fmitchell

Forgot about the DMCA. I keep thinking it only covers copy protected software, even if "copy protection" is a note saying, "Don't do that". Then again, it mainly seems to cover whatever a high-priced lawyer wants it to cover. Well, D&D (and by extension WotC/Hasbro) will always be top dogs in the market. From the last estimates I saw (in a Kenneth Hite column two years ago), WotC owns more than 50% of the market, White Wolf around 20%, and everyone else is fighting for scraps. From what I can tell, d20 itself is part of those scraps: Mongoose and Green Ronin had comparable numbers to SJ Games, FanPro, and Palladium. (For that matter, WotC has essentially abandoned d20 Modern, and rewrote the Star Wars RPG as a testing ground for changes in D&D 4e.) But back to BRP ... These days, a system isn't enough; RPG publishers, including WotC and especially White Wolf, sell settings, genres, and premises with game mechanics attached. (Even without Eberron or Forgotten Realms, the assumptions implicit in D&D practically form a setting by themselves.) Chaosium needs to develop or license another compelling setting besides Cthulhu that fits the assumptions of BRP. I don't think Chaosium can afford to publish the same number of genre-books and settings that GURPS has. From what I can tell, dual-system books don't do well: witness AFMBE d20/Unisystem or CoC d20. I might be wrong, though. (Certainly dual-system MRQ/BRP, ironically, would make sense to neither party.) The only other solution I can think of is for Chaosium to embrace the digital revolution and release new BRP material as PDFs. The per-unit cost dwindles to zero (or nearly so), leaving only the upfront costs of writing and layout. They can also release a chapter's-worth of material at a time, rather than committing to a full book, to reduce the up-front costs and gauge the market. (And PDFs never go out of print.)

Which I guess goes back to an earlier point, that PDQ, FATE, and HeroQuest primarily attempt to "simulate" stories, while BRP (among other systems) tries to model the real world in some way. (Didn't RuneQuest get a thumbs up from the SCA for their combat system.) One way I can see making BRP supers work is to restrict either the level or kind of powers the PCs and powered NPCs have. For example: All PCs have the same number of Hero Points to buy powers, and gain additional Hero Points at more-or-less the same rate. Super-powered NPCs are all comparable to the PCs, except perhaps for a Big Bad. All the PCs could strain at the limits of realistic human achievements, aided by slightly implausible technology, a la most pulp heroes or the Watchmen (minus Doctor Manhattan). NPCs could be ordinary humans, extraordinary humans, or low-powered superhumans. Only certain types of powers exist, e.g. psionics, elemental control, power rings, Superman-like abilities. All powers have a rating like T&J Super Qualities or HeroQuest Abilities, perhaps on a percentile scale; roll against a fixed difficulty to perform miracles with normals, or opposed against supers who have comparable or diametrically opposed powers.

Minor nitpick: From my understanding of the law, copyright applies only to the program text; absent patents or contracts, there's nothing preventing you from reverse-engineering a program's function. That's how GNU and Linux were born. So software and rules systems are similar in that respect. But in general, I see your point. Chaosium's business model revolves around its copyrights and trademarks. Unlike WotC, they don't have the deep pockets to risk some business, and unlike Evil Hat Games (who released a FATE SRD under the OGL) they're primarily a for-profit business. However, as mentioned above, they're also not like Steve Jackson Games, which actually has sufficient staff to write, edit and/or manage a large number of projects at once. It's frustrating for me, though, because I'd like to see BRP prosper, but I honestly don't think Chaosium can grow their BRP business and maintain their eldritch cash cow at the same time.

Truth & Justice conflicts are very abstract, with only a limited number of values that a "Quality" can take. The base PDQ system has only five levels: Poor, Average, Good, Expert, and Master. T&J adds "normal scale" and "super scale" to the mix, where a "normal scale" Master quality can sometimes compete with a "super scale" Average quality. So, according to the rules, Batman can have a "super scale" Gadgeteering that's the same as Superman's "super scale" Kryptonian Physique. If the GM buys the argument that they compete on an equal footing -- e.g. Batman prepared a few anti-Superman gadgets, or has an "undefined" gadget to play -- then the odds are 50/50. T&J, and the base PDQ system, resemble HeroQuest with far more radical simplification. PDQ Qualities are more like HeroQuest Keywords than abilities.

If you've seen Truth & Justice from Atomic Sock Monkey, the author explicitly tries to reproduce these sort of plot-dependent powers. Not to delve too deeply into the rules (what there is of them), every use of power is a roll against that power's rating. So, you can pit Superman's "Kryptonian Physique" +6 against Batman's "Gadgeteer" +6 directly, and the odds would be 50/50; if Supes won, he'd knock Bats for a loop (but not actually drive his fist through Bats' body, as he might in real life); if Bats won, he'd have some secret weapon in his utility belt that hurt Supes for that round.

Hm, maybe "secondary market" isn't what I meant, now that I look up the definition. Still, I disagree with the "competition within your own game system" and market confusion. First, Chaosium would retain the imprimatur of whether something had the "Official BRP" logo or was merely noted as "Compatible with BRP". (That could be a condition of the license: compatible products cannot use the logo, and can't attempt to hide the "Compatible with" part.) Secondly, if Chaosium required "BRP Core" to be physically separate, that's a big tipoff to consumers that a "compatible" product isn't official. Thirdly, the sort of market I envisioned was cheap PDFs, which is a market Chaosium doesn't even exploit. (Their only PDFs to date are reprints of their old books, at half the dead-tree price.) Fourth, there's already competition: MRQ. Flooding the market with BRP material would compete mainly with MRQ, especially if BRP touts the claim of being "the original". While Chaosium relies on freelancers to bring in its revenue, they can't sponsor every project. Maybe instead of automatic licenses, Chaosium would explicitly dispense "compatible" licenses to projects they don't want to take on ... it reduces the appeal for independent publishers, but it will grow the total market. As Terry Pratchett points out, accepting a smaller slice of the pie isn't so bad if the pie is bigger. Honestly, I'd be happy if Chaosium had a license allowing "BRP compatible" products only if they're offered free of charge or at cost, a la Creative Commons. It's still better than waiting for Chaosium to publish tiny print runs of a few books per year. That's definitely not the way to grow a market.

This argument is a little over-long, so to summarize: By allowing others to use the "core" of BRP free of charge, Chaosium could create a secondary market for BRP-compatible material, and boost the sales of their own BRP line. My premise is that Chaosium wants Basic Roleplaying to do well, perhaps even taking a little business away from D&D and White Wolf's Storyteller games. Chaosium's tendency to do small print runs, to the point where their books become instant collectors' items, belies this premise, but I'll run with it anyway. As far as the current market is concerned, BRP is a johnny-come-lately to the "generic system" market. Never mind it's been around forever; a lot of current gamers haven't heard of it, and others would be reluctant to jump systems unless it supports their particular genre or play style. Chaosium, as a four-man operation, can't hope to compete with the likes of GURPS, much less the D&D juggernaut. Therefore, a clear, legally binding statement from Chaosium allowing others to reference "core" rules free of charge would enable a secondary market of "BRP-compatible" rules extensions, settings, and adventures. Said market would consist mainly of small PDFs on DriveThruRPG or YourGamesNow; in today's market only an idiot would do a print-run of a full $30 book without establishing a market for it. By "core" rules, I mean the equivalent of the old BRP pamphlet: primary and secondary attributes, the percentile skill system, a common subset of skills, the essence of the combat system, and the principle of increasing skills through use. Since Chaosium used to provide those as a free pamphlet, now allowed to exist on a web page, and now presents a version in their free Call of Cthulhu quick-start, I can't see how endorsing an updated version would lose Chaosium sales. WotC didn't suffer during the d20 boom, since they still had the brand, and could make the final call whether a product had the "d20" logo on it. Unlike the d20 gold-rush, the BRP is small enough that, while 90% of it might be crap, it will be easier to find the 10% that isn't crap. And, of course, if you want guaranteed good stuff, you could buy from Chaosium. Discovering a wealth of add-ons and customizations for a new game would, as the marketroids would say, "delight the customer". Even better, Chaosium might allow anyone to drop "Core BRP" wholesale into a game, to make it "BRP compatible". (Which might not be the same as "Official BRP".) If you're trying a new game, ideally you'd buy a single book complete with setting and rules. A huge problem with, say, GURPS, is that you have to pay $75 for the 4th Edition Basic Set before you can use any of the $35+ other books. OGL itself might not be the solution. The specific provisions I'm thinking of designate "open content" from "product identity", and not charging for the former, but perhaps they're not precise enough, or have other legal entanglements. To strengthen the BRP brand, though, maybe Chaosium would require "Core BRP" to appear in its entirety, unedited, separate from any non-core content. Another possibility, since Mongoose already took the OGL hit, is to design a "BRP-compatible" system off MRQ, designate it as OGL, and release it free a la GORE. It would be the equivalent of the old BRP pamphlet, maybe with a few extra skills, and if Chaosium objects to even mentioning BRP, then said ruleset would have some alternate, but suggestive, name.

But hello, my name is Frank, and I'm a gamer. (Hi Frank.) I came into RPGs through an odd route, as with many other of my pursuits. Yes, there was D&D, but I also played a game or two of Traveller, and I really became enamored with Steve Jackson's Melee and Wizard, which evolved into The Fantasy Trip and, eventually GURPS. However, the first time I played Runequest (2nd Ed.), I realized what RPGs could be: skill-based, rules-light, and generalized beyond combat and trap-detection. I've been following BRP through the years, especially in its Cthuloid mutation, and with the imminent(?) release of Basic Roleplaying I hope that it will attract a wider audience. As far as gaming experience goes ... I played a bunch of games in college, fell out of gaming during my working life, and now trying to get back in as time permits. Right now, I'm in a Spirit of the Century campaign, but I've also played D&D 3.5 (sigh), a homebrew BRP campaign, and a few one-shots with PDQ and other modern systems. So, hello BRP world, and I hope to have some interesting discussions (but not in the Chinese curse way). P.S. I'm also a moderator on Pen and Paper Games

:focus: I've tuned into this discussion late, but I hope that, when BRP FINALLY comes out, someone can compile a FAQ with a detailed comparison between the two. I agree that MRQ wasn't playtested well -- Mongoose issued a "Player's Update" in July -- and their slim hardbacks are way overpriced. On the other hand, issuing their rules with the OGL does mean a) a free if less complete set of rules, and the freedom to publish your own MRQ derivatives, or MRQ add-ons, within the limits of the license. Does anyone know what kind of licenses Chaosium will have for BRP? At the very least, if I post some house rules or setting information on a website, could Chaosium (or some hypothetical company that bought them) pull a T$R and legitimately threaten legal action? If I someday wrote a supplement that had BRP stats in it, even as an appendix, could they go all Palladium on me? Does anything BRP need their explicit approval? That Chaosium allowed Basic Role Playing System to reprint the Basic Roleplaying pamphlet is encouraging, but honestly, given our litigious society, having a system licensed under the OGL or something like it does allay some fears.