For fun.
Let’s not forget that this is often a working adult hobby, especially those who actually buy products, and those people are often career people and quite a decent percentage are from educated backgrounds. And this is a generation with quick access to communication and knowledge and can quickly organize when and if needed. These are also the same people who have the patience to sit through hours of game time, deal with scheduling in a busy society, only to “complete” the game years down the road. Oh and let’s not forget it’s a cooperative game which means people who play it have to have some level of that to make a game function enough to be fun and so the communication and organization are even higher. Oh and last but definitely not least, a good portion of most of these campaigns are centered around the premise of defeating a bbeg, and hasbro/wotc have perfectly slotted themselves into that role of their own volition. Honestly? It almost feels like all those games were practice at this point.
@@mentalrebllion1270 You forgot one, shame. These are also people that are used to taking entire products, erasing any and all hints of trademarked details, and using them wholecloth. It's almost like you don't want to invite people that can in a lawyer friendly manner have your entire game within days to do so by mistreating them and creators.
It was early on Friday, first thing in the morning west coast time. But still, a terrible, terrible statement to release.
On a Friday 13th :D
Demonstrating how well they truly know their community. I mean, there are some real lawyers playing "rules lawyers"...
The fact that they confirmed this license was real and 100% serious was the biggest death sentence they could've gone for.
They said people misunderstood it's meaning though so they aren't really admitting what you think they are.
@@MarkoArillius We've "misunderstood it" in the same way that someone who found out their wife was cheating on them "Doesn't understand"
@@Alkavi_Ch You'll have to excuse him...simps like him are the reason why Hasbruh/NotC continues to think it can treat customers this way.
They didn't official acknowledge that, they pretended it was just "a draft" (that somehow got send out to content creators to sign within a week).
@@Nr4747"a draft" confirms that this was intended to be official,
If they said "a fake document was sent out by a spiteful employee" there'd be people who'd believe them.
They did roll a 1... on their deception check. Every sentence was a lie, smokescreen or diversion.
In fact, I think they rolled several successive 1's. Knowledge: Law in thinking this might work, Deception to trick the audience, and in Sense Motive against their own statement - after all, I think they themselves are the only ones that would believe that statement, or at least that it might work.
They should have at least burned an inspiration point on that check seeing how important it was...
Rolled a 1 on their negotiation, followed up with a 1 on deception
The term gaslighting gets thrown around so much, but rarely does it fit as well as it does in this situation. And yet, way to few people are using it in this instance. Hasbro and WotC are trying to make us doubt our perception of them. Don't let them get into your head!
Oh, but it was just a DRAFT! We released it to gain your VALUABLE feedback! Oh, and we only wrote it to PROTECT ourselves and YOU from nazis and NFTs! And those terrible corporations of course!
@@EisenKreutzer Ah yes, sure, WotC. Except we rolled a nat 20 on our insight check and we have identifyed the big bad evil guy of this story. But that's not why we are moving to diffrent game systems. We are doing that for you. So you don't have to carry the whole weight of the ttrpg market on your shoulders. All we want to do is ease your work load. Surely you don't want to burden yourself with that responsibilty. Let us help you.
Too few*
gaslighting is when someone makes you think you confused or made up the situation. So like. Yeah.
You said everything I'm feeling. The only thing that's gonna save Wizards is if they completely clean house, and even still...their rapport with the customers is SHREDDED right now. Utterly destroyed.
Yeah, they should sell the property at this point
@@lukewood8212 Indeed they have true and proven that they are not true custodians of the license kind of like how Disney proved with Star Wars. Ignore your fan base insult your consumers Chase away all of your returning customers. Fill your products full of toxic ideology speech That keeps people from returning. It's like all these corporations have forgotten the golden rule of business the number one golden rule of all business.
The customer is ALWAYS right...
I mean there's like only 3 businesses in the entire world that can afford to treat their customers like absolute dog c***. The 1st is the IRS because you know they can get away with it. The 2nd is the county treasurer because you're gonna pay or you're going to jail. And the 3rd is the morgue because you're already dead and they don't care what you think.
All you have to do is avoid using DnD terminology and they can't do a thing to you. Which means everything about the D and D multi verse has to be changed completely for a new campaign setting. I wish I had the skill the time and the resources because I have an entire world and an actual gaming system in my head right now using playing cards instead of dice. Where every player has a hand of cards. That refresh on the start of each of their terms each card is an action they get a certain number of actions per turn. The number on the card you play is added to your total challenge for the Check based off of your base abilities. And the strength of the creature or object or challenge to overcome. You may only need 2 points to do it so you only play the card of 2. Saving that 10 for a absolutely must succeed attack or defense. As for the world I have imagined in my head. Think a little bit skies of Arcadia. Mixed with a little secret of Mana. With some Traditional fantasy flavoring
this is basically what Games workshop did to their community in the mid 2000's that resulted in a rise in a bunch of competitors and new games. you would think that corporations would learn what happens when you do this.
Clean house AND commit to the ORC license too. Then maybe I might look at a D&D game again.
Thank you for calling out the lies! As you said "You don't ask people to sign drafts." No content creator should sign ANY OGL they put out. Play your old D&D books, or play something else. Basic Fantasy is free and old school. We had a great session of DCC this past Thursday, and have played Star Frontiers and classic Marvel not that long ago as well. Big LYING Company can get along without us.
I'm going to check out Star Frontiers. I've been wanting to play a sci-fi game for awhile now.
@@shaunhall960, they can't copyright the rules of the game. They can't do much OGL only work with dungeon and dragon content, not homebrew that doesn't have to do with it but copy the rules, so you should be good check out LegalEagle
I'm cooking up something, and there's no chance in hell I'm turning to D&D for it. I'd love to sell it, and ten years ago, I'd make it D&D compatible in a heartbeat. Not anymore, not a chance in hell. I don't want people stealing my ideas so they can use them to buy their tenth supercar. I'd rather give them away for free.
Don't forget Gurps
"You don't ask people to sign drafts." More importantly you don't make them sign an NDA if you want feedback from the wider community.
What I find glorious is that they have torpedoed a heap of good will with the community, just before they want to release what appears to be a highly monetised & predatory evolution of the game. Hopefully it will now be more cynically evaluated by the customer base & struggle to gain traction.
There was more gaslighting in that statement from Wizards than a manipulative ex.
Wizards is tryna gaslight us more than my dad did-
More than a 19th century lamplighter on main street.
The more they tighten their grip, the more systems will slip through their fingers.
The KEY thing here is that we *know WotC is lying* about 1.1 being a draft. Publishers have told news outlets including CNBC about how Hasbro approached them, asking them to sign early (before we could see what was up, in other words) for a better deal. You don't include a contract and sign-by date with a draft. WotC gave us a bold-faced lie.
One of many
Between D&D and MtG this year, WotC's executives have destroyed their own company.
Let's just wait and see
One can only hope. Bankruptcy is the only lesson that will actually stick. Otherwise they will just try again three, six, or twelve months down the line when they think (and may be right) that people have forgotten.
@Hazel Hazelton Agreed. Only in total destruction can mtg and d&d be saved.
I watched d&d survive tsr, I will watch it survive wotc.
More like Hasbro executives have destroyed WotC.
@@hazelhazelton1346 When people have forgotten, or when everyone who cared has moved on already. Even if they lose out on over half of their current players, those figures can be made up for with their predatory price schemes.
I really hope that their plans crash and burn, but I've seen enough to except that WotC will most likely recover without needing to backstep much. The only question is whether they recover in months or years.
"People are going to say they won and we lost. To that we say... nu-uh! We're the winner! We won! And now we're gonna pick up our ball and go home!"
How their PR team thought that statement would fix everything, I don't know
Most corporate PR thinks the general public is stupid, they are also all about minimal work and quick return to normal for the company. The general feeling is that in a few weeks we will forget and they can return to business as usual.
It's simple really. They think we're idiots.
I think their pr team had little to do with it. This honestly reads like some hastily written screed by a c-suite numbskull.
They clearly didn't know either. It's truly nauseating.
Let this be the hour when we draw swords together. Fell deeds awake. Now for wrath. Now for ruin. And the red DAWN!
Did you just sound the Horn-call of Buckland? Holee sheet.
Aight roll initiative
@@totallynotalpharius2283 I got a 6.
@@totallynotalpharius2283 Nat 20!
SPEARS SHALL BE BROKEN!
SHIELDS SHALL BE SPLINTERED!
A SWORD DAY!
A RED DAY!
AND 'ERE THE SUN RISES!
DEEEEEEEATH!
DEEEEEEEEEEEATH!
DEEEEEEEEEEEEEEATH!
@@Jamhael1 ok you’re first
Then @jimmysmith2249
Then a pile of dirty rags
And WotC can go whenever I feel like it
Not their community. OUR community. And we are letting them know that. Let's keep the pressure on these jackholes.
Also, EPIC Steel Panther tee.
Carpet bomb them, from orbit, with tactical nukes; it's the only way to be sure.
*Their* community now. I'm part of the TTRPG community, hard to imagine being part of the D&D community henceforth
@@mjp121 No, the D&D community is just part of the TTRPG community. Thing is, people don't need WotC to play D&D or to get the same experience from a different system. It's not the same thing as people needing Blizzard to play WoW. Already a lot of their customers play other games, many didn't but also didn't realize how much PF 2e did all the things they've been asking WotC for in D&D, and some will not switch but will not buy any more WotC products. The community doesn't need them, they need the community.
The ultimate gaslight is that you even need to sign the ogl at all. They can't own the rules to game, they only own text documents, logos, characters, and their published settings. Hasbro damn well knows that because the rules to their other board games get used all over the place, especially mobile games.
YEp.
Same goes for Paizo's ORC
I'm glad you mentioned the stupid NFT's with the Power Rangers, they did the same with Starting lineup. This is an epidemic all through Hasbro and it is fun seeing those on the action figure sides trying to defend this while not having a clue about what they are talking about, it's hilarious.
Oh don't worry, some of us on the action figure side are against it too.
They made a big deal about recyclable Transformers packaging, presumably to use the clout to disguise the emissions caused by their shitty NFTs
@@DoinItforNewCommTech I’m one of those in the action figure trenches so yeah I know others are there. That ghost rider has lab brought a lot to the surface.
The NFT thing makes sense though. At the end of the day it is their intellectual property. Making content is one thing. But someone else purely making money by selling JPEGS of the thing you own is stupid. NFTs are stupid themselves, but they exist and should be managed
@Dark Nova67 congrats you are the 3rd person I have found who openly accepts this gaslighting and backs these atrocities...honestly wouldn't be shocked if wizards/hasbro were trying to pretend to be part of this crowd at this point...nice try keep playing no one is going to fall for it and everyone is PISSED
@@Darknova67 To be blunt as discord said, the only ones doing NFTs is Hasbro. To be even more blunt NFT’s as w concept are idiotic.
What happened is clear to me. Hasbro higher ups made a decision with no understanding of their company, their product, their community, or the consequences. When their company effectively quarantined their product, burned down their community, and the consequences were laid bare, these same higher ups are now trying everything possible to cover their butts and do damage control. Turns out they're not very good at that, either.
Also, I really don't see Hasbro having any leg to stand on if they try to sue over the ORC license. They would literally be asking the court to give them a monopoly on open licenses, which would be 100% nonsense.
Surely they wouldn’t be crazy enough to sue over the ORC license? It has absolutely nothing to do with their copyright. I could see them suing Paizo for moving away from the OGL (which would be terrifying, even if they don’t have a leg to stand on there either), but suing over ORC?
@@thatonepossum5766 they can't sue paizo over the OGL, pathfinder doesn't use it. they only attached ogl so that wotc could use their content
@@thunderborn3231 I didn’t mean to imply they could sue and _win_ . Just that I could see them _thinking_ they had any grounds to sue, and that they might try it. Sorry that wasn’t clear. :)
@@thatonepossum5766 all good, just making sure you knew pathfinder is safe
Hasbro has about 5600 employees, WotC has 1000+ employees. Paizo has around 125 employees. Some of the other 3pps only have like 20 employees.
yeah it's insane - like Hasbro are actually afraid of another company taking advantage of D&D >.>
@@dungeonsanddiscourse If a company with 20 people could out compete WotC, they have bigger internal issues they should be dealing with instead of picking a fight with their audience and the 3pps
To be fair, there is Disney which owns Bioware whom made video games based on the OGL. ...But then again, I wonder if Hasbro really wanted their lawyers to take on Disney lawyers.
@@dungeonsanddiscourse At this point, after that statement, (with luck) those fear may have merit...
@@arthurmarshall6825 Highly unlikely, but I'd still pay to see it.
Just remember, it's not over, nobody has won and we have to keep up the pressure, Don't get complacent, don't think we won
Yeah, the community hasn't won until either WotC signs the ORC-license, releases D&D in its entirety to public domain, or goes bankrupt and dies. Nothing short of one of those is acceptable.
Exactly, don't play 5e or onednd, don't even pirate it. They don't deserve the exposure of their shitty games
As you point out…the problem was not that they ‘rolled a nat 1’ - we’ve all done that. The problem is that it was on a deception check! The latest statement shows that they just don’t get that!!!
Always remember: You don't need WotC, WotC needs you! It's you that keeps your game alive not their products.
EXACTLY!!!!!!!!
Play Pathfinder. 1e if you like roleplay.
It's worth mentioning that one unstated goal of the original OGL was to hamstring Palladium Books, which was becoming a huge rival in the TTRPG market at the time with a system that didn't rely on any D20 System mechanics. The OGL 1.0 garnered WotC a lot of goodwill with the public and steered people toward their system and away from other big players of the time, like Palladium, White Wolf, and GURPS. WotC has never done anything solely "for the community" or the state of gaming.
I dunno about that. Palladium just had bad systems. The only reason anybody played Rifts was for the lore. And third party lore wouldn't have carried the same weight as the official stuff.
@Joan Moriarity Palladium games were crunchy as hell, for sure, but they had a significant share of the RPG market at that time and were growing exponentially right up until the OGL. Having so many different IPs like TMNT, Ninjas and Superspies, Palladium Fantasy RPG, etc. and then tying them all together through Rifts - plus the sheer volume of supplements they were putting out - helped them sell a lot of books.
I LOVE your passion. Your usual videos are good, with a great blend of information and sarcasm...but this one is epic!
gonna be honest, I found this statement super frustrating. thank you i really appreciate this comment!
@@dungeonsanddiscourse it has a good part. It shows that we nerds can make a difference.
Also, the Pathfinder 2 subreddit has grown from 56k to 62k users since jan 6th, and I expect other systems to have similar growth. Many Flgs ran out of all Paizo products.
Did you enjoy your Valkyrie cameo in the Double Crit Fail's "OGL 1.1 : Hasbro vs the World - Biggest D&D Crossover Event of All Time" meme vid?
it was pretty badass :D
I can’t trust them anymore. This is just an huge cash grab
A corporation playing the winners and losers game is utterly infantile. Can't believe a group of people thought this was a good response.
It seriously sounds like an immature thirteen year old going NUH UH!
Wizards says that they only will take independent publishers content if they agree to it. But offcourse to sign the new open games licence include that permission. If you use it you give them defacto ownership of your content.
When a former lawyer eviscerates your flimsy PR shield you know you are in trouble :D Players need to recall that they don't need the company to play the game - I started at the end of the 70's and back then we pretty much came up with everything but the basic rules ourselves.
Always remember, when someone shows you who they really are, believe them the first time and don't fool yourself into thinking they're someone else later. Don't be a WotC simp. ORC smash!
This was Cynthia Williams (CEO of WoTC) doing. Funny how the former owner Loraine Williams (TSR owner), pulled equally greedy moves and bankrupted D&D and angered the RPG community. History repeating itself here folks. This is why the original OGL was created.
She needs to fall on her sword here.
The statement that bothered me the most was about what "scared" us. How can one be scared when everyone is united around you? The only thing that scared me is that anyone would capitulate to this - CR, primarily - I wasn't/am still not sure who holds the power in that singular dynamic. CR's statement was tepid and late. The gaming community as a whole saved Critical Role. I hope other Critters recognize that. ❤🧡💛💚💙💜
CR are more then likely bound by contracts and NDAs signed before this mess started, so they have to tread very carefully in what they say and are just making sure they are legally safe from being sued by Hasbro/WOTC, but if you look at their "likes" to different social media post they don't appear to be in favor of the new OGL but against it
@@1crlski I know. 🙂 I hope they'll be able to talk about it all someday. I suppose I selfishly wanted them to post a group pic of them giving Hasbro the bird. I hope to learn someday what went behind the scenes, there. If I ever do, I hope they were as disgusted as us.
@@billberndtson I think they are as disgusted as the rest of the community, but until any/all NDAs run out we will never know
@@1crlski I'll be patient. 💚
You have to think, they would want to be very careful about what they can and can not say, from a legal standpoint.
So a “late” statement makes a lot of sense, as they obviously don’t want to nuke their own company.
Wotc- We dont want major corporations to have this access
Community- You can leave anytiime you want. You are the only corp here...
(edit) Ive never been more attracted to you. Keep crushing it D.
I was chuckling through this video. Sums up my feelings towards WotC and Hasbro execs perfectly. Burn d&d to the ground at this point. They should have just apologized and promised to stick with ogl 1.0a instead of trying to gaslight and "awe shucks you guys"-ing their way through a disgusting PR statement.
Truth. I have all the books I need. "We don't need no water, let the muthaf***er burn."
The ORC has rendered the Wizard unconscious. Standing by until the Wizard fails all it death saves.
Better poke the Wizard within melee range, just to be sure he fails them.
Paizo is made out of the same cloth as WotC and Hasbro...
@ Until they're a publicly traded company... no not quite.
@@voland6846 We will see what kind of clauses this ORC has. So far Paizo refused to publicly state if the license will have any kind of censorship clause, despite getting asked exactly that multiple times.
as a newbie to the tabletop gaming scene seeing the community rally together like this has warmed my cold dead heart. i'm used to playing video games and major corps walking all over their patrons and treating them just as badly. There's always plenty of people still willing to pre order so it never stops.
Credit where it's due: You called this one.
I didn't take it seriously initially, but this is huge. Thank you for your content and your stewardship of fan communities.
I've already made the switch to PF2e, which is turns out already has all the stuff I needed to make the setting that D&D would have required me to homebrew almost from scratch!
Please PLEASE cross promote this on your other channel! Your take on this is right on the nose and it needs a signal boost. There's alot of journalists and weak chinned players that think that this statement means we won. We haven't
We have not. We need to keep kicking them in $$$ where they will notice it. Talk up not seeing the movie at all. And really try not to see it in first month.
Winning is not WOTC walking back their changes. Nobody can trust WOTC after this debacle no matter what they do. Winning is the wider TTRPG community coming to thrive outside of WOTC’s involvement. ORC will be an important part of that process.
@@wesleymarshall3741 agreed
@@wesleymarshall3741 I'dlike to see a much more ambitious win. You don't have to stop at abandoning wotc. You can abandon the entire stale genre of killing and looting monsters for xps. Role playing can be so much more. If we can get that win, wotc won't just be defeated, they'll be forgotten.
@Joan Moriarity I have no real interest in telling people how to play. If some enjoy the murderhobo style let them enjoy it. All should be able to play what they like. WOTC being “de-centered” from the TTRPG scene would likely result in some exploring other play styles as a result, but I don’t see that as a core goal. It’s too ideological to work without splintering the push back against WOTC.
Just wanted to bring up that WotC's opening line and the new OGL's clauses that require you to register your content and give WotC the right to revoke the license can not only be used to censor 3rd party products, but can be used to mandate that you include things even if they don't fit into the work. Below is something I posted in a comment I left on Slandered Gaming's video about the WotC statement.
I would like to point out the phrase "hateful and discriminatory" and how them using it may be even worse than the blatant money grab. My question to you is who is defining those words, what is their definition, and can/will those definitions change?
Based on everything I have heard so far, WotC (used here to mean Hasbro and WotC because WotC wouldn't be doing this without Hasbro's blessing) is still going to require creators to submit their works for review if they want to be published. The lack of a concrete definition of "hateful and discriminatory" means that they can use the vagueness of the phrase to block anything they don't like.
For example, say I want to publish a D&D 5e setting that is based off of the 10th century Middle East (or really any historic period and place before the 18th/19th century) and I want to be as historically accurate and have as much verisimilitude as I can manage and still keep it an interesting and fun setting, is WotC going to allow me to publish that, or are they going to say I have to take out the parts that make the setting what it is and water it down for their sensibilities? What about the fact that I'm a straight, white, male from Alabama? Will they consider my attempt to publish something like a Middle Eastern based setting cultural appropriation and thus a hateful attack on Arabic, Turkic, and Persian cultures? Or will they deny me a license because I belong to a "historically privileged class?" What about someone from Seattle just deciding that I'm a stupid hick from Alabama and couldn't produce anything good, and to protect the D&D brand I can't have a license to sell my work, even if it has nothing but references to the SRD and stat blocks that follow the common format they use in the Monster Manual, but are all my own work?
But that's just stuff they don't like. What about if they think there's not enough representation in the work? Could they deny you a license then? What if they think your Siberia-inspired setting needs more people of color, nevermind the dangers and costs of travelling before mass transit was a thing. What about there not being enough LGBT characters or cultures with age-fluid social norms? Is WotC going to say I have to put those kinds of things in there, no matter how bad of a fit it is or what my personal beliefs are, to be able to get a license so I can publish it?
Sure, WotC could use the OGL 1.1/2.0 to deny you the right to monetize your work then turn around and publish your work as their own for profit, but it could also be used to censor and mandate that favored classes and ideologies be represented in your work. Given the way that so many in Seattle, NYC, Washington, and California seem to think these days, I would not put it past them to do just that.
I have a character that is an half-orc paladin who is still in training and his goal is to pass some final test set by his mentor (Which can be a great way to explain why he would be interested in almost any adventure). He understands that people will judge him for his looks but still want to prove them wrong as well as fight the hate he gets as he moves forward in his journey. This isn't something that is just to prove himself to other people he doesn't know, but allows an arc for his character that shows he can overcome where his nature came from. I even included his half-sister in his backstory that is a cleric that gives him support along the way if need be. They do keep this a secret so that way when they do travel together she can do most of the talking if the other person has hate towards the orcs.
It is a bio that I really enjoyed writing and even seeing it grow. Now, well, WOTC can see it has hateful and will tell me that my character idea is now not acceptable. People can turn something that is normally looked poorly into an underdog story that raises above it all.
Then almost immediately, they can decide it's really not so bad, and make it an NPC story for one of their campaigns.
@@spacedinosaur8733 Pretty much, just got to protect my own characters. Though won't mind either of them being used in other peoples homebrewed projects so long as I get informed.
If one good thing came out of this mess, it's that I found your videos. You're so amazing and entertaining! I'm happy to be a new subscriber :3
Thank youuu!!
Kickstarter: We were great negotiating 5% off of the OGL 1.1 25% fee.
WotC: Due to the negative reaction from creators we are reducing the leaked fees by 5% to 20%.
Kickstarter: Oh....
And Kickstarter will go back to the table. Changing the terms of the Original Deal nullifies said Deal. And WoTC has now changed the terms. Which means Kickstarter can now throw that deal out the window and go back to bullying WoTC. Basically, "You changed the Deal which now makes that Deal null and void. Care to make a new one?"
Where did this reduction to 20% come from? I didn't see that in the Dndbeyond post. Was there another statement?
Yea, and what makes that royalty so bad is it is on Gross Revenue, not Net Profit, meaning many 3rd party publishers could or will lose money paying that.
The thing is, when one party can arbitrarily change a contract at will, then it is indeed a draft - every version is a draft, until the next version where they find new ways to **** people in the ****.
This is going to be painful for us in the short term, but not nearly as painful as it's going to be for Hasbro and WotC. They need us, but we don't need them.
Man I am so glad that no one at WotC said that DnD was under monetized.
As they can't put a copyright on the process, anything Paizo puts out, along with any other creator, should have the notice: "Compatible with Wizard's of the Cash D&D Game."
As Hasbro / WotC have harmed the livelihood of these people / entities, they are opening themselves up to suits by those same people / entities for loss of income, etc.
For a full breakdown, "Legal Eagle" has a great dialogue on this subject.
My group of old folks are already talking about what different system to switch to when we finish our 5.0 D&D campaign. Regardless of what they eventually do about the OGL situation. (Although basically I am sure they are looking for a way to wait things out and get their total control version set in).
O M G! I love your content! The energy level is off the charts and I cannot thank the UA-cam algorithm enough (I don't get to say that too often) for having one of your videos as a suggestion! Looking forward to more of your stuff and keep up the great work. :)
NotC and Assbro had already lost me as a customer, but now they’re giving me all kinds of free entertainment. 😄
NotC lmfaoo
I hope this outrage isn't temporary. More than ever, we need to band together and make Hasbro understand that what they did can not be mended and that actions do have consequence.
They show you who they are the first time, believe them. I promise you, if they can, they will keep finding new wats to screw you over.
A-fucking-men.
"... and i play warhammer!!" - This is a work of art :D
Having trouble getting past the awesomeness of the Steel Panther shirt
WTF?!!!!!!! They are truly mad! They will never recover from this.
I've spent the last three years drafting five short story/novellas based in a city in my homebrew world. The conceit is that it came out of a drunken conversation about PC backstories, and how it would be a cool or interesting thing to see the backstory to the adventure - the inciting incident - rather than the adventure proper. The plan was to put them out as a collection on kindle for a few quid and see how I get on as an author, since I'm currently unemployed. They're not earth-shattering, and I don't expect them to revolutionise anything, but it was a passion project; something I've wanted to do for a long time. Three are in pretty good shape, and two are getting tinkered around with.
Thing is, I would now have to go back through the whole thing and alter and remove stuff that is obviously D&D (TM) related, because it's just not worth the risk just for the (admittedly, quite self indulgent) effect I wanted, where someone could read it and recognise stuff from their own games and settings and create a connection or a moment of familiarity between the reader and the stories. A sort of 'Oh, hey! My warlock knows that spell too!' kind of thing.
Having to do that revision would eliminate the point of having bothered to try and write them that way to begin with. It's not just the games that this buggers up; it's all of the concomitant stuff like TP writing, media and artwork not created in-house, because at any moment you could find yourself getting rugpulled (a bit like with NFTs, ironically) and walking away with exactly sod all control over your own work.
Three years, essentially wasted. Thanks Hasbro WotC. You pricks.
It's not wasted. I'm sure the stories are cool. Please don't give up on them. There are so many beautiful things that just get crushed by corporate greed, don't let that one be one too.
@@paullp1685 thanks boss. I likely will still put it out there, I’m just a bit upset that the conceit - the whole point of the idea to begin with - behind it needs to be adjusted or possibly removed because of, as you correctly say, corporate greed. For me, it’s not actually just the money - I’m not delusional, this won’t make me rich at all; the odds of that happening are up there with shark attacks or lottery wins - it’s about ownership of the creation. The idea that simply by putting something out there with a recognisable D&D aspect to it (a spell, or a magic item, a class or a race/heritage) means they own it and I don’t is disillusioning. Under the original OGL this wasn’t so much of a problem, but under the new one, it is, because control can be taken away. It’s the difference between being prevented from doing something, and having what you’re trying to do taken away from you and handed to someone else in-house.
But with regards to the money side of it, like, what if I beat the odds and they turn out to sell reasonably well and I want to do a physical press run? If I do that, they get to say whether or not I can do so, and if I do, they get 25% of whatever is made from it, or take it away from me and keep 100% of whatever is made from it. Neither of those options are financially attractive.
What they are proposing is just a step towards a natural monopoly, because what it does is make the idea of creating something linked to the IP very unappealing for people who aren’t already well established, since at any time, control over what happens can be taken away from you, because for all the talk about “we won’t do that without your permission”, the contract includes a clause that means that you automatically give that permission. It’s positively Faustian.
Since I’ve done so much work already, I’ll probably revise the stories and kick them around for another year or two until I’m happy, but it won’t be the effect I was aiming for, and they won’t be the stories I wanted to tell. And whilst this sounds incredibly hubristic and vain, it’s genuinely depressing to have a vision of something you’ve worked on inhibited, altered or removed entirely by grubby moneygrabbing like this. And, I imagine, there’s a vast number of other people who are feeling a bit disillusioned about their passion projects - whether they would have failed or succeeded, regardless. For those people, I think this OGL debacle is amazingly demotivating, like it has been for me. Some of us will get over it (and I think I will too, even if I end up doing something that wasn’t what I wanted to do), but as you allude to, some won’t. They’ll just give up on it.
And that, for me, is the tragedy. As you say, there will be dreams and plans and ambitions and hopes that have been destroyed by this rather sordid corporatism.
funnily enough, currently working on releasing some things on youtube and D&D was going to be part of that, now . . . yeah I've dropped it oddly enough.
just my own personal experience but I do how many other people who have passion for games and TTRPGs, and even the D&D mythos itself have done the same, there are so many small channels that love it, and it's all drying up very quickly, except for this exact topic
The plan worked.
Not as clean as they would have liked, but they got the result they wanted and in a shorter time-frame than they could have imagined.
I think this is Phase 1 of Operation Scorched Earth
It seems pretty clear that their plan is to create an environment where WotC would be the only player in the D&D marketplace. They know they don't really have any legal means to do this, so the new OGL was designed to be untenable for 3pp so they would choose to no longer create D&D content - and once they were out of the way, Phase 2 could begin. The leak simply accelerated that process.
Phase 2 is the aforementioned full-scale monetization strategy they have already planned and are just waiting for the right time to begin roll-out. There was probably a whole 'transition' plan which will have to be reworked, but they must have known this kind of backlash was always going to be a possibility and would have accounted for it to some degree.
Once the leak broke, Paizo stepping in and offering a ship for everyone to jump on was a boon for them - everyone choosing not to produce D&D content of their own accord rather than WotC having to strongarm them out of the marketplace gets them where they wanted to be a lot quicker than they could have dreamt. Now it's just a matter of short-term damage control and waiting out the storm.
We are not their intended consumer base for the next phase - they know they were going to lose us along the way regardless, and we would have been annoying dissenting voices in the new D&D Oneland. They intend building a whole new consumer base based on mobile style low-cost/effort, high reward gaming and micro-transactions and they know we won't like it one bit.
The shitstorm is one they could have done without, but one of its outcomes may do them a huge favour for their long-term goals. No competition (for the D&DTM brand at least) and those who would be their most vocal dissenters mostly out of sight and sound.
The Plan is evil, executed poorly, risky as hell and its premature reveal will hit them hard financially in the short and even medium term, but they must strongly believe they can ultimately do without us and milk a whole new and much bigger consumer base - one which may be slightly less discerning and a whole lot more exploitable.
I wouldn't put it in _exactly_ the terms you've laid out here, but I *absolutely* agree with the broad strokes. They think the future of monetizable D&D lies in online play, a closed-off and proprietary VTT, and various kinds of DLCs/microtransactions inside that space. In my opinion this whole thing is primarily about laying the ground work for shutting out any competitor VTTs. The 3rdPP, streamers and influencers were never the main target, more just collateral damage.
I was actually watching Roll for Combat's livestream when, near the end before he had to run to a meeting, the chat suddenly started screaming that DnDBetond had added this statement. We were all blown away by the sheer audacity of the thing, except for _one guy._
This random dude was in the chat for quite a while before the statement was added to the website, having arrived slightly later than I did, and opened up by saying something like "So you're the guy who's been spreading all this misinformation? This is irresponsible". He was ignored by everyone, but every now and again I kept seeing his comments pop up.
"This is lies."
"You shouldn't spread stuff like this."
"You need to take back what you said."
And on and on and on every couple of minutes. Thankfully, no one addressed or acknowledged him, not even me (though I was insanely curious about, y'know, _why_ he was calling everything fake).
And then, when RfC finally got around to the superchats that had been screaming at him to look at DnDBeyond (because he wasn't reading regular chat) what did this guy have to say about the worst walk back WotC has ever released?
"See, you were wrong. You need to apologise for misinformation."
When I tell you I was stunned at seeing that comment fly by amongst all the laughing chat reactions... ooh boy, that was weird. I'd make the joke that the guy was paid, but honestly some people just have too much brand loyalty to accept the facts in front of them, or maybe they just hate it when communities aren't peaceful for whatever reason, or maybe they just really like using the words "Doom Sayer". Whatever.
Point is that those people do exist. Even now they're out there trying to downplay all of this, or just straight up deny the truth. I certainly won't mind leaving them behind to deal with WotC's buisiness practices all alone while everyone with any sense packs up and runs to support all the new projects that will hopefully be protected under the upcoming ORC.
So, the dnd official discord server finally made a channel about the OGL for people to discuss. They originally made it as a side topic but stated that they were unaware of how only x amount of people could partake in the side topic. Posted my screenshots to their mods (the mods are WotC employees) and thankfully, they fixed the issue by making an official channel for EVERYONE to discuss it without deleting comments
Here's a perspective that makes WotC more insidious than we have given them credit for.
Everything happening is exactly as WotC wanted it to happen and they don't have to release any OGL update to do it. WotC wants control of D&D so they created a situation that has caused just about every 3pp publisher to abandon the OGL of their own volition, to get everyone in the OSR to pull back and redo their books so they aren't D&D compatible, and while they may be facing a firestorm now in a few months to a year they will have exactly what they want, which is to be the only source of D&D.
Their gamble was on the short term memory of people, but the one thing they didn't anticipate was it becoming so public that CNBC is now talking about it and the analysts that could impact Hasbro stock.
Despite that possible consequence, WotC has gotten what they wanted in getting majority of 3pp to voluntarily stop making new 5e product for the foreseeable future and split up the fan base.
All without ever releasing any kind of actual official OGL update.
It's definitely gaslighting. The way they acted like they had innocently drafted a heinous and one-sided agreement that they themselves would never sign if they were on the other side of the table and gave the standard response of any corporate entity (or movie star, etc) that attempts to save face but is more of a sorry/not sorry kind of statement. Then the "we won too guys" statement is just...what are the kids saying nowadays? "Cringe". If they cared that much about controlling their brand from people making things they don't like (book of erotic fantasy, i guess) then they could have just updated the ogl with that kind of language instead of...what they did. They must be really up their own asses if they think people won't know what that first agreement was about. They would have gladly accepted the executed contracts if people had not pushed back against their BS. It's too late to walk that shit back. 20 years to build up trust and good-will, all shattered within a day.
'those people will only be half right - they won, and so did we'
- I really feel like this was shoved in there by some smarmy exec, while a sweating communications guy sat there and was like
'are you sure you want to...'
'Yep, put it in there. We're all winners!'
Ah yes, the Monty Python win.
"This is but a scratch."
"A scratch? Your arm's off!"
"No it isn't."
I dig the stand up and grab the mic style. Keep it up discourse
This backpedal has likly harmed there confidence from kickstarter and companys.
"You said this was final, what about our negationated deal"
Not sure if this has come up in one of your videos since WotC finally responded.
Would love to hear your legal opinion on whether or not revoking the 1.0a would stand up in court. Lots of people have given legal opinions that WotC is afraid it wouldn't, but your perspective is always so finely constructed that I would love to hear your take.
US lawyers say that the "irrevocable" term that is not included in the OGL was not a common term when it was written, but they expect it would be hard to unauthorize it.
The puking scene made me laugh out loud.
I nearly had the same reaction when I read it too so its fair.
Hasbro's CEO is probably really wishing his name wasn't "Cocks" right now. The memes will be never ending...
That would imply they understand memes. Or people.
I was watching a documentary about the origins of dnd in the 70s and 80s… where the hell did the love go?! When did dnd become like… some corporate bull bull?! It’s crazy!
Look at the whistleblower, love for the game and community is still alive at the level of their employee.
Nostalgia is powerfull... TSR wasn't much better in the 70's and 80's than this, just look up their court history.
@@mycatistypingthis5450 I hope vox machina doesn’t get canceled because of this ogl bull shit!
@@ernestorodriguez3637 Nah it won't. Critical Role went out of their way to remove any all Trademarks and Copyrights owned by WoTC. Besides, if Hasbro tried, they'd have to deal with Amazon. And I'm pretty sure that Jeff Bezos alone has more money than Hasbro combined. Amazon is one of the American Companies that Hasbro absolutely does NOT want to fuck with.
Wizards of the Coast delenda est?!
And Hasbro.
The cool thing about all of this is that I'm finding cool D&D channels! I like the colour coordination in this one
The thing is, wotc/Hasbro has had a long history of cutting out their own creators and employees, whether it was cutting off the original Magic Artists from card royalties (which they took in lieu of actual payment because wizards had nothing to pay them with a the time) to the fiasco with refusing to acknowledge that Magic Judges were their employees, to creating and promoting a roster of pro magic players in pursuit of eSports popularity then functionally abandoning them in terms of prize support. Many of their biggest hits and growth in the last few years, in d&d and magic, all came from third party content creators (the OSR, beyond, CR, dms guild authors graduating to official books) or was literally fan-created content. (Commander).
The core issue is that as a public company they are focused on quarterly returns... When they don't understand that D&D is almost a 50 year old franchise - it's about the LTR (long term revenue) and you can't get that if the potential market of players is scattered across a bunch of different game systems - the folks who wrote the OGL can tell you that. The 3PP's can tell you that. Even the people working on the core games can tell you that. It's the c-staff that's out of touch, when they are writing that they care about the players when last month they were on record as saying that d&d was under-monetized. Like, we can actually have that conversation with them, it's not a problem. But trying to act like that's not the case and throwing all these false flags up (protecting against racist content? Tell me again which company got in trouble recently to that? Right, d&d beyond! ) Acting like this is just disingenuous, and consumers are smarter than that.
Exhibit A of how "genuine" they are: the letter is posted as "D&D Beyond Staff" - they can't even get their PR people to claim ownership
"horse radish", Cute ^^. Many thanks as always for the summery !
They're right, they did roll a one... on their feckin' deception check.
In tabletop RPGs, only Embracer/Asmodee could punch at Hasbro's weight. No way Hasbro could be an underdog.
But wasn't it mainly FFG there that did RPGs, and FFG has been gutted for the last few years?
Wizards just wanted to give us a sense of pride and accomplishment.
My D&D Experiences that nobody have ever played with is an idiot. H*** I would argue that most of their I.Qs were higher than most of my professors ( in college)and Trying to get away with wording like they have in that statement is just beyond stupid. They have basically destroyed their own company
Your Hazbro corporate nerd voice cracks me up. Great video. Keep up the great work. 👍
This is fucking amazing.
The OGL is not needed as much as we think it is. Nearly all of the content of DnD isn't copyrightable. Only their specific expression of the rules is copyrightable, along with unique characters and locations, which most 3rd party stuff doesn't use anyways.
Don't get me wrong, this doesn't mean we should just roll over and take this bullshit. It just means we can stick it to them by continuing to do exactly as we are doing, with only slight adjustments needed, namely removing copy pasted rules text and typesetting and formatting. By ripping out rules references of this such, and just saying content is compatible with 5e, WotC can't do shit about it. Consult with your lawyers and the various guides about how to unOGLify your content.
More so, it's a great time to hop to other systems and show them how low their bottom line can really get.
WotC is half of that 9 billion.
The document had a total of ZERO instances of the word "draft"
I am starting to hope in the next 5-10 years we are using Hasbro/WOTC as an example of how to destroy your company and go out of business. I am so fed up with this company.
Honestly, the royalties was probably the most reasonable part of the new ogl (although pegging it to gross income was skeevy). The worst parts of the ogl appear to still be in place, namely they can use your work without compensation or recognition, and WOTC being able to modify the terms at any time, for any reason. This make it a non starter. Nobody should be willing to sign up under those terms. We cannot let them gaslight us into complacency. Make WOTC hurt, and hurt bad!
very funny and very well done you have a new subscriber!!
This was the dumbest move they could have made. With how technical and mobile the community has become, they should have known they couldn't get away with this.
So. What´s WotC and Hasbro gonna shit the bed on. MTG: Check. D&D: Check. Nerf? My Little Ponies?
Thanks for pumping up the signal! Can't let this fade! All this gaslighting and smoke and mirrors is just Hasbeen and KotYe latest salvo. I can only imagine what's coming next when they finally drop the OGL.
Give Wizards/Hasbro a blindfold, one last cigarette and a gun with 1 bullet. This whole situation is absolutely insane. They’re going to lose so much of a fan base.
I absolutely hated reading that statement. They're really not hiding how much they hate the people paying to keep their damn lights on. Least favorite moment line was the one that suggested that the community is afraid. As if this is all just one big overreaction to a loud noise or something. No, WoTC, we're not scared, we're pissed off. And a lot of us, have sworn off buying any of your products for life. The hilariously ironic part is if they just acted in good faith and were just a little less greedy, their market share would have only expanded. I mean talk about killing the goose that lays golden eggs because they're too impatient to actually conduct good business.
Haha the cows milk mime has disturbed me!
"oh my Granny Goodness" - I laughed out loud at that!
Jumping into reading the rules for Basic Fantasy RPG and White Box now
Did anyone in the boardroom or legal department point out the fact that TTRPG players excel at maths or have a subgroup of players with the word "lawyer" in their title?
This was a very good presentation, I think the best I've seen on this. You also get the best quality comments!
"...Hasbro just want to stop NFTs you guys..." "...just last year there was all this talk about NFTs... FROM HASBRO..." (~04:00) Oh my godness gracious me your vid is fabulous liked and subscribed
Not sure if you got to see this other leak from a senior staff member but from what it sounds like is this statement was just released to placate fans and released by higher ups and lawyers not the ones on the ground making the game. The leak also mentions that D&D employees are being fired for voicing their opinion on the matter.
Also thanks for making this your channels first topic to cover. Good to have a way to stay up-to-date in all this madness.
They're waiting for things to return to the status quo before trying again. Last time they waited 2 editions.
The executives at WotC only care about improving monitization on D&D. Unfortunately, I believe the only mass action that will get our point across will be to actively reduce WotC's revenue. It is about time we start boycotting WotC products across the board. It begins with D&D Beyond but must also include their physical products. No books, miniatures, dice, etc. We should probably boycott anything D&D branded. Shirt, stickers, novels, board games, movies, etc. In fact, we may want to boycutt non-D&D properties like MtG. We need to send a very clear message and that message MUST affect their earning's calls in quarters into the future until they change their ways. They are expecting us to complain and assimilate. They are expecting to loose a few customers but gain a large customer base of players that will not bat an eye at large subscriptions and microtransactions in a completely digital form of the game. They hope/expect if current D&D DMs are no longer available then the remaining players will be forced to buy into the subscriptions and microtransactions and AI-powered DMs they'll provide. Bring your players with you and boycott WotC. Consider boycotting Hasbro. NEVER FORGET. #BoycottWotC #OpenDnD #DnDBeGone
Well, the OGL and it's garden economy is going to evaporate. Those of us sitting over here _not_ playing a D&D/D&D-derivative/non-OGL game will only be _lightly_ affected. Join us in *_GURPS,_* we have psychic blueberry muffins.
The Steel Panther song "Community Property" is rather apt.