The Definite d20/D&D Conversion thread

[Faolyn]

I've posted the Achaierai, Air Demon, Ankheg, Ascomid, and Assassin Vine. I'll work on the Bs and Cs later on.

ETA: How do I get it so there's a place to email/PM me? I see that there's something like that on other people's pages.

[Faolyn]

Originally Posted by Anaraxes

For the sake of reference:

www.wizards.com/d20/files/v35/Legal.rtf

So I should remove those pages, then? And what do I do about monsters from other books?

[Anthony]

Originally Posted by Faolyn

So I should remove those pages, then? And what do I do about monsters from other books?

You'll generally have to check the book; it should say one way or the other.

[Anaraxes]

Originally Posted by Faolyn

So I should remove those pages, then? And what do I do about monsters from other books?

I'm not a lawyer, so I hesitate to advise. There's also a difference between publishing content under the OGL from WotC, and publishing content not under that license at all -- thus bound by general copyright and trademark law. Anything I say might well be wrong.

At the least, I'd rename the monsters. I understand WotC has those trademarked. Given what they put into the Open Content of the SRD, they seem happy with filing off the serial numbers to remove the trademarks (compare the "Bigby's" or "Mordenkainen's" spells, with their generic versions, which are often mechanically identical).

Ordinary trademark law allows you to mention other's trademarks as long as you don't use them in such as a way as to make it appear that you are that product or that you have the owner's endorsement. This is why you always see that boilerplate like "XXX is a trademark of XXX Holdings, Inc, and is used without permission". It might be sufficient to put a disclaimer and a "TM" in each of the covered monsters, even without renaming them.

You're not copying stat blocks -- it's an entirely different game system -- so the name seems like the only common point.

[Bruno]

Generally, it's considered both Good Practice and Covering Your Ass to dramatically differentiate trademarked terms that you're referencing from the rest of your text. This is why Kromm bolds and italicizes the names of GURPS books when he refers to them in the forum.

Also acceptable is a larger font, or distinct (but still readable) font colour.

Setting it apart visually emphasizes that you do not consider the term to be generic - making it visually "special" underlines the legal "specialness".

Obviously, same with the little TM - but it's not good enough to just hang font decorations and funky characters off of the term, you also have to make it clear it's not YOUR trademark. Typically such things are listed at the bottom of the first page; if you're on a webpage that looks like its' running more than a screen or two worth of content, put it at the top or very near the top instead. Stuffing it at the bottom of four megs of text is like hiding it at the back of a book - Rude at the very least, and legally a little sketchy.

[Faolyn]

Well, until I figure out exactly what I can put up and what I'll need to change the names for, I should probably just delete them. Jürgen, I can't figure out how to delete pages on the wiki. Can you do so--at least for the air demon and the ascomid? The other two are in the SRD, so they should be OK.

[Faolyn]

And, after checking with the SRD, I have now posted the Balor, the Barbed Demon, Behir, and the Cloaker.

[Jürgen Hubert]

The SRD is not applicable to this project in any case since GURPS does not fall under the SRD. Thus, it falls under "fan work" and the disclaimer should suffice.

So do not feel limited by the SRD, since if there are any legal objections they would apply to the SRD creatures as well - I only used it because it's a handy online reference.

In general though you should focus on the mechanics and not copy any "flavor text", since that might cause objections.

As for deleting pages I think only site members can do that, but as explained above I think deletion is unnecessary in this case.

[Ashtagon]

Originally Posted by Anaraxes

I'm not a lawyer, so I hesitate to advise. There's also a difference between publishing content under the OGL from WotC, and publishing content not under that license at all -- thus bound by general copyright and trademark law. Anything I say might well be wrong.

At the least, I'd rename the monsters. I understand WotC has those trademarked. Given what they put into the Open Content of the SRD, they seem happy with filing off the serial numbers to remove the trademarks (compare the "Bigby's" or "Mordenkainen's" spells, with their generic versions, which are often mechanically identical).

Ordinary trademark law allows you to mention other's trademarks as long as you don't use them in such as a way as to make it appear that you are that product or that you have the owner's endorsement. This is why you always see that boilerplate like "XXX is a trademark of XXX Holdings, Inc, and is used without permission". It might be sufficient to put a disclaimer and a "TM" in each of the covered monsters, even without renaming them.

You're not copying stat blocks -- it's an entirely different game system -- so the name seems like the only common point.

As I understand it (I am not a lawyer), the stat blocks are the one thing that can't be covered by copyright law. Game rule mechanics also can't be copyrighted -- although the specific wording used to describe a game rule can be (and the game rule exclusion doesn't apply because entirely different game system). Unique names, such as "hobbit" and "mind flayer" (in appropriate contexts, where relevant) are covered by copyright law. Simply noting a (tm) after the "product identity" names probably will not be sufficient to grant a protection from lawsuits.

Of course, you could rename it a mush-kuul (or something more meaningful), use the same (or converted) stats, and it would then be legal. Thanks to its Lovecraftian inspiration, there are reasonable questions surrounding the copyrightable status of mind flayers though.

[vierasmarius]

Just call them brain biters, mind munchers, psyche suckers or some other appropriate alliteration. =P