Announcing the Basic Roleplaying System Reference Document and Open Game License

[Mankcam]

Reilly

 

[Mankcam]

I can see why Chaosium are doing this, but personally OpenQuest is a much cleaner version of BRP to hang your own homebrew game on.
There's also RD100 out there, it has heaps of possibilities, although hasn't really taken off (the book can be a little hard to read).
And for a bit more meat on the bone, Mythras is really top-notch.

 

[Vile Traveller]

Okay, there's so much wrong with the first page that I only now noticed this on page 2:

12. Reputation: You must not copy, modify, or distribute Open Game
Content connected to this License in a way that would be prejudicial
or harmful to the honor or reputation of the Contributors.

What?

 

[AsenRG]

Does that mean we finally have a consensus about how to pronounce "R'lyeh"?

With a stop between the R and the L, the ye as in yesterday, and an H like the J in Jugo!

 

[The Butcher]

Does that mean we finally have a consensus about how to pronounce "R'lyeh"?

Ruh-lee-eh?

 

[Loz]

In the 'At the Mountains of Madness' audiobook I listened to recently, the narrator pronounces it 'earl-yay', which I rather like.

 

[soltakss]

Cha

Chaosium love their vague sabre-rattling over the other D100-based SRDs, particularly Mongoose's MRQ1 and Legend. They are always trying to convince people that the open content MRQ1 SRDs became closed once Mongoose lost their RQ licence. I don't know whether it's willful misdirection or a complete misunderstanding of how the (original) OGL works.

MOB has just stated in a thread at RPG.NET that Chaosium have no problem with the Legend OGL and wouldn't challenge it. They are not sure that the OGL is valid outside of D20, though, and are unsure if it would stand a legal challenge.

 

[K_Peterson]

I can see why Chaosium are doing this, but personally OpenQuest is a much cleaner version of BRP to hang your own homebrew game on.
There's also RD100 out there, it has heaps of possibilitiues, although hasn't really taken off (the book can be a little hard to read).

Healthy portions of the Delta Green Rpg's Agent's Handbook are OGL. It's what I'd use if I was throwing together a BRP homebrew game. It's a cleaner version of BRP, and frankly better, IMO.

 

[Mankcam]

Healthy portions of the Delta Green Rpg's Agent's Handbook are OGL. It's what I'd use if I was throwing together a BRP homebrew game. It's a cleaner version of BRP, and frankly better, IMO.

I got the new Delta Green slipocase as a kickstarter backer several months ago, but only recently have had time to take a good look.
Yeah it really is a very smooth update for BRP

 

[robertsconley]

MOB has just stated in a thread at RPG.NET that Chaosium have no problem with the Legend OGL and wouldn't challenge it. They are not sure that the OGL is valid outside of D20, though, and are unsure if it would stand a legal challenge.

Could you post a link? I am interested in following that thread.

 

[Baragei]

MOB has just stated in a thread at RPG.NET that Chaosium have no problem with the Legend OGL and wouldn't challenge it. They are not sure that the OGL is valid outside of D20, though, and are unsure if it would stand a legal challenge.

Whenever nuChaosium makes a statement my face developes a hand-shaped welt. It almost never fails. I must be allergic or something.

 

[CRKrueger]

Whenever nuChaosium makes a statement my face developes a hand-shaped welt. It almost never fails. I must be allergic or something.

Lol, I know. “We, of course, would never challenge it, but it would be a shame if something happened to your game...”

 

[RosenMcStern]

Hello all, greetings to the classic crew of "usual suspects". Here I am on Yet Another RPG Forum. This one sounds nicer than many others, though.

There's also RD100 out there, it has heaps of possibilitiues, although hasn't really taken off (the book can be a little hard to read).

In less than 48 hours, Cameron, you will have the opportunity to admire our new quality standard for clarity and readability.

 

[robertsconley]

This what I wrote in reply

rabbithat said:

The Legend OGL is valid as far as we are concerned - we have no interest in challenging it, it has nothing to do with Chaosium or Moon Design Publications. But we'd never rely on its legal validity being upheld by a court for anything other than in conjunction with WotC's IP (which it is definitely valid for). That's a key reason why we created our own license.

As an author I have the right to let people use, share, and derive from Blackmarsh and my other original works under the terms I choose to use. Which in my case include using the Open Game License Version 1.0a. This includes works not based on the D20 System Reference Document.

My use relies on the following
1) Wizards of the Coast explicitly gave their permission for other parties to use the license.
2) The release of the current version (and earlier version) only mentions the following in Section 15

15 COPYRIGHT NOTICE
Open Game License v 1.0 Copyright 2000, Wizards of the Coast, Inc.

This makes the OGL straightforward to use for RPGs and works that has nothing to do with Wizards of the Coast IP. For example Mongoose Traveller SRD 1st edition, Fate by Evil Hat and the Legends RPG

A clean copy of the license can be found here.
Open Game License v0.1 Simplified

Based on my discussion with my attorney in the past I am well within my right to license my works this way even when based on non-WoTC IP. What was explained that for copyright courts look primarily to what the author intent was in terms of how the material to be shared. Stated by both Mongoose and Chaosium, the Legends RPG was an original work by Mongoose so it is well within their rights to define the terms of sharing by use of the OGL Version 1.0

 

[Ronin]

Lol, I know. “We, of course, would never challenge it, but it would be a shame if something happened to your game...”

Its like Tony Soprano is running a RPG company.

 

[TristramEvans]

When did Chaosium become NuChaosium? I know very little of the inner workings of the company; my only awareness of the change came with the publication of the new edition of CoC

 

[TristramEvans]

Hello all, greetings to the classic crew of "usual suspects". Here I am on Yet Another RPG Forum. This one sounds nicer than many others, though.

Welcome to The Pub!

 

[Raleel]

Hello all, greetings to the classic crew of "usual suspects". Here I am on Yet Another RPG Forum. This one sounds nicer than many others, though.



In less than 48 hours, Cameron, you will have the opportunity to admire our new quality standard for clarity and readability.

welcome! We generally are. Sometimes a little salty, but at least it’s about games and not all the other stuff.

 

[Endless Flight]

Hello all, greetings to the classic crew of "usual suspects". Here I am on Yet Another RPG Forum. This one sounds nicer than many others, though.



In less than 48 hours, Cameron, you will have the opportunity to admire our new quality standard for clarity and readability.

Is there a new edition of Revolution coming on Tuesday?

 

[Raleel]

Is there a new edition of Revolution coming on Tuesday?

they said they want a revolution. Well...

 

[RosenMcStern]

Mission accomplished: thread successfully hijacked Thank you Cameron.

Is there a new edition of Revolution coming on Tuesday?

No but there is the crowdfunding of our new super robot themed game, based on Revolution. The new Revolution will come later this year, with a comparable level of graphic and verbal clarity.

I will post a link here when the CF starts. I have not hyped much on RPG forums because the main target is non-English speakers and possibly non-gamers.

Back to Chaosium and legal stuff now.

 

[Séadna]

Regarding R'lyeh, in the new Chaosium computer game they say "re-lay" with re as in "return".

 

[AsenRG]

Regarding R'lyeh, in the new Chaosium computer game they say "re-lay" with re as in "return".

That's not the same as my pronunciation above, so obviously they are wrong!

 

[Séadna]

That's not the same as my pronunciation above, so obviously they are wrong!

I just listened to a few parts of the game and it's not standardised. One guy does say [ʁʔle:x]. Which is basically what you gave.

 

[Raleel]

I’ve always assumed that all of our pronunciations are wrong because our feeble human tongues are unable to accurately produce the mind-tearing utterances required.

 

[Justin Alexander]

MOB has just stated in a thread at RPG.NET that Chaosium have no problem with the Legend OGL and wouldn't challenge it. They are not sure that the OGL is valid outside of D20, though, and are unsure if it would stand a legal challenge.

The third biggest reason not to trust this license is the fact that Chaosium's spokespeople seem to have literally no idea how open licenses work.

The second biggest reason is that the Prohibited Content section of the license is badly designed. Unlike the WotC OGL, they prevent anyone else from designating prohibited content, which means anyone using this license can't protect their own trademarks and IP. Anyone using this license would be strongly encouraged, legally speaking, to make a declaration of "open" content that consists strictly and only of material found in the BRP SRD. Anything else would be incredibly risky.

The biggest reason not to use this license is because it's not an open license. Clause 10 allows them to effectively close the license at any time. It grandfathers in existing content, but this provision is so badly written it actually makes the license even worse: It requires you to publish any material you designate as Open Game Content ONLY using the most recent version of the license.

This is, again, not how open licenses generally work: Although you grant other people the right to use your material with the license, you don't give up your own legal rights to do so outside of the license!

In fact, the clause appears to infect even the material you DON'T place under the license: "...You agree to Use the most recent authorized version of this License for any new Open Game Content You publish or for revised or updated works with thirty percent (30%) or more revised or new content." (emphasis added) Ignore that the meaning of "thirty percent" and "content" are completely undefined (word count? pages with revised content? what if I just swap out all the pictures? what if I just change the title -- is that a new work or a revised work?) and focus on the fact that they're requiring that any revised "work" (not Open Game Content) can only be published under the license.

Simple example: You publish a book using the BRP OGL and BRP Open Game Content. Then you pull all the BRP Open Game Content and mechanics and replace them with different mechanics. You no longer need to use the license, right? Wrong. You have revised the work and are still required by the license to publish it using the BRP OGL.

I remember back in 1999 that people were extremely skeptical of Dancey's proposals for an OGL. They were convinced that WotC was trying to pull a fast one. Many of the things they were paranoid about are things that this license from Chaosium actually does!

 

[Ronnie Sanford]

Hello all, greetings to the classic crew of "usual suspects". Here I am on Yet Another RPG Forum. This one sounds nicer than many others, though.



In less than 48 hours, Cameron, you will have the opportunity to admire our new quality standard for clarity and readability.

Welcome Paulo!

 

[AsenRG]

The third biggest reason not to trust this license is the fact that Chaosium's spokespeople seem to have literally no idea how open licenses work.

The second biggest reason is that the Prohibited Content section of the license is badly designed. Unlike the WotC OGL, they prevent anyone else from designating prohibited content, which means anyone using this license can't protect their own trademarks and IP. Anyone using this license would be strongly encouraged, legally speaking, to make a declaration of "open" content that consists strictly and only of material found in the BRP SRD. Anything else would be incredibly risky.

The biggest reason not to use this license is because it's not an open license. Clause 10 allows them to effectively close the license at any time. It grandfathers in existing content, but this provision is so badly written it actually makes the license even worse: It requires you to publish any material you designate as Open Game Content ONLY using the most recent version of the license.

This is, again, not how open licenses generally work: Although you grant other people the right to use your material with the license, you don't give up your own legal rights to do so outside of the license!

In fact, the clause appears to infect even the material you DON'T place under the license: "...You agree to Use the most recent authorized version of this License for any new Open Game Content You publish or for revised or updated works with thirty percent (30%) or more revised or new content." (emphasis added) Ignore that the meaning of "thirty percent" and "content" are completely undefined (word count? pages with revised content? what if I just swap out all the pictures? what if I just change the title -- is that a new work or a revised work?) and focus on the fact that they're requiring that any revised "work" (not Open Game Content) can only be published under the license.

Simple example: You publish a book using the BRP OGL and BRP Open Game Content. Then you pull all the BRP Open Game Content and mechanics and replace them with different mechanics. You no longer need to use the license, right? Wrong. You have revised the work and are still required by the license to publish it using the BRP OGL.

I remember back in 1999 that people were extremely skeptical of Dancey's proposals for an OGL. They were convinced that WotC was trying to pull a fast one. Many of the things they were paranoid about are things that this license from Chaosium actually does!

IANAPL, but yeah, that sucks!

 

[Spellslinging Sellsword]

Yeah, clearly nuChaosium is not a fan of the open gaming movement. Also, they will blatantly lie (claiming that a copyright owner can't legally release their own non Wizards material) about the real OGL to keep people from using it.

 

[robertsconley]

The second biggest reason is that the Prohibited Content section of the license is badly designed. Unlike the WotC OGL, they prevent anyone else from designating prohibited content, which means anyone using this license can't protect their own trademarks and IP. Anyone using this license would be strongly encouraged, legally speaking, to make a declaration of "open" content that consists strictly and only of material found in the BRP SRD. Anything else would be incredibly risky.

The license does allow the third party designate only part of their work as open content.

9. Identification: If you distribute Open Game Content You must clearly indicate which portions of the work that you are distributing are Open Game Content.

If the author only designate portions of the work as open content then the rest fall under normal copyright.

However as constructed it very unclear compare how the OGL designates product identity and and open content. So I share your criticism in part.

The biggest reason not to use this license is because it's not an open license. Clause 10 allows them to effectively close the license at any time. It grandfathers in existing content, but this provision is so badly written it actually makes the license even worse: It requires you to publish any material you designate as Open Game Content ONLY using the most recent version of the license.

10. Updating the License: Chaosium or its designated Agents may publish updated versions of the BRP Open Game License, including updates to the Prohibited Content list. Material published under any version of the License can continue to be published Using the terms of that version, but You agree to Use the most recent authorized version of this License for any new Open Game Content You publish or for revised or updated works with thirty percent (30%) or more revised or new content.

So this along with Section 5 means any publisher taking advantage of the license now can continue to distribute their work. However it does leave the future of their product line at the mercy of Chaosium. Still pretty bad in my opinion. So again I agree with the criticism in part. And wholly with the assessment that this is not a open license.

In fact, the clause appears to infect even the material you DON'T place under the license: "...You agree to Use the most recent authorized version of this License for any new Open Game Content You publish or for revised or updated works with thirty percent (30%) or more revised or new content." (emphasis added)

Good catch.

I remember back in 1999 that people were extremely skeptical of Dancey's proposals for an OGL. They were convinced that WotC was trying to pull a fast one. Many of the things they were paranoid about are things that this license from Chaosium actually does!

This is a terrible license for third party content especially given the alternative of the Legends open content.

So here is another one for you.

Section 1(e) states

The following items are hereby identified as “Prohibited Content”: All trademarks, registered trademarks, proper names (characters, deities, place names, etc.), plots, story elements, locations, characters, artwork, or trade dress from any of the following: any releases from the product lines of Call of Cthulhu, Dragn Lords of Melniboné, ElfQuest, Elric!, Hawkmoon, HeroQuest, Hero Wars, King Arthur Pendragon, Magic World, Nephilim, Prince Valiant, Ringworld, RuneQuest, 7th Sea, Stormbringer, Superworld, Thieves’ World, Worlds of Wonder, and any related sublines; the world and mythology of Glorantha; all works related to the Cthulhu Mythos, including those that are otherwise public domain; and all works related to Le Morte d’Arthur. This list may be updated in future versions of the License.

Note the sections I highlighted in black.

Now if you look at the lasted edition of King Arthur Pendragon Appendix Two Character and Creatures we have the following:
Knights, Fighting Men (Archer, Bandit, etc), Christian Monk, Farmer, Merchant (Rich), etc. IN creasures we have Horses, Boars, Bull, Deer, Dog, etc, Hawk, Wolf, Dragons, Giant, etc.

The literal reading of this clause mans all of the above is prohibited content. When you throw in the Call of the Cthulu 1920 and other era character this effectively rules out the use of any setting material except for example that completely or nearly non-human like Jorune.

 

[K_Peterson]

When did Chaosium become NuChaosium? I know very little of the inner workings of the company; my only awareness of the change came with the publication of the new edition of CoC

Early 2015.

 

[CRKrueger]

Hello all, greetings to the classic crew of "usual suspects". Here I am on Yet Another RPG Forum. This one sounds nicer than many others, though.



In less than 48 hours, Cameron, you will have the opportunity to admire our new quality standard for clarity and readability.

Hey Paolo, glad to see you.

 

[Mankcam]

Hello all, greetings to the classic crew of "usual suspects". Here I am on Yet Another RPG Forum. This one sounds nicer than many others, though.



In less than 48 hours, Cameron, you will have the opportunity to admire our new quality standard for clarity and readability.

Hi Paolo, welcome to yet another RPG forum!
Yes this one is loose and casual, a mixed bag of odds and ends, much like my old RQ2 box set
Perhaps a bit goofy at times, but it's a decent place to lay my hat these days

Now you showing up here all cryptic and mysterious, sprouting things about RD100 has got my interest
Yes this does sound promising!
Even if the core book is not primarily aimed at English speakers, I really like alot of the mechanics you put into RD100
Glad to know there is movement on the horizon

 

[Raleel]

I was just reading over the definitions. It would appear that place names, even of real world places, are covered in prohibited content, as well as generic real world names. I don’t think that is the intent, but England is presumably used in KAP, and I’m sure several countries are mentioned in CoC. I can’t see how that can possibly work.

 

[TristramEvans]

I find it interesting that , opposite to the D20 OGL, which allowed the user to display the D20 logo if they met the requirements of the contract, this contract forces you to use their logo, on the front and back cover of your product.

 

[Justin Alexander]

I find it interesting that , opposite to the D20 OGL, which allowed the user to display the D20 logo if they met the requirements of the contract, this contract forces you to use their logo, on the front and back cover of your product.

Minor point of order: That should actually be the D20 System Trademark License (D20 STL).

I mention this largely because a lot of the problems with the BRP OGL come specifically from trying to conflate a trademark license with an open license: With a trademark license, for example, there is a deep desire and possibly even need to reserve the ability to close the license at a later date; to maintain control over the central pillar of your IP. Recognizing that the needs of one license were incompatible with the needs of the other is why the OGL and D20 STL were split apart in the first place.

It's an example of how Chaosium doesn't appear to really understand what they're doing or how open licenses work. These are solved problems which, for whatever reason, they're reintroducing into their license.

The license does allow the third party designate only part of their work as open content.

If the author only designate portions of the work as open content then the rest fall under normal copyright.

There are two functions that Product Identity serve in the WotC OGL:

1. It gives publishers/creators an easy tool to make sure that they don't accidentally declare their trademark or other IPs as open content.

2. It may be necessary in order to make certain types of content POSSIBLE without the license forcing you to open your IP. Specifically, any material which mixes your IP with material derived from OGC.

For example, say you have a wizard named Razzamatazz the Magnificient. In the first example, you declare p. 59 to be OGC but don't notice that Razzamatazz' name appeared on that page. Whoops! You've just granted permission for anyone using the license to use Razzamatazz.

In the second example, Razzamatazz has created a spell named Razzamatazz' Fiery Spheres and you include that spell in a stat block. The stat block is probably derivative of OGC and is automatically swept up by the license as OGC... along with Razzamatazz' name. (Note: Yes, you declare which portions of your product are OGC. But content derivative of the OGC is defined as OGC in Clause 1 of the WotC OGL and therefore MUST be declared OGC.) Now, it's possible to argue that this specific instance (or any other instance) isn't actually derivative, but it's also an argument you could very easily lose in court. The license allows you to declare Product Identity (which specifically OVERRIDES any requirements for what is and is not OGC) in order to eliminate any possibility of a gray area and protect publishers.

This was considered particularly vital for anyone using the license with licensed material: You needed to be able to demonstrate to licensors that their IP would not be exposed and/or you needed to be 100% certain you didn't break the terms of your license and open yourself up to huge legal liability.

 

[robertsconley]

In the second example, Razzamatazz has created a spell named Razzamatazz' Fiery Spheres

Good point about an explicit declaration of product identity. It would cover instances of the term or concept that appears in the open content without making it open.

 

[Endless Flight]

You get the worst of both worlds: a crap license and a crap logo!

 

[Tulpa Girl]

This BRP SRD seems worthless. Less than 20 pages of fairly wordy generic rules on what a roleplaying game is, characteristics, percentile skills, and combat - and these are almost as basic as the old 16-page BRP booklet from 1982. As everyone presumably knows by now, rules cannot be copyrighted, so an afternoon with a keyboard could produce something equivalent with no restrictive covenants.

Completely worthless. Everything that it allows, except for logo, can be done using the Legend OGL and the Legend OGL is compatible with all the other Wizards derived OGL material. If you don't want to allow open material, just be man enough to say it rather than do some shitty license that pretends to be open while closing off everything that you'd want.

It worse than that you would be hard press to use the BRP SRD to make something that targets D&D style fantasy due to the IP overlap with not only Glorantha but Worlds of Wonder. A strict reading implies that because Runequest has stats for Lions means your came can't have stats for Lions or use Lions.

The biggest reason not to use this license is because it's not an open license. Clause 10 allows them to effectively close the license at any time. It grandfathers in existing content, but this provision is so badly written it actually makes the license even worse: It requires you to publish any material you designate as Open Game Content ONLY using the most recent version of the license.

This is, again, not how open licenses generally work: Although you grant other people the right to use your material with the license, you don't give up your own legal rights to do so outside of the license!

In fact, the clause appears to infect even the material you DON'T place under the license: "...You agree to Use the most recent authorized version of this License for any new Open Game Content You publish or for revised or updated works with thirty percent (30%) or more revised or new content." (emphasis added) Ignore that the meaning of "thirty percent" and "content" are completely undefined (word count? pages with revised content? what if I just swap out all the pictures? what if I just change the title -- is that a new work or a revised work?) and focus on the fact that they're requiring that any revised "work" (not Open Game Content) can only be published under the license.

Now if you look at the lasted edition of King Arthur Pendragon Appendix Two Character and Creatures we have the following:
Knights, Fighting Men (Archer, Bandit, etc), Christian Monk, Farmer, Merchant (Rich), etc. IN creasures we have Horses, Boars, Bull, Deer, Dog, etc, Hawk, Wolf, Dragons, Giant, etc.

The literal reading of this clause mans all of the above is prohibited content. When you throw in the Call of the Cthulu 1920 and other era character this effectively rules out the use of any setting material except for example that completely or nearly non-human like Jorune.

I was just reading over the definitions. It would appear that place names, even of real world places, are covered in prohibited content, as well as generic real world names. I don’t think that is the intent, but England is presumably used in KAP, and I’m sure several countries are mentioned in CoC. I can’t see how that can possibly work.

I find it interesting that , opposite to the D20 OGL, which allowed the user to display the D20 logo if they met the requirements of the contract, this contract forces you to use their logo, on the front and back cover of your product.

 

[Vile Traveller]

As MOB states ad infinitum everywhere, this thing isn't designed to let people create retro-clones of RQ7 or COC7. Well, that's not surprising because that would be a first for an OGL. What's not clear is what it is supposed to do, but there are plenty of products out there with no conceivable purpose so this is not the worst offender. What's somewhat puzzling is why there isn't a BRP equivalent of the Jonstown Compendium for RQ7 or the Miskatonic Repository for CoC7 instead. The PR disaster that was Chaosium's failed attempt at scaring Open Cthulhu into shut-down may have something to do with it, who knows. Really, fan publication of monograph-style stand-alone books with a BRP logo on the front seems to be the only niche for this, which I guess is an improvement of the original monograph system disaster under old Chaosium.