Real Talk About Wizards

Wizards broke radio silence and released a saccharine, disingenuous statement on the leaked OGL 1.1 and the public response to it. Time to talk about the reality of Wizards, and the reason behind the OGL.
Read moreWizards broke radio silence and released a saccharine, disingenuous statement on the leaked OGL 1.1 and the public response to it. Time to talk about the reality of Wizards, and the reason behind the OGL.
Read moreThe fallout from the OGL 1.1 leak as been snowballing from a serious gaffe into a full-blown avalanche of bad press and burnt bridges over the last week. Companies like Kobold Press and MCDM, among the heaviest hitters in the 5e OGL third party publishing world have announced that they’re moving forward with their own proprietary systems after completing their scheduled 5e contents. Other publishers are taking this opportunity to expand their community content programs, such as Pinnacle Entertainment Group (Savage Worlds) and Modiphius (2d20), or are expanding their OGL and SRD documents like Monty Cook Games. So what’s an OGL, what’s Open Source, and what’s available to creators and end users alike in terms of finding new systems to work with?
Read moreThrough its nearly 50 years of existence, Dungeons & Dragons has changed the battlespace of the hobby several times. TSR pioneered supporting media as a cartoon, various comic book series, and extensive novel collections. In 2001, now under Wizards, they broke the taboo of controlling your game’s core mechanics and introduced the OGL, launching the d20 era and many careers. In 2016, they pioneered a new level of community content creation with the DMs Guild, creating a closed ecosystem for creators to have free rein on allowed IP. Then in 2017, Wizards did it again with D&D Beyond. Now, as we approach 2024, they’ve announced One D&D, a comprehensive single portal for all things D&D and the best deals on official D&D stuff. But what does any of this mean from the level of A list small publishers to Indie level creators in the hobby?
Read moreDesigning an adventure is, for many, one of the biggest early hurdles in their life as a new gamemaster. This post will hopefully demystify some of the process and offer some advice of hammering together a simple adventure. Let’s dive in!
Read moreSpelljammer. The name makes my skin crawl and my brain cringe. But why? Isn’t it a beloved TSR era setting? Well, apparently people want to know, so here we go with why Spelljammer missed the mark hard for me back in the day and now.
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