Quick Question: Tables missing from official PHB module?

[jshauber]

There's a whole volume of reasons why I disagree - but you're kind of the boss around here, so I can be cool. Sorry man.

Disagree all you want, copyright laws say you can't...LOL.

And the last thing we need on these forums are a bunch of attorneys. Apologizes to any that may be attorneys, at least you aren't acting like it and we want to keep it that way!

[chillman0122]

Haha, I would love a rousing legal argument, arguing rules is like 50% of D&D.

[gqwebb]

Don't mind loosing cp or gp about dnd but dollars no way.. my get out of jail card doesn't work in the real world.

[chillman0122]

I'll bite

First, I'll say that all of this is hypothetical - I'm not going to (metaphorically) piddle on Z's carpet...it's his house, and he's done a lot for the community, and I respect the hell out of it.

Second, in this hypothetical situation, nobody's going to get clapped in irons and dragged to the stockades over thirty-ish lines of text. Maaaaybe if there are some really really really aggressive and bored litigators, a cease and desist letter to show that they're protecting their material. They have to make the attempt, otherwise they lose credibility in larger, more important cases. However, a full-blown lawsuit costs tens of thousands of dollars, they know they can't win (since they wouldn't be able to show the market was affected, that a significant portion of the material was copied, or that the purpose of the use was for gain), and even if they did, they couldn't make a dime of their money back suing a fat sweaty nerd making minimum wage. Nevermind the PR blowback, which in sympathetic circuits could leave them vulnerable to countersuit.

Third, there's even less hypothetical reason to run for the hills if this material is shared between people who held licenses for the PHB material...if one person copies text from the source book, shares it with another "owner" of the the source book, both peoples have rights to access that content. There's no violation in that instance, just a re-formatting of the content.

Finally, I whole-heartedly agree that if the material in question was a full-fledged dump of all three 5e core rulebooks, stand by for a flogging. If it were "mad torrentz scnz 5e download now" you should point your toes inwards, bend over, and breathe deep, because the nice lawyers are coming for you. And they should; not only do the guys who make this stuff deserve to get intellectual credit for their work, they need to get paid so they can keep eating so they can keep living so they can keep making awesome stuff. Part of being a good member of this community is keeping our content creators fed and clothed and in front of their desks so we can go on really neat adventures. I just don't believe that means we should cower in fear of the lawyer brigade every time we see a way to make something great even better.

[jshauber]

You are probably correct that if you posted your table of copyright protected material, WotC and their lawyers most likely would only ask nicely that it be removed.

The real damage would come when it came time to renew the license or give additional licensed material to Smiteworks. WotC might take the stand that if it happened once, it could happen again and with a much more impactful module. Then it would have an economic impact in Smiteworks and would negatively impact the community here at large.

The best thing to do is email [email protected] and tell them you have developed the table that you think would make a nice addition to the PHB. If they agree and WotC agrees, then it can be added to the base module (if that is possible) for all to have as part of the continuing support that is part of the package that is FG.

[chillman0122]

I'm still skeptical. Maybe I'm misunderstanding the licensing process, but Wizards has almost no overhead - they give Smiteworks permission to modulize their content and SmWk does all the legwork. Wizards should be raking in money hand over fist from this deal, and I think they're business savvy enough to keep shearing the sheep.

I've never tried talking with SmWk in that capacity (although I gotta say their support game is on point), thanks... I'll give it a shot.

As a side note, I have tried to talk to Wizards before about something similar, and got a nice form-letter style email thanking me for my interest and have I seen their exciting table top game called Dungeons and Dragons(tm)? Haha

[Zacchaeus]

Sorry, but there is no argument or counter argument here. Distribution of copyright material is not on under any circumstances no matter how trivial it may or may not be.

[chillman0122]

It was in the nature of an academic discussion... But we're way off topic anyway, Z. I don't know how to close a thread, but we're done here.