Now this was an unexpected announcement, Wizards have walked back their talk of revoking the OGL 1.0a and even gone further than anyone imagined by putting the SRD 5.1 into the Creative Commons.
Paizo announces Open RPG License
Things are moving apace in the RPG space, with multiple publishing companies announcing moves away from the Wizards owned OGL.
But the most significant development so far is the announcement today by Paizo of a new open license by them for use by the wider RPG community. The contents of the announcement is below.
https://paizo.com/community/blog/v5748dyo6si7v?Paizo-Announces-SystemNeutral-Open-RPG-License
- Their site is currently getting overwhelmed by the interest for the license.
DnD Carnage – Open Games License 1.1
Unless you have been living under a rock, you’ll have to be aware of the turmoil within role-playing games community over Hazbo/Wizards of the Coast attempting to revoke the OGL 1.0a license which has been used for 20 or so years.
And replace it with one which is closed (in spite of the name) and also performs a serious land-grab of third-party IP at the same time as looking to milk everyone they can.
Naturally this hasn’t gone down to well 🙂
The following video gives a good run-down on the situation along with providing a link to the revised license.
Keep on the Borderlands – Maps
We’re currently playing through the Keep on the Borderlands on our weekly DnD sessions.
As such in preparation for some possible encounters which the party might have I’ve knocked up some simple maps we can use in the VTT we’re using.
These are shown below, maybe they’ll be of use to others.
Humble Bundle – Pathfinder
If you’re new into role-playing games, then this is a pretty good deal.
The core rulebooks for both Pathfinder and Starfinder for around a fifteen euro.
Pathfinder itself comes from Dungeons and Dragons, being a port from DnD 3.5, though the second edition is move away from that original starting point.
The basic concepts remain similar between the two games with similar races, classes and mechanics.
https://www.humblebundle.com/books/give-gift-pathfinder-starfinder-paizo-books
Generating RPG Character Assets
I’ve recently been on a AI image generation role, primarily using MidJourney to create landscapes, but there is a cost to that service (It’s a processing expensive task, so I’m OK with that).
But for the job of creating character portraits, I’ve taken to using Stable Diffusion which is an open sourced implementation which can be run locally. It’s pretty heavy on the hardware requirements, needing a GPU with 6+gb of ram, but if you can meet that the results are pretty good.
The following are some character portraits I’ve used it to create:
MidJourney – AI Drawings
I’ve recently taken to playing with MidJourney to create AI generated drawings. They’re certainly impressive if not a little unworldly.
Here’s a few created on a theme of the games we have been playing, namely 1920s Lovecraft mythos related.
This time I tried to get one for Rock and Agatha using “1920s male and female investigate haunted house”
Which D&D version to play
Here’s a good video I recently got recommended describing the various versions of Dungeons & Dragons, along with the advantages/disadvantages they have and similar alternatives available.
Bad DnD Art
I’ve been playing a game of Dungeons and Dragons with a group for friends for the last year or so.
Starting with the starter campaign “Dragon of Icespire Peak”, followed by the first half of “Out of the Abyss” and then into one of smaller campaigns while the players level enough to tackle either the second part of the Abyss.
For the start of the sessions I’ve taken to capturing what happened previously in image form.
Allow me to present in crude pictorial format our story so far.
I know what you’re thinking… breathtaking.
Best Card-Game: Citadels
If you buy one card game, the game you buy is Citadels.
In Citadels, players take on new roles each round to represent characters they hire in order to help them acquire gold and erect buildings. The game ends at the close of a round in which a player erects his/her eighth building. Players then tally their points, and the player with the highest score wins.
This must rank as one of, if not the, most played games I have in my possession. Universally liked by both players new to board-games and those who are an old hand at them. Its a deceptively simple game with a good amount of depth.
Both versions contain beautifully illustrated cards, consisting of player role cards (the larger in the image below) and the district cards.
I’ve found that the player role cards are prime candidates for card protectors, we’ve played this many times in pubs and accidents happen 🙂
The aim of the game is to create a given number of districts whose costs are added up at the end of the game which occurs when the round is completed when a player places the required number of districts.
Each round consists of the players choosing a role card from a shuffled list.
Then using the order of the role cards the player take their turns.
With the role cards allowing you to either hinder another player, protecting your player or effecting the districts built in that turn.
The real skill and fun comes from attempting to second guess what roles the players have taken and attempting to counter them.