The End of the OGL?

Twenty-odd years ago Wizards of the Coast introduced the Open Game License (OGL) - a permanent, unalterable license to allow companies to produce third-party books compatible with the then-current 3e ruleset. Since then, there has been an explosion of materials using that license, including entirely separate games, and including Pathfinder.

(I should note at this point that the OGL was never intended to give rise to a significant competitor to D&D, but this was foreseen as a possibility. The then-management were relaxed about it, because in order for it to happen Wizards would have to make a complete mess of an edition change... which they then did.)

One of the clauses of the OGL states that Wizards have the right to issue new versions of the license, but that material could be published under any authorized version. This had the effect of preventing them from ever issuing a new version, as any changes they made would just be ignored.

Until now.

It seems that Wizards have decided to kill the OGL, and they've hit on a wheeze to do it - they're introducing a new version of the OGL (that is essentially unusable), and at the same time seem intent on declaring the older versions to be de-authorized.

I've seen a bunch of opinions on whether this actually holds any water or not - some lawyers have weighed in to say it works, others to say that it does not. There are, annoyingly, precedents both ways, though the closest seems to go against them. And Ryan Dancey, the originator of the OGL back in the day, doesn't think it can be done.

That said, I'm not sure the legal position matters.

The dominant source of funding for RPG products is now Kickstarter, and the dominant marketplace is One Book Shelf. WotC have strong, and very beneficial, agreements with both of these sites. So if WotC declare the license de-authorized, and if they can get KS and OBS to play along, that would effectively end a vast swathe of projects - sure, you can still publish, but good luck getting funding without KS, and good luck selling without your marketplace.

The other major effect of this is that a lot of the mid-sized companies are now looking at the OGL as no longer being the safe harbour it was always assumed to be. Many of them are now moving away from it, either entirely or at least for new products.

The upshot is that the OGL may well be effectively dead. 2023 has not started well for gaming.