Wizards of the Coast has certainly grown tired of the planned changes to the Open Gaming License for Dungeons & Dragons, which allows creators and publishers to use fantasy RPG rules and ideas in their own works. The fans and creators are pissed and are fighting back.
An open letter called “OpenDND” was released a couple of days ago condemning the licensing rules stating that it will “dismantle the entire RPG industry”. That letter now has over 66,000 signatures. The letter calls on D&D studio Wizards of the Coast to “revoke the draconian 1.1 OGL and commit to supporting the current 1.0 OGL in future editions of their games.”
We’re seeing a bigger backlash when fans launched a campaign to cancel their subscriptions to D&D Beyond. So many people flooded the page to unsubscribe that it blocked their page and at one point displayed a “500 Internal Server Error”.
The D&D Beyond cancellation campaign began after an email from a reported Wizards of the Coast employee was leaked and shared by YouTube and TikTok user DnD_Shorts. That email stated that management was looking into D&D Beyond subscriptions and cancellations because “it’s the fastest financials they currently have.”
Huge leak from an insider @Wizard
That’s what we feared: The top brass despise us, the D&D community, and see us only as a “trap to their money.”
The subs on D&D Beyond are all important to WotC, so I’ve deleted mine. Make your voice heard #opennd #StopTheSub pic.twitter.com/LhaBM4tGML
— DnD_Shorts (@DnD_Shorts) January 12, 2023
Even popular D&D personality Ginny Di jumped in to push back against the license changes by revealing that he canceled his D&D Beyond and suggested other fans do the same. There are tons of tweet replies and quotes claiming to have done the same.
For those asking how they can help push back OGL 1.1, we now know WotC is considering DnD Beyond subscriptions as a relevant metric (see previous RT). This is your chance to send them a message. Just sent mine 📬 pic.twitter.com/IEXDmYvno9
— Ginny Di 🎲 #OpenDnD (@itsginnydi) January 12, 2023
According to io9, this fan backlash has already caused Wizards of the Coast to cancel an announcement about its updated Open Gaming License for the second time this week. Wizards of the Coast sources say that “the company is rushing to formulate a response to the backlash against the new OGL.”
The report goes on to say that “these cancellations and their impact on Wizards of the Coast’s bottom line are not negligible, according to io9’s sources at the company, and have caused executives to rush to tailor their messaging to the situation, leading to delays in [new Open Game License] publication.”
Prior to this, DnD_Shorts’ tweet suggested that senior management blamed the community for “overreaction”. Wizards of the Coast has lost the trust of fans. They definitely didn’t think through their decision and now it’s costing them.
It looks like that @DnDBeyondThe subscriptions management page of is down as a movement grows to cancel subscriptions in protest of reported OGL changes. This is displayed when attempting to use the Manage Subscriptions page. pic.twitter.com/HOlFvvt8zk
— Christian Hoffer (@CHofferCBus) January 12, 2023
by Joey Paur
Source: Geek Tyrant
Lloyd Grunewald is an author at “The Fashion Vibes”. He is a talented writer who focuses on bringing the latest entertainment-related news to his readers. With a deep understanding of the entertainment industry and a passion for writing, Lloyd delivers engaging articles that keep his readers informed and entertained.
