If this is the case, I would like to know who I might contact about creating and organizing such a thing (even if it is someone at Wizards). Since there's a large emphasis on volunteers, this is what I would like to volunteer to do--be a Global Admin for a Living Dark Sun campaign.
If not, well, I'm developing one for my game store anyway, and I'll keep people updated on my homebrew version of DS OP.
It occurs to me I should probably state my qualifications. I'm a retail game store owner; I've been playing D&D since...oh, 1982 or so, including lots of Dark Sun; I DM a lot; and I've led teams to the finals in the Championship 3 years in a row (3rd place 2008; Best Roleplaying 2009; 3rd Place 2010). I know a number of very high quality RPGA gamemasters (one who judged the Championship (but not my table); some authors for RPGA mods in the past; and the like), and I intend to rely on them as resources for the development of this program. Before I was a retail store owner, I did project management and managed large departments in various corporate arenas (primarily in customer service); I've also been employed as the director of customer experience for a pay-to-play text-based online gaming company, and have a great deal of experience managing volunteer gamemasters in that capacity and in others.
Incidentally, my store runs 30-40 LFR tables a month, holds 3 RPGA conventions a year, and has 50+ active players, with more coming in every day.
Even if LFR is being "volunteer-run" going forward, as I understand it, they'll still be operating under the RPGA banner; they won't be completely "independent". That's an important thing to note, because the Realms are still WotC's intellectual property (as is Dark Sun), and I have to imagine that WotC will still be exerting a certain level of control over what LFR does with that intellectual property.
That likely feeds directly into what you want to do.
I'd be *very* surprised if WotC would be willing to let an absolutely independent individual or group run an Living Dark Sun campaign (due to the fact you'd be using WotC's IP). If you decided you want to run a "homebfew version of DS OP", you'd need to be very careful about how you handle things like distribution of adventures.
IANAL, but, as I understand it, if you write an adventure set in the Dark Sun game world, and run it fo players (even at a public event), you're be within your rights in using WotC's intellectual property (i.e., the Dark Sun material). But, if you take that adventure you wrote, and give it to someone else to run, that *would* be somethung that's outside of your rights for using that property. And, if WotC got wind of it, they would likely ask you to shut down (otherwise, as I understand it, they would risk losing their rights to that intellectual property).
So, that gets back to running "Living Dark Sun" as an officially sanctioned campaign. Honestly, I'm not entirely sure who you'd talk to, but I'd guess it'd be Chris Tulach.
That said, I have to believe that, with the Dark Sun books currently being launched, if WotC was going to consider doing a Living Dark Sun campaign, they would have already announced it.
I don't believe a Living Dark Sun can be started without the consent of Chris Tulach/WotC and a boatload of legal paperwork surrounding its administration. All I can say is good luck. I've fairly consistantly heard that Forgotten Realms would be the only living campaign and Ebberron and Dark Sun would be used for other types of events (Delves, Encounters, One-shots, etc...)
Like I said, I'm glad to run a private, yet open, game. Yes, Dark Sun is Wizards IP and no, I have no intention of infringing on it.
That being said: while I would certainly have to call it something OTHER than "Living Dark Sun" as the "Living" prepend certainly has an official association written all over it, there's nothing stopping me (or anyone else, really) from essentially creating a home campaign based in the Dark Sun universe and publishing the rules for it online, making homebrew freely-downloadable modules for it online, and encouraging other DMs to run for it and players to play in it. Infrno.net would be a site providing all the tools for this. I would have to abide by the rules for not publishing WotC's non-free material (for example, I couldn't put stat blocks for monsters in the modules without WotC consent), but there's nothing stopping anyone from doing what I'll do if I can't obtain Wizards permission, and I would be more than glad to work with them to make sure of such a thing.
I don't want to get in trouble with Wizards. I do want to provide a gaming community for Dark Sun players and DMs that's publically and freely available. That's pretty simple, essentially. I would *PREFER* to do it under WOTC's supervision.
Out of curiosity, why the statement that I couldn't write my own adventures and post them freely? Certainly I couldn't publish stat blocks in them (unless they were original stat block material that I created specific monsters for), but if I'm not charging for them, I would presume that would be fair use. If not, there are a lotta DMs out there who are probably infringing the crap out of the game.
I'll contact Chris Tulach about this.
He's a great guy from every other dealing I've had with him.there's nothing stopping me (or anyone else, really) from essentially creating a home campaign based in the Dark Sun universe and publishing the rules for it online, making homebrew freely-downloadable modules for it online, and encouraging other DMs to run for it and players to play in it. Infrno.net would be a site providing all the tools for this. I would have to abide by the rules for not publishing WotC's non-free material (for example, I couldn't put stat blocks for monsters in the modules without WotC consent), but there's nothing stopping anyone from doing what I'll do if I can't obtain Wizards permission, and I would be more than glad to work with them to make sure of such a thing.
I'd hazard a guess that the stat blocks aren't the only "non-free" material; I would imagine that all of the names (location names, NPC names, deities, creatures names, etc.) at least, are also IP (not as sure about powers, feats, etc.). That's why, back in the 3.x OGL days, spell and magic item names which referred to NPCs (Tenser's Floating Disk, Heward's Handy Haversack, Quiver of Ehlonna, etc.) had those proper names removed in the OGL). Heck, even noting that the adventure is set in Athas / Dark Sun might violate IP rules.
As I understand it, if you publish material which uses WotC's IP (even if you aren't charging money for it), once WotC's legal department gets wind of it, they're likely to shut you down.
What Wizards will not allow you to do is have someone other than you run a Dark Sun adventure that you wrote, nor can you run a Dark Sun adventure that someone else wrote (other than what Wizards has published, of course).
So if John Doe writes a Dark Sun adventure, the only person who can DM that adventure is John Doe.
Out of curiosity, why the statement that I couldn't write my own adventures and post them freely? Certainly I couldn't publish stat blocks in them (unless they were original stat block material that I created specific monsters for), but if I'm not charging for them, I would presume that would be fair use. If not, there are a lotta DMs out there who are probably infringing the crap out of the game.
Again, I'm not a lawyer, but I'm somewhat familiar with the topic, having formerly worked on the campaign staff for Legends of the Shining Jewel, which was set in the Forgotten Realms until WotC decided that they no longer wanted to allow them to do so. (Perhaps karmainferno will see this thread and weigh in; he was even more intimately involved in LSJ than I was, and he also worked for a company which licensed Star Wars IP from Lucasfilm, and so, he understands the topic even more thoroughly..)
"Fair use", as I understand it, lets you write adventures using WotC's IP (to which you received access when you purchased a WotC product which contained the IP, such as a Dark Sun book) and run them for other players. You can run those adventures for private groups, and at public settings (i.e., conventions).
However, as I understand it, when you take what you've written, and give it, in written form, to someone else as an adventure to be run (rather than simply running them through it as a player), you are now considered to be "publishing" using WotC's IP, and are no longer engaging in "fair use" of the IP. The fact of whether or not you're charging money for that adventure makes no difference; you're still "publishing".
And, yes, you're likely right, there are probably a lot of DMs out there who are infringing. The difference is that they are *such* small potatoes that WotC never hears about them. Again, as I understand it, once WotC learns of such use of their IP (e.g., they start seeing convention flyers for "Living Dark Sun" events), their lawyers will advise them to shut down people who are doing this. My understanding of the IP laws is that, when the owner of the IP learns about infringement, if they do not actively work to stop the infringement, a court may subsequently rule that they do not care to enforce their rights to that IP.
the "Living" prepend certainly has an official association written all over it, there's nothing stopping me (or anyone else, really) from essentially creating a home campaign based in the Dark Sun universe and publishing the rules for it online, making homebrew freely-downloadable modules for it online, and encouraging other DMs to run for it and players to play in it.
The second you post it online for distribution is when you get to meet WOTC's IP infringement lawyers (assuming you use any word referring to Dark Sun such "Athas"). That said, I hear rumors that the RPGA might looking into how they might have sanctioned completely volunteer campaigns but they aren't quite ready to let anyone do that yet. LFR is a whole different fish, since the Globals all have contracts for beer money so we can be owned by the company and thus protect the IP and be fired if they wish. What I hear is only rumors and ruminations, so its definately not anything official.
created specific monsters for), but if I'm not charging for them, I would presume that would be fair use. If not, there are a lotta DMs out there who are probably infringing the crap out of the game.
That's very true and some of them probably are going beyond what's legal (at least in WOTC's) mind, but its partly a matter of size. If Joe Gamer posts an adv. he came up with generically, no a huge problem from an IP standpoint. But if Joe Gamer puts up rules for a huge organized play campaign and uses the Dark Sun setting, that becomes an issue.
That's...well, not only is it remarkably foolish, I'd wager a guess that many, many people do that anyway. It's done for many game systems out there--fan-made adventures, that is; I've used material for Dark Heresy, for instance, and other game systems out there. You can find D&D websites with many adventures that people have written.
That being said, I've written Chris Tulach. I'll write other people as well if there's anyone I need to write (do the Global Admins for LFR have anything to do with this sort of thing, Skerrit?) If all else fails I'll just run a small version in my store. I'm trying to get people to play 4E and buy Wizards product, dammit, and offer something other than LFR to those who want to do it. Whetting their appetites with D&D Dark Sun Encounters and then pulling it away from them by not running any OTHER DS material is counterintuitive and will drive away players otherwise interested in OP.
Are you telling me that no one can write adventures and post them to the internet for other people to run?
In truth, in many cases, those people *are* likely violating the IP rights of the game publishers. (It's a situation that goes beyond gaming...fan-fiction is in the same boat.)
As skerrit and I noted, it's probably a matter of scale. Guys posting some of their own 4E adventures on some little website, visited by a few hundred people, aren't likely to get noticed by WotC. But, publishing on a bigger website (say, EN World) *would* get noticed.
And, some game companies are more vigilant about this than others. WotC seems to be fairly vigilant, once things get to a noticeable size. Palladium, from what I've heard, is *very* vigilant about scouring the Web for player-posted content using their rules.
AWhetting their appetites with D&D Dark Sun Encounters and then pulling it away from them by not running any OTHER DS material is counterintuitive and will drive away players otherwise interested in OP.
I would imagine that WotC views the "follow-up" from whetting their appetites with Dark Sun Encounters to be one of two directions:
- Did that make you interested in Dark Sun? Well, hey, we have these books. (And I imagine there'll be some adventures published for Dark Sun, between stand-alone store-bought adventures and Dungeon adventures, much as they did for Eberron.)
- Did that make you interested in organized D&D play? Well, hey, we have this thing called Living Forgotten Realms.
Now, yes, what you would lose is the person who says, "I liked that. I want more OP, and I want more Dark Sun, and it has to be a combo containing both of those, or I won't be happy."
Sounds a little counter productive to me, I'd think they would want anything that'll generate sales and he's got a good marketing idea to do it.
I suspect it's about limited resources; a lot of things that might generate sales don't do so efficently.
An organized play campaign requires a certain level of resources (web presence, maintaining the staff -- both paid and volunteer, getting modules produced, etc.). All things considered, the RPGA does *not* have a big budget. In other words: they can't do everything. Note that both Eberron (and Star Wars Saga Edition, to broaden the discussion further) received very limited organized-play support, as well.
So, they have to consider: would starting a second Living campaign add a significantly larger number of new players, and contribute a significantly higher number of sales, versus other options?
I'm not really into Dark Sun; I know some folks just love it, but, face it, it's a bit of a niche campaign setting, compared to Forgotten Realms, which is more of a "baseline" swords-and-sorcery fantasy setting. While I'm sure that there are a good number of people who would get excited over a Living Dark Sun (or a Living Eberron, for that matter), I have a feeling it would be substantially smaller than LFR. It wouldn't surprise me to learn that Dark Sun's appeal is smaller than even Eberron's...and, if that's the case, if they didn't do a Living Eberron, I surely wouldn't expect a Living Dark Sun.
Are you seriously telling me that no one can write adventures and post them to the internet for other people to run?
If you think I am making stuff up, you are welcome to have a conversation with the folks that run Living Shining Jewel or Living Planar... well at least used to run, until they had a small conversation with Hasbro's legal department.
If you think I am making stuff up, you are welcome to have a conversation with the folks that run Living Shining Jewel or Living Planar... well at least used to run, until they had a small conversation with Hasbro's legal department.
See post #7.
Legends of the Shining Jewel started out as the "Procampur Expansion" to the RPGA's Living City campaign. In those days, despite being run by a volunteer group, it was still sanctioned by the RPGA.
When Ryan Dancey's Organized Play group bought LC from the RPGA in 2002, Dancey's group decided that they didn't want to continue having Procampur be part of the new LC, and so, the group which was running Procampur struck out on their own. They started a new, independent campaign, called "Legends of the Shining Jewel", which built on the history from what they'd done for the Procampur Expansion. It was still set in the Realms.
After about 2 years or so, and several dozen modules, which ran at a number of conventions (particularly on the East Coast, which was home to much of the campaign staff), WotC's lawyers took notice. The LSJ folks were ultimately given two options: shut down the campaign, or remove all references to the Realms (and all WotC-published non-OGL rules items) from the campaign. LSJ chose the latter, and took the campaign offline for several months while they created their own campaign setting.
If you think I am making stuff up, you are welcome to have a conversation with the folks that run Living Shining Jewel or Living Planar... well at least used to run, until they had a small conversation with Hasbro's legal department.
Tone of voice doesn't translate well--that wasn't "doubting of facts presented" so much as "incredulity at the idea".
Be that as it may, I'm still going to try to get the RPGA/Wizards to support such a thing. If I can't, I suppose I'll just run a bunch of Dark Sun adventures myself with my friends.
It's probably not true that 'if you don't defend your copyright you can lose it'. That's a common misconception, because that's how trade mar
We are not talking about copyright, that has to do with actual typed texts in various media. When you discuss publishing Dark Sun adventures of your own creation, then copyright is not infringed since you do not copy and paste previous published material. We are talking about IP, such as the name Elminster and Athas, and from what I understood from various people more knowledgable on the subject then I, you can loose IP if you do not defend it. Mind you, I am by no means an expert on legal IP matters. So I might very well be wrong...
I have a longer screed on this topic, but it's probably not worth it. The short continuation is that you can lose trademarks if you don't defend them. I'm not an IP lawyer either and I'm not sure that you could make Elminster a trademark (Forgotten Realms certainly is).
It's worth noting that you don't have to copy and paste to breach copyright. The copyright includes the right to make derivative works and the associated right to prevent anyone else from making a derivative work - but it has to be derivative of the copyrightable elements of another work, which is vaguely analogous to the 'fluff' in RPG products as you can't copyright the underlying rules. Certainly anyone setting adventures on Athas would have to create a derivative work in order to make it recognisably Athas - just as you could create a story about a teenage wizard in a wizarding school, but as soon as the reader would recognise your story as being set in the Harry Potter universe you've probably created an (infringing) derivative work. So the OP's idea is, as others have said, going to be infringing without WotC's consent.
Having said all that, I expect that WotC's decision to close down Sarbreenar and Living Procampur was linked to the plans for the 4e Realms, and the launch of LFR. I am guessing, but I wouldn't be surprised if a Living Hollow World campaign might have continued to live under the radar, for instance, even if it was clearly derivative of old WotC/TSR material. I don't know what happened with Living Planar, though, and that might prove me wrong! Certainly there's an artistic reason for such action, as well as a legal one: the continuation of alternative campaigns set (presumably) in a pre-Spellplague Realms is potentially confusing and diminshes the 'currency' of the current Realms campaign, which is of particular importance when you're essentially rebooting the Realms in order to make things simpler for newcomers.
A basic problem is that the more non-commercial any such campaign would be, the more likely it would be that it could survive a lawsuit, and at the same time the less likely it would be that the organizers would actually be willing to defend such a lawsuit.
Having said all that, I expect that WotC's decision to close down Sarbreenar and Living Procampur was linked to the plans for the 4e Realms, and the launch of LFR.
Living Sarbreenar, that wouldn't surprise me. IIRC, WotC had them shut down in 2007 (maybe 2006 at the earliest), at which point it's entirely possible that the plans for LFR were already underway.
Legends of the Shining Jewel (a.k.a. Living Procampur) was dealing with the WotC lawyers in late 2003 or early 2004...I was playing in the campaign at the time, and I attended a con in the fall of 2004, which was one of the first events for the campaign *after* they removed all of the FR IP content. I'd be surprised if *that* decision by WotC was related to LFR or 4E.
In the US, we operate largely on `Stupidly Expensive Forgiveness' principle -- which is to say that you violate the laws of copyright, patent, trademark, trade dress, etc, and then both sides pay lawyers to figure out if it's an `ok' violation or not. ACTA will probably not help make things any more reasonable, but at least it might normalize things from country to country.
There's a reason that nobody is *publicly* posting the Living City or Living Greyhawk adventures/materials, for example. It's not due to lack of requests, but due to the murky legal questions (and the crazy-huge amount it would cost someone in lawyers to resolve even half of it).
Back to Living Dark Sun (or my preferred Dark Sun Campaigns) - the rumor is that we (nebulous members of the RPGA community) might be able to start other RPGA-`sanctioned' campaigns following the Community-Run LFR model at some point in the future. The Community-Run LFR campaign is basically mid-birthing at the moment, so I'm afraid that patience is all we have at the moment, but there is serious interest in the idea; if the situation changes (and the group I'm a part of is still interested), I'll contact you and see if we can't put together something cool.
The way you can do this is by not publishing modules. What you do is set up a continuity comity for each region and the overall LDS game. Then a GM that wishes to run a game that is sanctioned by LDS game writes his own mod and submits it to the council who checks it for balance and continuity, they tell him wait he needs to change and then he runs the mod for his group. Each gm runs a unique mod for the game and does not run someone elses mod. Basically all mods are my realms adventures for dark sun. The OP just sets the guidelines for running adventures in the OP that the Gams have to follow and they also sanction the mods written by the GMs for approved play. For more global stories the council can give a general sinuses of a major event that is happening and the GMs submit there versions of the events such as house so-in-so goes to war this yearnwith blah. The GMs can then implant them in there mods.
The LDS OP council could consist of three volunteers for each city state that is diffined in an area as well as a overall continuity storyteller, you divided the US up into sections that comprise the individual city states to help insure that playersnfrom a certain area meet each other and gonthrough similar meta stories, like in LG.
This of course is a quick gotting down of an idea but think it has merit with the right guidelines I think it could work well.
Constructive thoughts?
Red
I'm not sure that anyone's going to think that it's a `Living Campaign' if none of the adventures are shared, but if you can get the volunteers for it, you can give it a try.
Red
wasn't even thinking about LDS. Very funny.Seriously though we would probably have to call it something else than living Dark Sun, yes but a name is easy to get. Public recognition and support would be the things that we would have two work on.
Red