Knights & Knaves Alehouse

thedungeondelver wrote:

Clangador wrote:I wonder how much it would cost to buy D&D. Millions I am sure.

Thirty million was a number floated around in the late 2000s.

I wonder if I could put that on my credit card.

francisca wrote:Uh. No.

I think that would actually be worse than the current situation.

Right now, OSRIC products and the rest of the enabled-by-the-OGL stuff is essentially "in the noise" and flying below the threshold of Hasbro's ire. (I'm NOT starting the legal debate here, guys. DON'T GO THERE.)

Now picture your Uber-Grognard, with the ego and hubris to match his wealth. Think someone like that wouldn't set himself up as final arbiter of what is and isn't D&D, and set about "correcting" everything?

You misconstrued my wish (good thing it wasn't a spell ). I would like to see someone purchase the rights whose only agenda is to let the D&D line die, instead of the continual need to revise and update it.

thedungeondelver wrote:Either that or I'd do this...

Classic. The Gygax statue would definitely have to have two thieves on top, though, trying to pry out one of his eyeballs.

blackprinceofmuncie wrote:I have to agree with Francisca. Right now, the real legacy of O/AD&D is in the hands of the fans and "brand" D&D is a completely seperate thing. I think that is ultimately a better situation than returning to the days where O/AD&D was more corporate. I love it that O/AD&D has returned to being a hobby rather than an industry.

With this I fully agree.

foxroe wrote:

thedungeondelver wrote:Either that or I'd do this...

Classic. The Gygax statue would definitely have to have two thieves on top, though, trying to pry out one of his eyeballs.

No, I need the room for future death-ray installation.

I look forward to the Mousie Delver RPG Cultural Revolution.

Of course, we'll all be going insane as we melt lead over small, front lawn fires to pour into molds for our own minis.

With OSRIC I don't see the point. Even if someone did buy D&D they couldn't stop OSRIC products (or any other clone for that matter).

TRP wrote:Pray I don't hit the Powerball when it's quarter of a billion dollars.

Best thing I have heard in a long time!

I'd agree with TDD more or less, I would keep it running but also try to release "the classics" or do something. The biggest problem with D&D is that it's fan base changes with each edition, and finding "one true way" would likely alienate so many people it's not funny. Plus, it's a business, and if I spent a lot of money I wouldn't want to do anything that would hurt the business.

I might try to create a 5e that tries to reverse the radical changes from 1-3 edition, as I feel in the last few years that really removed itself from tradition. I might keep 4e solely for computer games for one of the game worlds. Any further revisions to D&D after 5 would be very minor and developing 5 would take a long time and try to solicit the most feedback I could get.

I think the one thing I might do is try to bring back better relations with the creative types. If we decide not to release more material for a campaign, I might release the IP back to the creators or their heirs. If we didn't use Greyhawk, I would will it back to Gail--if for some reason The Forgotten Realms wouldn't be published, it would go back to Greenwood. (The other properties are a little tougher because they were built by teams in house--but I might work out scenarios where Salvatore could write novels a la the way Gary worked out his deal.) I can see this being useful now--revert the rights to Blackmoor back to Arneson's heirs, give Gail the rights to Dangerous Journeys, etc. I think WoTC released most original art still in their possession back to their creators, but I'd try to do stuff like that, if I could. (Rights can be really complex at times, and these dreams might not reflect reality).

I would never release to the public domain or creative commons though--I'm inspired by EGG's wish for D&D to thrive as a business, not a hobby. I think the business side of it keeps the fandom alive, and I would fear making it a public common would lead to a "tragedy of the commons", where the existing fans are happy but new potential fans stick with the better known brands, likely meaning a slow death (over decades, of course) for the "original D&D".

Matthew wrote:Honestly, I am happy with the way things are. The brand is irrevocably tainted for my lifetime, millions of dollars can be much better spent.

This.

At this point, "D&D" has become two different things: #1. D&D the corporate brand, which has been run into the ground and destroyed forever, and #2. D&D the genre, which encapsulates all those things which fit into what we know as "true D&D."

These days, OSRIC and the other various clones/semi-clones are seared into my consciousness just as much as "D&D" is. If you could change the titles of the clones to D&D, it wouldn't make a bit of difference to me. That wasn't always the case for me, but it is now.

Steve wrote:

Matthew wrote:Honestly, I am happy with the way things are. The brand is irrevocably tainted for my lifetime, millions of dollars can be much better spent.

This.

At this point, "D&D" has become two different things: #1. D&D the corporate brand, which has been run into the ground and destroyed forever, and #2. D&D the genre, which encapsulates all those things which fit into what we know as "true D&D."

These days, OSRIC and the other various clones/semi-clones are seared into my consciousness just as much as "D&D" is. If you could change the titles of the clones to D&D, it wouldn't make a bit of difference to me. That wasn't always the case for me, but it is now.

No. This.

I would feel much better about the potential emergence of YADD so long as more folks feel this way.

Well said, Steve.

I don't agree with Steve. Nothing can take the place of AD&D for me. Nothing. Irrespective of what Hasbro does or does not with the brand. I like, acknowledge and even participated in OSRIC and my hat is off to what it's done. But when the shouting has died down, it's Gary Gygax's AD&D for me.

I have to agree with TDD on that.

The problem with D&D becoming a "folk culture" is that over time, such traditions morph into something different over time. Ignoring what might happen to the owners of D&D, as time passes, others add to the folk culture and instead of being a timeless representation, it becomes something else. As new people come into it and others die off, the retro-clones games may get their own popularity, and since rules get to be tinkered with constantly, you'll see these games grabbing elements from other games and adventures. Without a popular guide or somebody at the controls, I think two things will happen (a) the "underground culture" will be weak from a lack of specific direction and dozens of variants and (b) eventually it will evolve into something as new players bring their own perspectives in. Even if there are rules like OSRIC, S&W, etc, others might gain popularity instead--being "free and open source" doesn't matter if you're not popular.

I would say if an underground culture develops, it will morph, likely adding in other elements of D&D and other games over time. 20 years from now I suspect what we call the OSR will rub shoulders with 3e fans or maybe even 4e fans, cross-pollinating, etc. Anybody looking for a "pure pre-UA 1e AD&D" from this movement will gradually become the minority over time, as the culture slowly takes in the future disenfranchised and the old guard dies off. In short, the folk culture will assimilate other elements, or else suffer from rampant factionalism and likely not survive. That's classic sociology.

Sadly, games aren't really a good place to celebrate "the author", and when I say gaming is commercial it is more like the mass media industry than the literature arts. In a lot of commercial lit the author doesn't matter unless you are savvy enough to recognize it. Fans of Gygax the writer were eclipsed by Greyhawk and D&D fans, otherwise Dangerous Journeys or Lejendary Adventures would have taken off. It reminds me of when Chris Claremont, a writer for 17 years, the man who made the X-Men the #1 comic, was forced out in 1991. People didn't follow him, they stayed with the book. How many people know who wrote the best episodes of things like the Transformers cartoon, for instance. That's why I argued about this earlier. It's not that I don't want this not to be the case, it's just that I've become cynical from experience. The only ones who seem to have gotten a bigger die-hard following when they've moved to their own work are the novelists.

The only way to keep Gary's work alive--and I am talking about his most famous work, which is the 70s and early 80s stuff he did with TSR--is either continue to print them or wait until the copyright expires. The former would have to see some sort of change in the way games are marketed, and how many people are interested in reading the old material. Most of the arguments here are "for our kids/the future" because many of us have our old copies, but you can't predict what they'll want to read or learn from. Again, I'd like to see this, but I think it would be hard to argue a business model that would be worth the effort on their part. The copyright will expire someday but not until after 2050 or so, likely after many of us are dead.

In short, I believe in part we got into this hobby because of it's commercial nature, and that's part of what made this a success. I'll be interested in revisiting things 20 years from now and see what method is more successful--Paizo's commercial continuation of 3e, which seems to be doing really well for them, and provides a stable product baseline with specific rules, a campaign setting, and new material, or the OSR movement and the retro-clones, which has a lot of creativity but not major unifying goal and doesn't have as much of a presence at retail.

JRT wrote:The problem with D&D becoming a "folk culture" is that over time, such traditions morph into something different over time. Ignoring what might happen to the owners of D&D, as time passes, others add to the folk culture and instead of being a timeless representation, it becomes something else.

That is the beauty of D&D returning to being a hobby rather than an "industry". As a hobby, the game isn't and never has been a monolithic "timeless representation". Corporate D&D monism is the only danger to the loss of AD&D in its true form. With a folk culture, there will always be room for adherents like DD who keep the true, real, pure AD&D fire burning, even if many others deviate according to their own preferences.

JRT wrote:Anybody looking for a "pure pre-UA 1e AD&D" from this movement will gradually become the minority over time, as the culture slowly takes in the future disenfranchised and the old guard dies off.

People looking for a "pure pre-UA 1e AD&D" are in the minority now and most seem perfectly happy to be so. Again, one advantage of AD&D returning to the hobbyists is that people are less interested in advancing an agenda or dominating some other market segment because doing so isn't necessary for survival of their particular point of view. The advantage of the OGL and retroclones is that eveyone can share their particular take on the hobby and the rest of us can pick and choose what we like. The alternative is having some monolithic corporate gatekeeper deciding what is and is not acceptable for distribution to the fans based on what they (many times mistakenly) believe will be best for their bottom line.

That is the beauty of D&D returning to being a hobby rather than an "industry". As a hobby, the game isn't and never has been a monolithic "timeless representation". Corporate D&D monism is the only danger to the loss of AD&D in its true form. With a folk culture, there will always be room for adherents like DD who keep the true, real, pure AD&D fire burning, even if many others deviate according to their own preferences.

Its always been an industry ever since the first boxed set came out. It's never been purely a hobby. So it can't, by definition ever return to being a pure hobby.

Your statement of a folk culture is the most optimistic scenario, the most pessimistic is that it dies out, at least the "true, real, pure" part of it. Looking at sociology, there are few cases where time doesn't weaken or change cultures--there's only a few cultural structures that have lasted for over a few centuries, the most common structure that have lasted have been major religions. Because of that, I think for a shared culture to survive you'd need a very strong base and by default, D&D culture has been dependent on either the success of the distributor (which gave it to the uninitiated). Without some strong charismatic or leadership presence, I can't see any one main interpretation to survive long without fundamentaly changing. I think a more centralized viewpoint helps shape a stronger culture.

Of course, I expect this eventuality anyway--I don't expect people to be playing tabletop role-playing games 100 years from now. I think somebody actually invented RPGs in ancient Greece and Rome and they were forgotten when those cultures failed and many elements of their histories weren't preserved. That's why I tend to look at the big picture--worrying about whether or not the hobby survives is sort of futile, we just need to enjoy what we have now and not be bitter if it is lost, because life is short and a lot of things you enjoy die off. We just need to enjoy what we've got at the time we have it.