Pathfinder Developer Announces Open Alternative to D&D's New Licensing Scheme

Yesterday, Paizo, the developer behind the popular tabletop roleplaying game, Pathfinder, announced a new licensing agreement for tabletop games designed to replace the industry standard Open Gaming License (OGL) that Wizards of the Coast is in the process of rewriting. The Open RPG Creative License (ORC) will not be owned by Paizo, and will instead be owned by Azora Law, a legal firm with long ties to the tabletop game industry.

The OGL was created for Dungeons and Dragons Third Edition, and allowed third party developers to create content based on the basic rules of the game, as long as you didn’t use any Dungeons and Dragons specific content or branding. The OGL, itself, was also open for use by other developers as a licensing agreement governing their own systems. It went on to spawn dozens of spin-off game systems, including Pathfinder, sparked a stable third party publishing industry, and became industry standard practice. Many TTRPGs are published under some form of OGL, with the expectation that fans will eventually begin to produce and sell their own content for the game. The OGL 2.0 not only further restricts what other developers can do, but grants Wizards of the Coast the right to use anything published under the OGL 2.0 without royalties. In trying to change the OGL, a document which was previously described as irrevocable, Wizards of the Coast is trying to change a 20 year old industry.

In response to a leaked draft of the OGL 2.0, first reported on by Gizmodo, fans and independent developers alike have been up-in-arms. Fans began the #OpenDnD hashtag on twitter, which has been dominating the conversation around the OGL for over a week now. Kobold Press, a sizable independent publisher, announced “Project Black Flag,” a new, open-source TTRPG ruleset for fantasy games—it also announced that it would no longer be releasing new content for D&D 5e beyond currently announced projects. This discontent culminated in Paizo’s announcement of the Open RPG Creative License.

Paizo was founded by several former Wizards of the Coast employees, including individuals who were integral to the creation of the original OGL. Azora Law, the legal firm that will be creating the ORC, was co-founded by Wizards of the Coasts’ in-house lawyer who built the legal framework of the OGL. Unlike the OGL, which is the official property of a developer, the ORC will be controlled by Azora Law, acting as a neutral third party. Azora Law has also claimed that it will be open to community feedback during the drafting process, making the document a collaborative effort of the tabletop publishing industry.

Already, other publishers are putting their weight behind the ORC. Kobold Press, Green Ronin, Legendary Games, and several independent presses have already voiced their support for the ORC, and say they plan to use it once the license is completed. Paizo concludes its announcement with a vicious sign-off: “You can count on us not to go back on our word.”

The last week has, in almost every conceivable way, been a PR failure for Wizards of the Coast. The OGL 2.0 draft was leaked, then the company floundered for a few days, before announcing a livestream to explain the OGL, which it then delayed at the last minute. Not only is the company making unpopular decisions, but it seems unable to communicate anything about those decisions to its audience—creating a massive power vacuum which the company’s biggest competitor has chosen to fill.