This is going to be looked at as cheating but here goes:
No part of the Player's Handbook is actually open gaming content. It's just not in there. So everything up to and including the level advancement rules and such are closed and copyrighted. For a list of what's open, you go to the Reference Document. No reference to anything involving level advancement there either.
HOWEVER, this does not stop you from creating your own version of level advancment. Ie. Every time you kill 3^Current level monsters you go up a level. You can then designate _that_ as open game content that anyone can use to advance their character.
The Downside of this is that you've created something that is completely legal under the OGL but NOT under the d20 trademark liscence. Since nothing character creationwise is allowed there.
Heck, under the OGL you can create your own game system, rules for advancement and all with the exact same skill and feat system and all. you just CAN'T EVER identify it as a d20 game.
|-----Original Message-----
|From: Tom Caudron [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]
|Sent: Tuesday, October 24, 2000 9:42 AM
|To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
|Subject: Re: [ogf-d20-l] D20 License question...
|
|
|You cannot distribute the level advancement rules whether you
|use the d20
|logo or not. Using the rules themselves consitutes acceptance
|of the d20
|license, which states that you cannot redistribute the level
|advancement
|rules. How that pertains to an app that does level
|advancement behind the
|scenes, I do not know.
|
|At least, that's how I read the license.
|
|-Tom Caudron
|
|PS. Has anyone given thought to the creation of an XML standard for
|distribution of d20 character info? I mean, if a group of
|people produced a
|CML (Character Meta-Language) and us programmers actually
|stuck to it when
|creating character-related apps, we could then reliably move
|character info
|between different apps (as long as the apps were all CML
|compliant. I know
|the Master Tools hasn't released their internal format, but
|that doesn't
|mean we can't have one. Who knows, if it became more widely used, they
|might include support for the CML format in future iterations. Just a
|thought. It would be nice to be able to use apps from
|different companies
|on the same character info and be able to share character info
|with others
|regardless of the app the other person prefers. This is
|something I've been
|kicking around with a friend for a while. Y'all think there's a
|use/need/place for such a thing?
|
|
|----- Original Message -----
|From: "Jeremy Reaban" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
|
|
|Sorry if this has been asked before. I'm writing a character
|generator for
|D20 , but if I read the license correctly, because it creates
|characters and
|can advance them a level, I can't distribute it under the D20
|license? But
|as long as I don't use the D20 name or logo, I can distribute
|it, right?
|
|If I can't use the term 'D20 System', then any ideas what I
|should call it?
|"A character generator for games based around a 20 sided die"
|is my current
|favorite.
|
