Srd

[Mushroom Ninja]

Has wizards made a SWSE SRD available yet?

[Waspinator]

As far as I know, no. And given what they're doing for 4th edition D&D, they probably never will.

[Mushroom Ninja]

As far as I know, no. And given what they're doing for 4th edition D&D, they probably never will.

:smallfrown::smallfrown::smallfrown::smallfrown::s mallfrown::smallfrown::smallfrown:

Alas, this is sad news.

:smallfrown::smallfrown::smallfrown::smallfrown::s mallfrown::smallfrown::smallfrown::smallfrown:

[DeathQuaker]

If you're talking about Star Wars: Saga Edition, they probably can't because of licensing restrictions. I doubt Lucas's people would allow that.

[Waspinator]

Good point. The Saga Edition system is very closely tied to concepts integral to Star Wars intellectual property (like the Force) and it's very unlikely that Lucas would allow that to go open-source.

That's in addition to the fact that, as I was saying, the way that Wizards is handling 4th edition implies that they consider the way they did the OGL and SRD in the past to be a mistake.

[Mushroom Ninja]

Hmmm... that does make sense. Oh well, I guess I'll have to get my PCs to actually buy the book. :smallsigh:

[ericgrau]

Good point. The Saga Edition system is very closely tied to concepts integral to Star Wars intellectual property (like the Force) and it's very unlikely that Lucas would allow that to go open-source.

That's in addition to the fact that, as I was saying, the way that Wizards is handling 4th edition implies that they consider the way they did the OGL and SRD in the past to be a mistake.

Yes and no. If anything, they might have made the mistake of releasing most of d&d along with the d20 system. Thier open reason was to make the d20 system public and prevent variation. If it's free and good then no one will want to play by different rules, everyone will play by the same rules, and it's easier to join new groups. And no one will be forced to make variation b/c of copyright issues. This might have been a problem with 2e, not just among house rules but also a variety of 3rd party source books, but I'm not sure.

As for people not buying the book, that they most certainly want to avoid. So again, why would they release another SRD? One is enough for their original purpose, and more might keep people from buying the book. They had a reason for the SRD, and providng a free game wasn't it. They're certainly not gonna give away other games for free for no reason. And technically they didn't give away 3e either, though some people (illegally) use the SRD to avoid buying books.

For 4e they are releasing a descripton of what 3rd party books may and may not use (but not full text of rules), so that 3rd party publishers can still stick to core rules and not have to worry about copyright issues.

[Tsotha-lanti]

There's two SRDs - d20 and d20 Modern. (Well, them and RuneQuest, but that's Mongoose.) Both are generic systems. Why would anyone release a specific one as an SRD? There's no theoretical use for a SWSE SRD. Their reason for existence is not to let people avoid buying the books.

Not that I get why everyone needs a book. We play all our RPGs with one copy of each book.

[Aquillion]

Yes and no. If anything, they might have made the mistake of releasing most of d&d along with the d20 system.In all honesty, it probably has less to do with whether or not they think it was a mistake, and more to do with the fact that overarching copyright decisions are now being made by different people.

But another key factor is probably the way the market has changed. Near the end of 2nd edition, there were a lot of popular, competing systems. One of the reasons for the OGL (to put it bluntly) was to try and kill them off by encouraging publishers to focus on D&D / D20 derivatives instead of going their own way or supporting a competitor. It was largely successful at this (some competitors survived, of course, but the field as a whole has been significantly cut down.)

Now that there's less competition, there's less incentive to have something like the OGL.

Finally, one major factor: They're realizing belatedly that the OGL, combined with this dominance over the market, means that 4th edition will have to at least partially compete with 3rd edition (something like what Microsoft has to deal with every time they release a new product.) They don't want to make that mistake again; one of the reasons they're changing the license for 4th edition is certainly to ensure that they can quickly and cleanly kill off all 4th-edition related publication when the time comes so they don't have to compete with themselves.