More updates...

Lich Dungeon (Level 1) PDF:
http://rpg.drivethrustuff.com/product/1 ... -Level-One

Eldritch Ent. section (multiproduct):
http://rpg.drivethrustuff.com/index.php ... rs_id=4250

bombadil wrote:We want paper, not that phony pdf bullshit!

Here here....  
+1

ExTSR wrote:Same site should offer paper shortly (or so I'm told).

F

Once it does, I shall be hitting my credit card in a enthusiastic manner.  

ExTSR wrote:Same site should offer paper shortly (or so I'm told).

F

Will that POD version be the printed version, or will a regular run be issued?

ExTSR wrote:But mark my words, the graphic quality (for both home & POD) will be rising sharply in the near future.

F

I already thought they were very well done as they were sold at GaryCon. I have given a meticulous read through on two of them now and I will stick with my first very glowing impression regarding their overall quality. It will be interesting to "mark your words" in this regard.

Zach

Gnat the Beggar wrote:

ExTSR wrote:Same site should offer paper shortly (or so I'm told).

F

Once it does, I shall be hitting my credit card in a enthusiastic manner.  :)

Hell, yes! *hic*

Hector.

Munafik wrote:does Eldritch Enterprises have any plans to offer their products in OSRIC, Labyrinth Lord, or Swords & Wizardry statistics in future?

Indeed we do. Negotiations and production are in progress as we speak.

We understand your position and it's not rare. However, I refused to cede WotC the rights to as much as half of our all-new work by making them OGL products.

Sorry if my post rains a bit on Eldritch Enterprises' parade

Not at all. We welcome honest and well-considered opinions, such as those you present. (Ill-considered impulse rants, otoh, are another matter...)

F

ExTSR wrote:We understand your position and it's not rare. However, I refused to cede WotC the rights to as much as half of our all-new work by making them OGL products.

While I applaud everybody at Eldtrich Enterprise for releasing their first batch products, there is a big misconception here about the Open Game License. You are not ceding Wizards any rights you are not granting to everybody else. Also as a practical matter Wizards has only used the OGL once beyond the d20 SRD in any of their published product and has never used any third party material. And more importantly for adventures you can declare everything but the actual stat blocks themselves as product identity.

For example on page one of the preview PDF you have the Behemoth.
---------------------------------------------------------
... akin to famous Japanese monsters of cinematic history.

Spider Behemoth
AC 0[20], HD 50; HP 750; ATK 1; DMG 10d10 (crushing foot); MV 50'  <----------- This is the only thing that would be under the OGL.
Deameanor: Does not take....
Appearance: ....
-------------------------------------

For examples of this see Necromancer Game and Goodman Games Adventure modules. This is an example of the boilerplate they use

Designation of Product Identity: The following items are hereby designated as Product Identity in accordance with Section 1(e) of the Open Game License, version 1.0: Any and all Dungeon Crawl Classics logos and identifying marks and trade dress; all proper nouns, capitalized terms, italicized terms, artwork, maps, symbols, depictions, and illustrations, except such elements that already appear in the System Reference Document.
Designation of Open Content: Subject to the Product Identity designation above, all creature and NPC statistic blocks are designated as Open Gaming Content, as well as all material derived from the SRD or other open content sources.

Using this on a new monster means that not even the name is under the OGL only the actual mechanical stats.

I am pointing this out because I am see that you post on various Old School forums. From my experience is the stat block format and lack of compatibility will be a deal breaker for many if not most of your target audience. It would be a shame if they didn't sell as well as they could have because of this. Particularly it from a misunderstanding of the OGL.

I do realize that one of your partners had a bad experience with the OGL. While I am a known advocate for open gaming, I realize that there are people that want to keep greater control over their work, and Ithe OGL can accommodate this.

ExTSR wrote:

Munafik wrote:does Eldritch Enterprises have any plans to offer their products in OSRIC, Labyrinth Lord, or Swords & Wizardry statistics in future?

Indeed we do. Negotiations and production are in progress as we speak.

I hope this works out and looking forward to seeing what else you and the rest of the folks at Eldritch come up with.

ExTSR wrote:Thanks for your input, Rob. Your excellent work is well-known in the biz; thanks for those contributions to our mutual hobby.
(For those who don't know of RSC, see HERE.)

Thanks for the shout out.

ExTSR wrote:Eldritch has established legal and ethical positions with these generic non-OGL versions of our products. In doing so we are breaking new ground, instead of following the route so many others have taken.

I haven't had any 'bad experiences' with the OGL, but we feel that there are legal implications in using it, beyond the simple matters you bring up. We are also not willing to cede that the OGL is irrevocable (time will tell).

I would be interested in seeing a blog post, essay, etc on yours and the rest of Eldritch's thoughts on this.  Sounds like there been a lot of thought put into this.

ExTSR wrote:As noted above, we WILL be doing OGL versions to specifically target various game systems. We're quite aware that most gamers are math-resistant and don't want to do the conversions.

Taking the long view, I feel that sales data for these generic versions (and similar generic treatments of other products to come) may prove to be a minor share of overall company revenues, but the products amply serve their purposes at this time.

I saw that in a earlier post here and made sure I mention that in my blog post over on Bat In The Attic.  It would a good thing to know how well generic adventure products sell. My Points of Light and Blackmarsh books are not a good indicator of the generic format as the hex crawl format precludes having long stat blocks of any short. So it wouldn't matter if I was using d20, GURPS or any number system for those books.

The only suggestion I would make in improving your generic format is not make a d20 style stat block but rather compress much of it into a stat line. That way more focus is on the adventure text. For example something like

Spider Behemoth
POW: 1,500% (not a typo!); DEF 50%; HT 70; MV 50'  INIT -20%(motionless)/+25%(moving); DMG 10d10 (crushing foot); SP Huge Mass;
Demeanor: <text>
Appearance: <text>

Doing this will avoid the issues that d20 adventures had with the same style of stat block.