Deck Play Testing
TappedOut forum
Posted on May 3, 2021, 9:27 p.m. by AdwinBalkar
So this might be a stupid question, but how do I playtest my deck against someone elses?
Femme_Fatale says... #3
The fact that we would be providing an alternate way to play a game that we do not own any rights to free of charge? Should be pretty self-explanatory.
May 5, 2021 2:26 a.m.
AdwinBalkar says... #4
Sorry, but that isn't an alternate way to play the game. Just a different deck make up. There are no legal pretenses that can be used to argue that. You are playing by the same rules and using the cards that they released. If someone could pull that argument off then by rights this ENTIRE site violates that because of the fact that you can still playtest the other person's deck. Now, if it was against their wishes then that would be one thing, but the fact that you can make your deck private negates that argument.
May 5, 2021 7:37 p.m.
Mcat1999 - I assume you're not an attorney because you managed to get... pretty much all your armchair lawyering wrong. As an attorney myself, I quite understand where yeaGo is coming from.
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Copyright is not "predicated on you claiming the identity for yourself"--it is predicated on using copyrighted materials of another for your own end. I do not have to claim that I wrote Outlaw: Champions of Kamigawa to be in violation of a copyright; I merely have to reproduce it (or heavily rip off elements of it, etc.).
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Starting to use TappedOut as a competitor to Wizards' online products could open TappedOut up to liability. Though Wizards has taken a somewhat lackadaisical approach to protecting their rights from online competitors, that doesn't mean they might not one day.
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Copyright does not require the violator to profit in order to be a violation.
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Piracy isn't a separate issue from copyright violation--it's just the more colloquial term for infringement, usually applied in a digital setting.
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There is a difference between kitchen table proxies and TappedOut; TappedOut generates income from its website. When you use someone else's copyrighted materials to generate your own profits, you run into additional liability problems. Though TappedOut might not profit directly from the playing in such a situation, it still profits from the site, and such a playtesting feature would be quite a draw for potential new users (and thus new revenues).
Wizards has turned a blind eye to other sites that allow online play; but they do not have to turn a blind eye. TappedOut wants to avoid potential liability by avoiding legal grey areas. It's a perfectly understandable, entirely logical position to take.
May 5, 2021 8:48 p.m.
AdwinBalkar says... #6
Caerwyn That makes more sense. I was laboring under the illusion that the person was stating that the sites were facing suits from the people who had their decks play tested. That was what I was saying had no legal precedence for a lawsuit.
May 5, 2021 10:11 p.m.
I don't think it would really add much, a lot of work to basically recreate that which already exists
May 6, 2021 4:05 p.m.
Femme_Fatale says... #8
This site already has a practically never ending amount of features to implement and redesign, don't think we need something that 10 other sites and programs do that both requires a large team's constant attention and that WotC/Hasbro are turning a blind eye to. They didn't always turn a blind eye in the past, and for something as large as tappedout I don't want to have them suddenly not be turning a blind eye anymore again.
Femme_Fatale says... #2
Playtesting against someone else's deck is treading on dangerous legal ground. Some programs already got hit in the past and tappedout does not want to follow them.
May 4, 2021 10:22 p.m.