Dragonshorn Studios, OGL, and the future

As you probably know by now, Wizards of the Coasts are meddling with OGL, the license that allows publishers like us to publish 5th and 3rd edition compatible material (and much more). WotC are trying to deauthorize OGL 1.0a and push a new license version. While we do not know how it will end up looking - the recently presented OGL 1.2 seems less harsh than previous leaks, and the moving of some parts of 5th edition rules to CC seems a decent move - we want to be able to bring adventures, encounters, and items to you no matter the outcome. We also know about ORC and that a large group of publishers is working on an alternative to OGL (us included!).

Because of that, we are diversifying and making our content available in even more TTRPG systems, so no matter what happens, we will be able to bring new stories to you.

Legacies of the Dragon and System Agnostic Adventures

Because of recent events, we do not know what the future will bring. We, however, know that we can do something to make our adventures future-proof - and we are launching Legacies of the Dragon, our system-agnostic framework for writing (and running) adventures. You may have seen it already in some of our books where we experimented with it -  Encounters Vol. VII, Rhaxir's Lost Treasures and the re-edition of In the Court of the Frozen Queen.

Legacies of the Dragon is meant to make the adventures easier to run in any fantasy TTRPG system. The framework is designed so each skill challenge, trap, and puzzle is easy to convert to the system of your choice.

In most cases, if licenses allow, we will include the essential bits in the adventure itself - like converted statblocks, magic items, and tables for the most popular systems (5th edition, 3rd edition, and Pathfinder Second Edition). We also provide ready-to-use conversion guides for several systems that will help you convert the adventure when playing in person - even if the adventure does not contain pre-converted elements.

Adventures that use the Legacies of the Dragon framework will use the Legacies of the Dragon logo at the top instead of our usual Dragonshorn Tales one.

Pathfinder Compatibility

As a part of the Legacies of the Dragon multi-system approach, we also are taking part in Pathfinder Compatibility Program. All our adventures, starting with Splintered Pyramid (out early February 2023), will be fully Pathfinder Second Edition Compatible - from the PDFs to Foundry VTT modules. If you play Pathfinder Second Edition, you will see a familiar logo on the cover.

Patreon Encounters and Magical Items

We will continue to release encounters; however, as we want to support more systems and be more system agnostic, we will move away from providing PDF files (which can get very complex for multi-system content). Instead, we will release everything to Dragonshorn Codex, where you will be able to view encounters in any system that we support (at least for newly released ones). The older encounters will land there, too, as time allows, but we will focus on the new content for now.

Magical items will follow suit - we will, however still release magic item card images, so you can either print them or show them.

Foundry modules for Encounters and Items will also gain support for additional systems, so you will be able to download compatible content there.

Final words

Finally we want to thank all of you that helped us through this uncertain time. You probably seen that we released most of the content for January long in advance, not knowing what the month will bring. That certainly made the rest of the month look bleak and empty, with no releases but worry not - we are gearing back up and we are ready to bring you some more content soon!

~Ayatee and Rughalt (with Geezer in his dinosaur costume!)