For my 2 cents, I say OGL Space Opera.
- Thread starter Kevida
- Start date
There have been rumours of SpaceQuest (and ModernQuest) using the OGL'ed RuneQuest rules, so you may be in luck here 
Note it'll be RuneQuest OGL rules as opposed to d20 OGL, and they have made no promises of it being "open" (although I suspect very much it will be)
There is, for various reasons, a bit of a push to drop d20 (both logoed and unlogoed) amongst some publishers at the moment. I'm taking the recent announcement of Mongoose using RQ OGL to power a few new settings as an indication they are going the same way (obviously not dropping support for their existing d20-based games, but not introducing any new ones).
Note it'll be RuneQuest OGL rules as opposed to d20 OGL, and they have made no promises of it being "open" (although I suspect very much it will be)
There is, for various reasons, a bit of a push to drop d20 (both logoed and unlogoed) amongst some publishers at the moment. I'm taking the recent announcement of Mongoose using RQ OGL to power a few new settings as an indication they are going the same way (obviously not dropping support for their existing d20-based games, but not introducing any new ones).
Kevida said:
Not just sense for Mongoose, either. A lot of d20 publishers are now officially "worried" about what D&D 4th edition is going to do to the d20 market. Those who don't have their own core rulebooks especially, as they're going to be left producing d20 products for a ever-dwindling market.
According to the reports and rumours:
The new 4th Edition will not be that backwards-compatible, will have no logo licence, and will not be OGLed. Therefore all new D&D gamers coming into the hobby will be picking up the new 4th edition and third party material just won't be able to work with it.
For those companies that have core rulebooks derived from d20 this isn't too much of a problem - they can keep producing their own game and support for it. For those publishers that mostly produce support material, they'll eventually be screwed.
Add that problem to the glut of d20 material in the market that is driving most independent publishers' d20 sales ever downwards already, and thats why "d20 is doomed" - not my words, but I'm tempted to believe them. While that "doom" isn't coming any time soon, it's the kind of thing most are preparing for by getting busy branding their products away from d20 - even if they are just OGLed d20 books, the logos are being taken off in an attempt to sell things on their own merits and remove dependence on the D&D PHB.
Unfortuately it's not really down to what the customers want - they may well prefer d20, but more and more publishers will most likely be pulling away from it as D&D 4th Edition draws closer. The things likely to pull through are licensed settings like World of Warcraft , Conan, B5 and well-known settings such as Spycraft. Generic d20 Fantasy adventures will take a huge hit once 4th ed has been out a while - granted there'll be a lot of people who stick with 3.5, but it'll be an audience that slowly shrinks and can't grow... unless someone goes and makes a nice generic 3.5-compatable set of rules, brands it, and somehow gives that brand a huge push. I feel it's just one of these unavoidable things where marketing will beat fan support
- whatever goes out with a "D&D" label on will be where a large number of newbies automatically gravitate to, on the strength of that name alone.mthomason said:
I don't know how these rumors get started. WotC has denied such a thing. Even if the rumors were true the backlash on Hasbro would be very bad. Mongoose could take an example from Kenzer and Company. Some of their stuff is "dual-purpose" being useful for both D&D and Hackmaster. That wouldn't be a bad route for MGP to go! Just a thought.
Kevida said:
Happy weaseling!
Certainly the larger publishers have all but withdrawn from use of the d20 logo now. A lot are going for their own branded core rulebook under the OGL, which I feel is a huge step in the right direction - the uniqueness of each game is returning (such as evidenced in WoW and B5) while still retaining enough of a d20 base to allow you to mix and match between products to a degree. The chatter on the ogl-l list certainly shows most of the larger publishers have a thing against the d20 logo in general now, even those that don't care whether D&D 4.0 messes things up or not or whether the logo gets withdrawn. (Here's an interesting thing though - I can no longer see the d20 logo licence pack for download at the d20 page on the Wizards website - I see lots of licences but no zip file with the logo artwork any more)
A lot of people just refuse to touch "d20" material because of the logo on it - for a lot of people a d20 logo has grown to mean "cobbled-together rubbish material by some unknown trying to sell their work". Even for those who still like "d20" there's just so much to choose from nowadays that any new d20 product can disappear into the ocean of alternatives, you only have to go to the d20 section at rpgnow.com and try and find something specific to see how much clutter there is in the market
Theres a lot of good stuff out there, but there's also a lot of rubbish, and without a good brand name behind a product it can be hard to tell - which is a shame really because theres a lot of good stuff out there that isn't under a known brand.
On the other hand, some of publishers are leaving the scene simply because of the number of smaller publishers on that same scene. Some appear to be going the way of Necromancer games and just dropping the d20 logo in favour of their own now-recognisable branding. Some are concentrating on licenced products derived from the d20 SRD.
It's kinda like watching the evolution of RPG companies all over again in a macrocosm
(sorry, I just find the whole topic fascinating to watch and ramble on about... I'm surprised I haven't sent people to sleep by now.)mthomason said:
I don't think that this is a bad thing. There are now a great many rule systems out there which use a d20 but are not Wizards d20. Omni is one such system, which is really easy to pick up.
It could be a risk too, I suppose, for companies planning on releasing only Wizards d20 compliant books. How will the market for 3rd party Wizard d20 compliant books be hit when the D&D 4th edition hits? I expect that OGL will be the way that a lot of people go.
It's kinda like watching the evolution of RPG companies all over again in a macrocosm
Not at all. Your example of B5 is quite interesting - I know that there are a few/some (delete as applicable) complaints about a migration document to 2nd Edition, but the Second Edition is for the most part a very good book IMHO, because it feels like Babylon 5.
I'm thinking of picking up the new Star Wars Saga Edition next year (heck, I'd love to write a New Republic Source Book). On other boards, there have been complaints aplenty about the changes to that future book in the way that characters take damage. As a writer, GM and a player, to be honest I don't really care. If it doesn't feel right, I can change it. What is important to me with a licenced property it that it feels like the brand it is supposed to be.
There has been one problem with the d20 explosion, and you said it yourself. Many 'good' supplements have been lost in the tide of others. I'm not saying which are good and which are bad, but the sheer success of the d20 explosion has come to be something of a problem.
It'll be interesting to see what happens. Me myself, I'm looking at several systems, including the Runequest SRD at the moment, because, as a (part-time) writer, there is simply no reason not to. Give it a couple of years, I think any freelance RPG writer will need to be versed in two or three systems, at least.
Chobbly
Chobbly said:
That one looks interesting. Looks like they're going the same direction as D&D and giving it heavy integration with miniatures - lets face it there's no real money in RPGs - you can almost give a rulebook away for free if you know the people buying it are going to go away and spend twenty times the cover price on miniatures over the next year or so. It's also many magnitudes more difficult to make illegal copies of miniatures
Chobbly said:
And likely a contributing factor to Wizards/Hasbro realising that their own invention is now dragging their sales down. D&D core rulebook sales have most likely gone through the roof as a result of d20, but it also means there's something like ten alternatives to every additional D&D sourcebook Wizards publish. To put it bluntly, there are likely far more gamers interested in the World of Warcraft campaign setting which pretty much everyone on the planet has heard of. Forgotten Realms on the other hand is pretty much living up to its own name as far as the newer gamers are concerned - why pick that up when they can play the same setting they have on the PC (/Mac) and set games there? Who the heck wants to play generic "d20 Future" when there's Babylon 5?
Chobbly said:
I agree with you completely on this. Anyone tying themselves to d20 is taking a huge risk over the longer term. As far as writing goes - it took me ages to get anything published for d20, while for RQ it took about a week after the rulebook came out... okay maybe previous d20 experience counted a bit, but I think there's currently more chance of an opportunity where RQ is involved simply because it's possible to get in "on the ground floor" right now before any third party publishers and writers get established. Anyone getting involved right now has a decent chance of being the established third-party RQ people a year from now.
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