On Fri, 20 Oct 2000, Martin L. Shoemaker wrote:
[snip]
> Exactly: it would serve all the functional purposes of the work, thus
> discouraging sales of the work. And Mr. Caldwell's position, I believe, is
> that this may discourage PRODUCTION of the work.
Persuading a Rolemaster fan to agree to rewrite some of his ideas in D&D
terms, pruning out any items which are too similar to existing items in
the DMG, ensuring that all Rolemaster terms have been replaced by D&D 3E
equivalents to protect ICE's intellectual property and prevent The Guild
Companion from violating the OGL, plus normal editing, layout, etc., is a
non-trivial undertaking. Unless it has a chance of providing reasonable
financial return *to the author* and The Guild Companion, it's not worth
the effort.
> "Now I'm having my doubts about going to the author and explaining how we
> might make it compatible with D20/OGL." I'd say the answer to your first
> question is, "Yes, until this issue gave me doubts." And the answer to the
> other questions is, "Well, if we don't convert to D20, we won't go OGL at
> all. We'll just license from ICE." And if I have read his intentions
> correctly, I want to emphasize: "We won't go OGL at all." Yep, that helps
> Open Gaming...
My current analysis is that electronic-only publishers must either produce
virtually "closed" products or simply avoid certain types of products
altogether. Your reading is indeed correct.
Regards,
Nicholas HM Caldwell
General Editor for The Guild Companion
http://www.guildcompanion.com/
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