Phoenicia Player's Guide in Layout! plus FAQ

Yes that's right, the Phoenicia player's guide is now in layout!  One of the interesting things about this player's guide is that there isn't going to be an image of the city with it's falls.  The problem is: No one in their right mind has built a thriving city around a waterfall yet, especially one as big as a cataract fall complex.

The cataract waterfall is actually inspired by Iguazu Falls in both Argentina and Brazil.  Although Mosi-oa-Tunya ("The Smoke that Thunders"), also known as Victoria Falls, is also an inspiration. 

Why would a thriving city be built around a cataract?   Well, people do dumb things.  But the major reason is the Lemurian Obsidian pyramid located under the major spill way.  Made of Orgonite, the pyramid attracts both Arcane Spellcasters and psions.  Fortunately, the psions got there first and started to build a magnificent city.  However, in real life, the practical problems of flooding and noise pollution (from the falls) are practically tough to overcome.  So, city builders had too many problems with cities centralized around waterfalls.

Q. Why a city of Psionics in Pathfinder?

A. Everyone needs a city that they can drop in their campaigns without a fuss.  Phoenicia, and it's three sister cities -- Sybaris and Syracuse; are designed so that the Game Master can do just that.  This allows you to explore psionics at your leisure if your players or you -- the GM -- enjoys the system.

Q.  Why don't you just add it to Glorion?
 
A. Are you nuts?  No Author in his right mind would submit his work to Paizo and sign a work for hire agreement when the Internet -- the world's most powerful and easiest Copying Machine -- is still operational.  I'll take my chances with releasing it under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 License.

Q. Why a Creative Commons License?

A. Why not?  With a creative commons license, major companies can compete with me directly.  So everyone wins.

Wizards of the Coast wins, because they can create a game book derivative of mine.

Paizo wins because they can do the same.

Same for Dreamscarred Press.

Steve Jackson Games.

And a host of other companies.   Plus, the city can reach an amazing amount of gamers.  So I win, and you win.  You can get an official 4e product and play Phoenicia with official 4e guidelines.  Or you can get an official Exalted product and play Phoenicia with Exalted.  Plus, gamers can translate it into their favorite languages and the translations can compete with each other.  Again.  Everyone wins.

Q. Are you nuts?

A.  No, I am not.  But please, don't flood my email box asking for permission, I'll get frustrated with you all.

Pathfinder and the Open Gaming License

[Note, this article contains some observations that I had for a long time.]
-auth


This article should be titled How Wizards of the Coast Killed the Open Gaming Movement, and how Paizo saved it


But that's just too much.  Recently there was a thread on Paizo's boards were a poster was concerned that the Pathfinder SRD Wiki (Pathfinder OGC) was posting material before it was published.  However, Paizo came to the site's defense and said a public thank you.  Several other publishers followed their lead.

Paizo supports the Open Gaming Movement, as the company now carries the torch for Open Gaming.  This is because they use the OGL, or Open Gaming License, which is been generally good for the creative side of our little interest.  So, why is Paizo carrying the torch?  Why isn't Wizards of the Coast still carrying the torch?  That's simply because they dropped it.

About eleven years ago, Ryan Dancey convinced Wizards of the Coast to open up and release the Dungeons and Dragons 3rd Edition System to all of us.  This is simply because Dungeons and Dragons was the most popular roleplaying system in the world (followed by GURPS, et al.)  And it is true, most every RPG markets their system as different from D&D.  There is a lot of D&D hate, and a lot of love at the time.

In truth, I wasn't going to buy in to the system, as 2nd Edition really is something I was content with.  I was frustrated over the rejections I've been getting so I prayed that I wouldn't have to go through TSR or Wizards of the Coast to publish my ideas.  Well, the OGL was an answer to a prayer!  From my perspective it was the best thing to happen in a long time!  Well, that is until Wizards of the Coast reserved the right not to OGL everything they came out with.

I went -- "huh?"

So began years of non-support.  Wizards of the Coast did not support the d20 system.  Yet, they were coming out with a lot of good stuff that should be put in the System Reference Document.  A partial list includes:

• Kalashtar
• Warforged
• Shifters
• Tactical Feats
• Several Feats
• Racial Substitution Levels
• The new NPC format

Plus, they were bought out by Hasbro, which was not a good thing.  Wizards of the Coast had lost their self-determination, and many of their products started going downhill.  d20 was dying.  Not just because of all the not so stellar products, and how the FLGS treated the d20 market; but also because Wizards of the Coast did not give any support.  There was no reviews by Wizards of the Coast staff on what they liked.  There was no referrals, there was no use on really what they liked, except for one or two pieces.  And every new product they put out, except for d20 modern products and Unearthed Arcana, information wasn't added to the SRD.

The SRD was dying.  And the death knell was the 4th Edition of Dungeons and Dragons.  Good bye SRD, good bye WIzards OGL.  The d20 System was going to die, after all, 4th Edition is a completely different game than from the other three. Most established publishers (creative types) got frustrated with the GSL, and they didn't want to adopt the new system and publish derivative works for 4th Edition.  Only a few got on the ball, and they had to work around the GSL to publish.  After all, the GSL was designed to really inspire creativity and originality.  I guess no one ever got the memo, no one ever has.  The OGL Movement seemed dead.

However, all is not lost.  Enter PAIZO PUBLISHING.

Paizo,  got its start by publishing the Dragon and Dungeon magazines.  Paizo broke off Wizards of the Coast to publish these magazines for Wizards of the Coast.  This was a good thing until WotC cut off the license to print these magazines.  The reaction was less than stellar, as WotC thought it was better to make them apart of their DDI.

Paizo responded by creating Pathfinder.  Pathfinder cleans up the 3rd Edition of the D&D game.  The System itself streamlines the 3rd Edition and makes it work.  Clearly a derivative, Pathfinder took two years to write and edit before it came out on the market.   When Pathfinder was published, several companies were started and they jumped aboard.  The OGL movement was restarted anew.

It also made it easier that PAIZO couldn't pull the same trick that Wizards of the Coast did.  That is, claim full ownership over the d20 System and any derivatives they pumped out.  Each new book had an OGL attached, meaning that the d20 System was still owned by Wizards of the Coast.  The Pathfinder OGC site was started, where the whole gaming system could be documented and referenced besides the Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Reference Document (or PRD).  Paizo offered full support to 3rd Party Publishers.

On the Paizo Blog, the Paizo folks would -- by all accounts -- review 3rd Party products that used the d20 System on their Blog.   Plus they sell 3rd party products, and allow people to critique them.  The mistakes that Wizards of the Coast had made it seemed that Paizo has learned from.  Where Wizards of the Coast now acts like a bully, Paizo is much more respectful of creativity.

Most say that Copyright is a good thing.  It was designed to forment Creativity and help authors produce new works.  However, it's not necessarily so now.  Copyright serves the publisher today, and the publisher only.  However, the OGL is the best thing that happened to gaming and creativity in this arena of Roleplaying Games.  After all, despite of the lackluster products for the d20 System out of third party publishers, there is no doubt that the d20 System (D&D and all) is enriched because of stiff competition.  It's an experiment that works in opening a game system and provides output.

For other personal opinions on how the Open Gaming Movement has been good I have a few references here:

Monte Cook's The Open Game License, as I see it pt 1
The Open Game License, as I see it pt 2
Copyright and Game Rules
Why do we need Open Source Games?

The Open Game License

Was it good? Was it bad? Did it succeed?

To tell the truth, it DID NOT succeed. The Open Game License didn't succeed perfectly. The Open Game License was the best idea for gaming, but people didn't use it the way it was meant to be used. They all created derivatives of Wizards of the Coast's stuff; and not derivatives of each other's stuff.

So, why is this bad? Its bad because people are timid of Copyright lawsuits. (Here we go again, Elton is going to talk about the Libertarian Case Against Copyright!). Here is how copyright works:

"I claim what ever I create as my property, therefore only I have the right to print it! Anyone else who prints it without my permission and me getting a cut of the action is considered stealing!"

Stealing one's intellectual property is considered bad form in today's society. But it has been taken too far by companies such as Walt Disney for instance. Or Estates, like the Tolkien estate. If you steal someone's intellectual property and pass it off as yours and sell it, you are stealing it. Their can be damages: you can be civilly sued, you can face Federal Prosecution. But lets take a look at this from a different angle.

The Open Game License is meant for a way for everyone to SHARE and SHARE ALIKE. A better way for the OGL to work is that it works like Creative Commons. It provides you with the power to make derivative works without threat of being SUED!

However, every gaming company is nervous of the other guy. As a result, you got thousands of splat books or Campaign Settings but not enough adventures utilizing the materials. People were just too scared to use the other guy's stuff. Added to the fact that Wizards of the Coast did not share all of its best toys to adventure makers. So most of the market share went to Wizards of Coast. Good one guys.

So what is to be done?

You could show your support by joining the Libertarian Case Against Copyrights. As for myself, I do believe I'll make an intention. I intend to buy Alderac Entertainment Group and its most profitable property: Legend of the Five Rings. After I buy the Company, I'm going to put all of L5R's RPG materials under the Creative Commons and make sure everyone has the right to make derivative works of the RPG. After all, Roleplaying Games' best and most wonderful strength is that they appeal to creative gamers. Give the Creative Gamer the power to CREATE A DERIVATIVE WORK and you will see growth beyond your wildest dreams.

Soulknives ROLEMASTERIZED!

This Jedi/Soulknife Moment brought to you by the Open Game License.



Soulknife Duel by ~Atlantean6 on deviantART

I converted the Soulknife to Rolemaster before. Now it is time to rewrite and update those rules for use with both Rolemaster Classic and Rolemaster Fantasy Roleplaying. Here, two soulknives are practicing their own variant of swordmanship.

What if Hasbro gets itself out of the RPG business?

So, what would happen if the D&D brand fails and the RPG development department is suddenly out of a job due to Hasbro's corporate bullying and draconian tactics to protect its D&D sales? One thing for sure, people won't stop playing Dungeons and Dragons. Plus, a lot of talent from WotC will look to find work doing what they do best: create games.

Dungeons and Dragons is forever. There would be no official supplements, but it will be subsumed into the community. The community of gamers will support Dungeons and Dragons on the web and the internet. And various companies will fight to become top dog.

One person hopes that if WotC tanks due to Hasbro mis-management of the D&D brand, it would be sold to Iron Crown Enterprises and the Rolemaster revision of the game would be the 5th incarnation of the Game. Since wizards did everything to make D&D not D&D, Dungeons and Dragons is just a marketing brand if nothing else.

Just something to ponder . . .

Although, if WotC does tank due to mis-managment by the PARENT company; I do hope that D&D is sold to a company that understands how the D20 System and the OGL worked for Dungeons and Dragons. OR . . . even better . . . make it totally open sourced and COPYLEFTED; allowing anyone to produce work for the game with a simple game license like the OGL was.