Leafing through the Dungeon Crawl Classics Beta, and the first thing that struck me on the head was the section on how the game was different from other retro-styled games.
Holy shit, it was like an epiphany.
Why wouldn't you want to flat-out say "This game is different from this edition like this, and this edition like this", especially when retro-clones are one of the few areas of the hobby where people really will compare and contrast your works like that.
Just a quick thought, and I'm back to what I was doing before.
Well, an OGL publisher wouldn't want to get *specific*, because as I understand it, the OGL forbids comparing your rules to other copyright-protected rules systems without the permission of the copyright holder. Daniel Proctor (Labyrinth Lord) and Matt Finch (Swords & Wizardry) have some kind of mutual agreement specifically for that reason.
ReplyDeleteI don't mind that they're not getting specific, it's just nice to remind you that, for example, this game uses Ascending AC instead of descending, and there are no prestige classes and races are classes, etc.
ReplyDeleteSometimes you get the rules a little mixed up in your head, and it's nice to come out front and say, "This is the way it is."
I think you can do that without getting too terribly specific.