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Should I boycott Wizards of the Coast product line

Posted: Fri Jan 27, 2023 3:00 pm
by brainbomb
If you have followed the current internet battle between tabletop gamers vs wizards of the coast the action is heating up over the OGL (Online Gaming Liscense). I have chosen the worst time imaginable to transition from playing 2nd edition for 20 years to finally buying 5th edition books. Now im hearing gamers are boycotting Dungeouns and Dragons product line and switching to other rpg systems to voice disgust at the over monetization of the WoTC products.

Re: Should I boycott Wizards of the Coast product line

Posted: Fri Jan 27, 2023 3:02 pm
by brainbomb
Considering magic the gathering is a giant money fuck, always has been and will never stop being about milking their product for every dollar they can I am more shocked that people are only just now getting annoyed by WoTC

Re: Should I boycott Wizards of the Coast product line

Posted: Fri Jan 27, 2023 3:02 pm
by brainbomb
I want someone to explain why I should not transition to 5th edition and should join the boycott.

Re: Should I boycott Wizards of the Coast product line

Posted: Fri Jan 27, 2023 3:44 pm
by Doom427
WotC in third edition decided to make DND the even more biggest name in town by deciding to legalize other writers to make gamebooks that use DND 3rd edition mechanics without paying WotC for the right to use those mechanics. They brought that back for fifth edition (I at least don't think 4th edition had that legal agreement, but I left DnD almost entirely after 3rd).

Recently WotC decided that if your company makes above 750,000 a year (I believe), then they want to be paid for the use of the DnD license. This would obviously hurt smaller tabletop companies that make DnD 5th edition conversions for other properties that will expect to make above the 750,000 threshold WotC set. (There was an official doctor who 5th edition tabletop game, for example, that I imagine got near that threshold.)

It also made it where the copyright for all these works would fall under WotC instead of the original creator, which would effect the smaller devs who are likely only making ~1000 a year, if that, on tabletop publishing.

I personally didn't like 5th edition all that much, and haven't played DnD or its clones in a long time, so I can't say if you should or shouldn't transition. But that's the general gist of why people are mad

Re: Should I boycott Wizards of the Coast product line

Posted: Fri Jan 27, 2023 3:45 pm
by Doom427
Play world of darkness instead- embrace the nineties

Re: Should I boycott Wizards of the Coast product line

Posted: Fri Jan 27, 2023 4:46 pm
by brainbomb
I have played world of darkness. was quite fun!

Re: Should I boycott Wizards of the Coast product line

Posted: Fri Jan 27, 2023 5:20 pm
by Jamiet99uk
brainbomb wrote:
Fri Jan 27, 2023 3:02 pm
I want someone to explain why I should not transition to 5th edition and should join the boycott.
The core books are incredibly badly laid out which makes them a real chore to use.

Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay is a better system.

Re: Should I boycott Wizards of the Coast product line

Posted: Fri Jan 27, 2023 5:22 pm
by Jamiet99uk
Doom427 wrote:
Fri Jan 27, 2023 3:45 pm
Play world of darkness instead- embrace the nineties


Revenant: The Ravishing was my favourite.

Re: Should I boycott Wizards of the Coast product line

Posted: Fri Jan 27, 2023 5:24 pm
by brainbomb
Yea I saw that they chose to organize spells alphabetically instead of by level which is pretty dense.

Re: Should I boycott Wizards of the Coast product line

Posted: Fri Jan 27, 2023 5:27 pm
by Jamiet99uk
brainbomb wrote:
Fri Jan 27, 2023 5:24 pm
Yea I saw that they chose to organize spells alphabetically instead of by level which is pretty dense.
The whole layout of all the core books gives the impression they loaded all the chapters into a blunderbuss and fired them into the air, then bound them together in the order they landed.

Re: Should I boycott Wizards of the Coast product line

Posted: Fri Jan 27, 2023 5:35 pm
by brainbomb
The artwork in the monster manual is very good however. its a super pretty book.
The work they did to make monks and warlocks fun to play I appreciate as well.

Re: Should I boycott Wizards of the Coast product line

Posted: Fri Jan 27, 2023 5:36 pm
by Doom427
Jamiet99uk wrote:
Fri Jan 27, 2023 5:22 pm
Doom427 wrote:
Fri Jan 27, 2023 3:45 pm
Play world of darkness instead- embrace the nineties


Revenant: The Ravishing was my favourite.

I use so many house rules, I just use the Zombie: The Putrescence name instead because that edition was more popular where I am

Re: Should I boycott Wizards of the Coast product line

Posted: Fri Jan 27, 2023 5:39 pm
by Doom427
Jamiet99uk wrote:
Fri Jan 27, 2023 5:27 pm

The whole layout of all the core books gives the impression they loaded all the chapters into a blunderbuss and fired them into the air, then bound them together in the order they landed.
That's just accepted practice in Tabletop games, to be fair. I haven't checked out the warhammer book, but I can think of like, 1 game book that I thought was set up in the order I would expect, and I still got lost trying to find particular rules during play.
That book was Thirsty Sword Lesbians- laser targeting at me with that theme and it was easy enough to read I could even get the players to read it before play for once

Re: Should I boycott Wizards of the Coast product line

Posted: Fri Jan 27, 2023 6:01 pm
by Jamiet99uk
Doom427 wrote:
Fri Jan 27, 2023 5:39 pm
That book was Thirsty Sword Lesbians- laser targeting at me with that theme and it was easy enough to read I could even get the players to read it before play for once
I haven't played or read that one, but isn't it based on the same system as Apocalypse World uses? That's supposed to be a very good RPG framework.

Re: Should I boycott Wizards of the Coast product line

Posted: Fri Jan 27, 2023 6:31 pm
by Doom427
Yeah, same system. I can understand the appeal, even though I didn't find much value in it and ended up running the game much more traditionally instead.

Powered by Apoclaypse games just hit an uncanny valley for me where it has too many rules to actually be system free and unobtrusive, but way too few rules to be run as a full game in itself.

Re: Should I boycott Wizards of the Coast product line

Posted: Fri Jan 27, 2023 9:16 pm
by brainbomb
I have tons of figurines and miniatures, thousands of dice, and multiple copies of every second edition book they made. So buying a fee fifth edition books didnt feel like an evil deed. Part of the issue is getting players to be willing to try some other rpg system if they dont know enough about it. brand name for dnd is powerful and people are insanely loyal to that product and its various editions.

trying to convert to 5th has caused issues within our group where there are people who refuse to play the new edition and wont buy the books but thats because they had a horrible experience with 3.5

Re: Should I boycott Wizards of the Coast product line

Posted: Fri Jan 27, 2023 9:19 pm
by brainbomb
I guess im just mentally defeated over the whole thing.

Re: Should I boycott Wizards of the Coast product line

Posted: Sat Jan 28, 2023 12:15 am
by Jamiet99uk
brainbomb wrote:
Fri Jan 27, 2023 9:19 pm
I guess im just mentally defeated over the whole thing.
Don't worry about it, Brain. It's not a big deal either way. Games are for having fun, so do whatever you think will be fun. It's not like the Gamer Police are going to come and arrest you whatever you do.

Re: Should I boycott Wizards of the Coast product line

Posted: Sat Jan 28, 2023 4:48 am
by Chaqa
brainbomb wrote:
Fri Jan 27, 2023 9:19 pm
I guess im just mentally defeated over the whole thing.
Did you not see the announcement earlier today?

The 5e SRD is now under Creative Commons, so 5e is safe permanently.

Im still unsure on how much money if any I’ll give WOTC going forward, but at the least I’ll probably go see the movie

Re: Should I boycott Wizards of the Coast product line

Posted: Sun Jan 29, 2023 8:19 pm
by Hamilton Brian
I read that there was an exodus to Pathfinder. To be honest, the last good D&D session I was a part of was in 1981, made use of AD&D rules, and was based on the module of In Search of the Unknown. I foolishly gave away all of my materials (everything from 78-81) in 1990. Thought I would start a gaming group for students at one of my schools and purchased the 5e books in 2018. In true procrastination fashion, I'll see if I manage to do anything with them.