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Post by harlandski on Jan 21, 2019 11:12:23 GMT -6
I realise this question may be really dumb, or impossible to answer for legal reasons, or both, but I'm just beginning to find my way in the land of OGL, SRDs, and open game content, with a view to making my own retro clone, or retro-inspired game.
What I am clear about:
1) Its OK to use material from an OGL SRD as long as you include an appropriate OGL at the end, and include whichever SRD you used in the copyright notice at the end.
2) It's also OK to use other people's open game content, as long as you mention them in your copyright notice as well.
What I'm less clear about:
3) How to exactly determine what is and what isn't open game content outside of an SRD (I know there's a statement of open game content, and of product identity, but their exact definitions in specific products' legal appendices often leave me confused)
4) If mechanics themselves can ever be anything but open game content. In fact outside of the D&D SRDs all I'm really interested in re-using is mechanics.
5) If it's ok to paraphrase/modify other people's mechanics, or if you have to quote whatever you use verbatim.
The specific games I'm potentially interested in taking mechanics from (apart from the D&D 3e and/or 5e SRDs) are:
- Delving Deeper - Swords & Wizardry - Labyrinth Lord - Dungeon Crawl Classics
If anyone can offer me any (general-knowledge, non-legal-counsel) pointers, I'd be very grateful.
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Post by thegreyelf on Jan 22, 2019 7:49:30 GMT -6
Any game that includes Open Content will have a clear "Designation of Open Content" section, usually either in the front of the book on the credits and copyright page, or with the OGL at the back. It will also be accompanied by a "Designation of Product Identity" section. If the game does not have either of those sections, it does not include any open content and may not be used. Best practice, if you have any doubts whatsoever, is to not use content from a given game, and stick to what you can do with the SRD.
Now, that being said, also look into the special licenses for Swords & Wizardry and Labyrinth Lord. Each of those games expressly allow the use of material from them (and the advertisement of compatibility with them) under special licenses they provide. The licenses should be found on their respective websites. I'm not sure about Delving Deeper. DCC doesn't offer that kind of license, but should have a very clear Designation of Open Content. Joe Goodman is also very approachable and will be happy to answer any questions you have regarding material you are and are not allowed to use from his game.
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Post by Vile Traveller on Jan 22, 2019 9:22:39 GMT -6
It’s OK to say your product is intended for use with another company‘s product. Be careful there - under the OGL, it is expressly not okay to claim compatibility with another product unless you have a specific agreement with that product's publisher. If you don't use the OGL it's usually fine to do so, but in practice that depends on how big and aggressive their lawyers are compared to your lawyers. Remember, law is not about who's in the right right right, it's about who has more money for lawyers. The only reason to use the OGL is if you want to base your product on a particular SRD. That's at least part of what's behind the overwhelming majority of OGL products being based on the D&D SRD, because that actually has a lot of material directly taken from the game. The Mongoose Traveller SRD, on the other hand, is entirely worthless as there is nothing copyrightable in there at all - advanced combat rifles and psionics are not FFE IP. Of course, because of 2nd edition MGT the MGT1 SRD has given birth to the Cepheus Engine, which could have become Mongoose's Pathfinder if an actual RPG company had been behind it instead of one Traveller fan. But then an actual RPG company could as easily have written their own version of Traveller without using the SRD at all. If you don't need that, it's better (i.e. less restrictive) to write your material in your own words, even if it is closely related to the ideas in another product. It also means you don't lay your work open to being done better by someone with more resources who takes your OGL material and does their thing with it.
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Post by grodog on Jan 22, 2019 9:29:43 GMT -6
Now, that being said, also look into the special licenses for Swords & Wizardry and Labyrinth Lord. Each of those games expressly allow the use of material from them (and the advertisement of compatibility with them) under special licenses they provide. OSRIC has similar provisions to allow the sharing of designated content among OSRIC publishers without designating the content as pure open-to-all content: knights-n-knaves.com/osric/s1.htmlAllan.
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Post by thegreyelf on Jan 22, 2019 12:30:26 GMT -6
Be careful there - under the OGL, it is expressly not okay to claim compatibility with another product unless you have a specific agreement with that product's publisher. If you don't use the OGL it's usually fine to do so ... Yes, thank you. The OGL does have that restriction. In general, a statement of compatibility with another company‘s product is acceptable, provided you don’t claim to be an official product or make your product look like that company’s product, but as you rightly pointed out there are limitations. As an interesting historical side-note, the reason this stipulation is in the OGL is expressly because WotC didn't want people publishing D&D supplements and indicating compatibility with D&D, thus creating direct competition. in the 3.x era, the d20 System License (a separate license entirely) required you to say, "Requires the use of the Dungeons & Dragons Player's Handbook by Wizards of the Coast," if you chose to carry the d20 logo on your product. Now, the no-compatibility stiplulation remains as an artifact of that desire to avoid competition. Unfortunately for WotC, people got around it simply by saying, "Compatible with the Third Edition of the World's Most Famous Fantasy Role Playing Game."
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Post by thegreyelf on Jan 22, 2019 12:31:17 GMT -6
Now, that being said, also look into the special licenses for Swords & Wizardry and Labyrinth Lord. Each of those games expressly allow the use of material from them (and the advertisement of compatibility with them) under special licenses they provide. OSRIC has similar provisions to allow the sharing of designated content among OSRIC publishers without designating the content as pure open-to-all content: knights-n-knaves.com/osric/s1.htmlAllan. They do indeed. i just didn't mention OSRIC as it wasn't one of the systems the OP mentioned.
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Post by harlandski on Jan 22, 2019 22:30:16 GMT -6
If you don't need that, it's better (i.e. less restrictive) to write your material in your own words, even if it is closely related to the ideas in another product. It also means you don't lay your work open to being done better by someone with more resources who takes your OGL material and does their thing with it. But in your own words would be for everything, right? So no Strength, Dexterity etc but Power, Agility or whatever etc?
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