The tabletop role-playing game community has been experiencing a wave of drama never before experienced in the wake of leaked documents that indicate Dungeons & Dragons‘ owners, Wizards of the Coast, will be changing the Open Gaming License that allows developers to use, modify, and copy the D&D gaming mechanics. The proposed changes have resulted in an uproar of protests online and elsewhere. And a recent post suggests that it goes against the spirit of the game as designed.
A recent Reddit post showed a highlighted section of the preface of D&D Player’s Handbook written by Lead Designer Mike Mearls. The handbook is, as its title implies, one of the most essential tools for a D&D player to own — in many ways, it’s the “starter set” of the game and its core gaming document. In the section, Mearls tells the readers that “D&D is yours,” “will be yours,” “you have free reign,” and that the rules of the game are “nothing without the spark of life that you give them.”