Old modules

[wpmaura]

Can i distribute old modules such as ravenloft or u1 for free as fg modules

[Trenloe]

Nope, you can't distribute any copyright material - even for free.

[wpmaura]

Wonder how nwn got around it back in the day oh well

[LordEntrails]

The closest you can do (if you are careful) is conversion notes like ClassicModulesToday does.
https://classicmodulestoday.com/

About the best you could do would be to make all the encounters and the item parcels. All the text, images, etc would have to be left out and added by the individual or read from a print or pdf version.

EDIT: Oh, and you could only use SRD NPCs and items unless you distribute via the DMsGuild.

[LordEntrails]

Wonder how nwn got around it back in the day oh well
They had a license.

[wpmaura]

They had a license.

U think wizarss would grant fg one. Oh well

[Trenloe]

U think wizarss would grant fg one. Oh well
They only have a license to produce 5E material. Even if WotC did grant a license to FG for material from older versions of D&D, it still wouldn't allow community members to distribute material - giving Smiteworks a license to produce commercial products doesn't remove copyright protection on those original products.

[SirGraystone]

It wouldn't make sense to give a license for old module like U1 while they make a new product for 5e with a conversion U1-3 included in it. Many of the5e product from wizards are conversion or inspired by old module, temple of elemental evil / prince of apocalypse, G1-3 giant module / Storm King's Thunder, Ravenloft / Curse of Strahd

[Varsuuk]

Granted, it is a limited market - but some folks just never switched to 5E or did and switched back. Those conversions are uninteresting to me since I only run 1E/2E games. I do play in 5E though.

But I know WotC are not showing interest in selling licensing on their older products. If they did, I'd be buying up all that stuff a second (in some cases 3rd) time ;) but nope, they don't make it legal to buy.

[wpmaura]

They only have a license to produce 5E material. Even if WotC did grant a license to FG for material from older versions of D&D, it still wouldn't allow community members to distribute material - giving Smiteworks a license to produce commercial products doesn't remove copyright protection on those original products.

One of the big selling points of NWN was that people were allowed to due exactly that so people bought NWN knowing that there was a ton of module support even for older modules. I dont see what it wouldnt work that with FG, maybe if they didnt have a demo version. The more modules out there the more people would use FG. And if its legal for me to reproduce it and play with my friends, whats stopping me from then giving it to john to play.

But my question has been answered. I was defiantly wondering why no one had done it yet.

[Trenloe]

And if its legal for me to reproduce it and play with my friends, whats stopping me from then giving it to john to play. You're getting into the realms of what's legal and what's possible without getting caught. Any reproduction of copyright material, other than for the grey area of personal use, is illegal. If you take an old copy of a D&D module you own and make photocopies of various pages for your game then that is considered personal use. If you gave all of those photocopies to someone else to take away and use outside your game, even for free, then that's actually breaking copyright. The same is relevant for making copies of that material for playing games on a computer (NWN, Fantasy Grounds, Roll20, d20Pro, MapTools, whatever).

I know this thread has gone off topic, but I want to be clear to anyone reading this - the Fantasy Grounds owners and moderators on these forums are very clear that we don't support or condone distributing copyright protected material without the IP owners permission. Any such material posted on these forums, or links external to the forums, will be removed. Please always consider where you got any material from before you post on the forums. It's great to share with the community, but only if that material is legally shareable.