We won! (OGL)

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I don’t play (or buy stuff for) 5E and don’t plan to start. Nothing I’ve seen about 6E/1DnD makes it seem like I’ll like it any better (quite the opposite). But there is a fair amount of old-edition stuff on my DriveThruRPG wishlist that I had made a decision not to purchase that is now back on the list (and, as fortune would have it, the panic-buying frenzy of the last few weeks has left me with a couple hundred extra $ in my publisher account so the timing is right). Looks like a good time to finally pull the trigger on those POD copies of Gamma World 1E, L3, B10, and the dozen or so other old TSR titles I’ve been hemming and hawing over for months (and maybe even expand that list - even though it’s not my favorite version, I could maybe use a new hardcopy of the RC, or maybe some of those 2E settings that I snobbishly turned my nose up at at the time but everyone else seems to love).
 
Gringnr said:
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I really hope people don’t go back. Paizo and Chaosium basically ran out of several months worth of printed books and had to order more.

Shadow of the Demon Lord and WFRP4 have years worth of adventuring content available, and it’s a damn sight better than what WotC has been producing lately. Talislanta and Glorantha are waiting. For those who want to use their own world or tinker another, there’s Mythras.

Then there’s at least a dozen OSR systems which are all better than 5e.

It’s a prime time to get new eyes on new games.
 
sharps54 said:
I loved Gamma World as a kid, we played 2E, but all that is gone. I should take this chance to pick all that up.
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Yeah, it looks like they’ve got everything for Gamma World 1E-4E available in POD (tip to the wise: steer clear of the 3E stuff; despite the pretty covers (most/all recycled from TSR’s 1986 Amazing Stories calendar) the content is pretty much all hot garbage; the personal low point for me being the module that literally reused the maps from AD&D module S3 and I guess just hoped we wouldn’t notice?).

They’ve also got the complete run of Star Frontiers up, which is also pulling nostalgia strings for me - I LOVED that game when I was 10 years old but later “outgrew” and poo-pooed it as kiddie stuff.
 
CRKrueger said:
I really hope people don’t go back. Paizo and Chaosium basically ran out of several months worth of printed books and had to order more.
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Even if just 5% of the people that jumped stay with their new games, that's still an improvement. Much as I'd have loved for this to have toppled D&D as market leader, that was never going to be a likely outcome.
 
Pathfinder 2 is like 400+ pages. Buying the book is the easiest part. Reading it, understanding it and playing take the work. People I find are lazy and will go the easy route which is back to 5e.
WotC did one smart thing which is to see the actual dollars not just cease coming to them but flow to a sufficiently strong competitor. They stemmed the damage as soon as that info came out. Maybe coincidence with other internal discussions and maybe just luck but it's timed right to minimize permanent damage.

I wish Paizo and everyone else luck and hope this diversifies the hobby but I think for now WotC has applied a tourniquet.

The next challenge will be what happens with 6e. If they don't make big enough changes will people take that time to switch to PF2 given they have the book and need to learn a new system (potentially)?
 
CRKrueger said:
I really hope people don’t go back. Paizo and Chaosium basically ran out of several months worth of printed books and had to order more.

Shadow of the Demon Lord and WFRP4 have years worth of adventuring content available, and it’s a damn sight better than what WotC has been producing lately. Talislanta and Glorantha are waiting. For those who want to use their own world or tinker another, there’s Mythras.

Then there’s at least a dozen OSR systems which are all better than 5e.

It’s a prime time to get new eyes on new games.
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Unfortunately, they're going to. I think most will go back. There's people already saying it all over the place, such things like "unconditional surrender" and "we won." But who's "we," really? Is it the fans of 5e? They can go back to droning on about 5e and not feel the guilt that the company that makes their beloved game has reversed their stance on trying to bully and shakedown the TTRPG gaming industry? Is it the 5e publishers, so they can continue to cash in on the biggest game in the hobby without worry they'll lose their identity/product/revenue stream? It certainly isn't the non-5e fans and publishers, whose games struggle for a foothold in the industry, and a chance to step out of the corporate shadow WotC casts. I fear the status quo of a thousand blogs and videos of 5e will continue, unabated. It's free advertising for WotC, and it they almost made a fatal mistake not realizing it, or at least not understanding the implications their actions with this OGL debacle might reckon.

The thing is, the great content of the Paizo's, Chaosium's, the TDM's, and the Kobold Press's of the world has been there. And even - or especially - the even smaller companies of the world, where they cannot afford to take some high social or moral road a company like WotC can and afford a subpar (or lower sales), or otherwise release a terribly delivered product and basically be okay.

I'm so sorry if this looks like anti-DnD vitriol. I thought I was seeing something revolutionary, but it's in the process of getting swept under the rug. To be a footnote. I posited in another thread, will all be forgiven once WotC has backpedaled? I think it will. In some places, I've already seen the, lets get back to making great 5e content and put this nonsense behind us, mindset taking hold.
 
I’ve got to imagine people who just spent $60 (or more) on a Pathfinder or DCC or 13th Age or WWN or Mythras or whatever book are likely to at least read it, and that at least some of them will realize they like it better than 5E (especially since I’m guessing at least some of them will have never really paid any attention to anything other than 5E before). And if they’re GMs, they may well tell all their players that this is what we’re going to play now and they’ll probably go along because GMs, especially ones who you already know and know are good, aren’t easy to find.

D&D will still rule the roost (at least until 1DnD comes out and everybody sees first-hand how shitty the subscription/microtransaction-based model is) but if it goes from being 90% of the market to 75 or 80% that’s a definitive win for everybody else and makes for a healthier hobby.
 
Lord Dynel said:
I'm so sorry if this looks like anti-DnD vitriol. I thought I was seeing something revolutionary, but it's in the process of getting swept under the rug. To be a footnote. I posited in another thread, will all be forgiven once WotC has backpedaled? I think it will. In some places, I've already seen the, lets get back to making great 5e content and put this nonsense behind us, mindset taking hold.
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I understand, and I don't mean this as a knock on anyone who felt this way. I think it was always a far reach to take these events:
  • The functional parts of D&D are open allowing people to make D&D adjacent products, creating D&D fans who consider the game a good time and making it the majority of the hobby.
  • Wizards tries to deny these people (D&D fans), easy access to the functional parts of D&D, without any warning or explanation, causing a revolt among D&D fans and creators.
  • Wizards currently appears to not only relent, but take positive actions to create irrevocable and perpetual access to the functional parts of D&D.
And conclude the outcome would be some vast number of D&D fans deciding to play Mythras for the rest of their lives. I think T.Foster has the most optimistic scenario where the shift is much more modest. In other words, when someone's favorite sports team starts to suck, many don't switch to a new team forever, they gripe or tune out until the team stops sucking.
 
T. Foster said:
I’ve got to imagine people who just spent $60 (or more) on a Pathfinder or DCC or 13th Age or WWN or Mythras or whatever book are likely to at least read it, and that at least some of them will realize they like it better than 5E (especially since I’m guessing at least some of them will have never really paid any attention to anything other than 5E before). And if they’re GMs, they may well tell all their players that this is what we’re going to play now and they’ll probably go along because GMs, especially ones who you already know and know are good, aren’t easy to find.

D&D will still rule the roost (at least until 1DnD comes out and everybody sees first-hand how shitty the subscription/microtransaction-based model is) but if it goes from being 90% of the market to 75 or 80% that’s a definitive win for everybody else and makes for a healthier hobby.
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The first system is by default the best system. Whether it's an OS, program to solve a problem, etc. You have to be probably 10x better in some dimension important to a user to justify overcoming existing familiarity
 
Bunch said:
Pathfinder 2 is like 400+ pages. Buying the book is the easiest part. Reading it, understanding it and playing take the work. People I find are lazy and will go the easy route which is back to 5e.
WotC did one smart thing which is to see the actual dollars not just cease coming to them but flow to a sufficiently strong competitor. They stemmed the damage as soon as that info came out. Maybe coincidence with other internal discussions and maybe just luck but it's timed right to minimize permanent damage.

I wish Paizo and everyone else luck and hope this diversifies the hobby but I think for now WotC has applied a tourniquet.

The next challenge will be what happens with 6e. If they don't make big enough changes will people take that time to switch to PF2 given they have the book and need to learn a new system (potentially)?
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I don't really see people jumping over to PF2 as diversifying the hobby. I'd rather that we got more people playing something other than D&D instead of 'I Can't Believe it isn't D&D' with more fiddly bits attached.
 
Gamma World 2e does not appear to be available in POD. That's too bad.
 
Voros said:
I don't really see people jumping over to PF2 as diversifying the hobby. I'd rather that we got more people playing something other than D&D instead of 'I Can't Believe it isn't D&D' with more fiddly bits attached.
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Different axis of diversification. Almost all the eggs are in the WotC D&D basket. A shift to 20% of the eggs are in the Paizo D&D basket is a risk mitigation as we can see from the last few weeks.
 
Bunch said:
Different axis of diversification. Almost all the eggs are in the WotC D&D basket. A shift to 20% of the eggs are in the Paizo D&D basket is a risk mitigation as we can see from the last few weeks.
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Sure, but I just can't see people playing just another version of D&D really making much of a change in the hobby, as much as I'd rather people played BtW and DCC instead.

But I figured any real change in that was highly unlikely despite the online shitstorm this ignited. I think the lower estimates, say less than 5 or perhaps even 1 percent actually moving to a new D&D variant let alone one of the many other excellent non-D&D options, seems increasingly likely.

Will be mildly amusing to where we are in the perennially lame field of D&D YouTubers in a few months. How many are going to stick with their declarations of abandoning the current edition of D&D? I suspect not many, unless they can retain those sweet high view numbers by becoming full-time current-edition bashers (the narrator says 'they can't').
 
I suspect most of those who switched rapidly from 5e to PF2 were already familiar with PF.

I can't imagine the average player familiar with 5e checking out the dense, complicated ruleset of PF and thinking 'oh yeah, this is the game I've been looking for.'

Those who complain about 5e not having enough rules (they exist) usually started with 3e or 4e and bring that expectation of crunch.

Selling it to newbies would be a greater challenge, unless they're teenagers, who I think are drawn to heavier crunch for a whole host of reasons as younger players for reasons previously noted by Baulderstone.
 
Bunch said:
The first system is by default the best system. Whether it's an OS, program to solve a problem, etc. You have to be probably 10x better in some dimension important to a user to justify overcoming existing familiarity
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Well, I think back to my own situation in the 80s. I’m sure most of my players would’ve been content to stick with AD&D forever, but I picked up and got intrigued by stuff like Stormbringer and WFRP and told them that’s what I was willing to run and they went along (and we still played some AD&D alongside them) and eventually we settled on RuneQuest as our fantasy game of choice and never really looked at D&D again after about 1991. There’s no reason to think something similar couldn’t happen with the players (and especially the GMs) of this generation.

I see Pathfinder as a gateway drug because it’s effectively still D&D, but once the (substantial) conceptual hurdle of playing something with a different name and from a different publisher has been crossed, there’s no reason to think they won’t eventually get more curious about other games and continue to branch out further - to realize there’s more out there than just D&D and pseudo-D&D, and that one of them may actually be better aligned with their tastes and preferences, just like we did in the 80s and 90s.
 
A Fiery Flying Roll said:
Indeed, that's kinda the point of the OGL. From a Dancey interview at the time:

View attachment 55601
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Yeah this whole thing has made me start to question the wisdom of the OSR's whole approach.

The rulesets in the OSR have always been the least interesting bit to me but now I'm starting to wonder if the OSR isn't really just reinforcing the undue dominance of D&D in the hobby.

I used to think of the OSR as a kinda 'punk rock' for rpgs where people go back to the roots of the hobby and see how they can make it new again.

But punk rock ossified overtime and as The Who said 'meet the new Boss, same as the old boss.'

I think going forward for me the real punk rockers are those who move beyond D&D and yes, even fantasy, as the over-riding premise of the hobby.

I think we need more games inspired by the likes of Over the Edge and Delta Green, not more 'Not THAT D&D...Instead THIS D&D.'
 
Voros said:
Yeah this whole thing has made me start to question the wisdom of the OSR's whole approach.

The rulesets in the OSR have always been the least interesting bit to me but now I'm starting to wonder if the OSR isn't really just reinforcing the undue dominance of D&D in the hobby.

I used to think of the OSR as a kinda 'punk rock' for rpgs where people go back to the roots of the hobby and see how they can make it new again.

But punk rock ossified overtime and as The Who said 'meet the new Boss, same as the old boss.'

I think going forward for me the real punk rockers are those who move beyond D&D and yes, even fantasy, as the over-riding premise of the hobby.
I think we need more games inspired by the likes of Over the Edge and Delta Green, not more 'Not THAT D&D...Instead THIS D&D.'
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Yeah, I think there is the interesting question of what the most innovative of OSR people would have done if the OGL hadn't existed.
 
Voros said:
But I figured any real change in that was highly unlikely despite the online shitstorm this ignited. I think the lower estimates, say less than 5 or perhaps even 1 percent actually moving to a new D&D variant let alone one of the many other excellent non-D&D options, seems increasingly likely.
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I think there's a good possibility that those who jumped from 3.5 to PF1e, and returned to D&D for 5e may decide to just jump back to PF2e and stay with Pathfinder simply out of convenience. Having been burned twice, it makes more sense to make one change again and not have to worry about jumping away in 10 years when WotC tries something like this again.
 
BedrockBrendan said:
People should make this judgement for themselves. If others feel different than I do, that is fair. I personally think because the problem was they came in and basically tried to crater this thing that was essential to the culture of the hobby, then decided not to do so when the reaction was so strong, doesn't prompt strong feelings of gratitude or a sense admiration for them finally having done the right thing (and just based on their past behavior I really want to wait to see how all this pans out before forming a judgement in that respect). It was such a direct attack on the hobby itself, prompted by what looked like very simple greed, that I don't know I am going to feel very positive towards them simply because they decided to stop the attack. They should never have made that attack in the first place. That said, I am not saying they should be forever condemned or something. I just don't think trust and goodwill is something they get back after retreating from a move like that.
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Yeah, I'm not saying forget all that has occurred and trust them unconditionally. I also wasn't posting in response to any sense that the overall reaction has been unfair. I just think that, logically, if the general community response turned out to be, "Too late, fuck you!" then that's potentially unhelpful.

And, like I say, it's not as if my opinion on the matter is worth much. WotC never had my business, never lost it, and never got it back; and it's not as if I was fighting the good fight at any point, just making the odd comment over here.
 
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