A rose by another name

[aldarron]

As certain corporate interests have a lock on the name, I've been wondering about alternate names for the territory and maybe for the castle too. One thing I note is that at times, the seat of power seems to shift between BM and Vestfold, so that the territory might sometimes be called the duchy of Vestfold. But there could be some historical names or something else that might be used. Any ideas?

[Rafael]

I wouldn't go there in your place. Wizbro has about 200 names on BM copyrighted.

One reason Havard and I are working on a completely new setting instead of a clone.

[gsvenson]

Yes, every name of anything mentioned anywhere in DA1-DA4. And they were very careful to produce a highly detailed list...

[Havard]

Vestfold is interesting since it is a region in Norway, so can you really copyright it? Also, it might be challenged by the Tolkien Estate, so might be particularly wise to stay away from that one.

I don't know if it would actually be possible to copyright generic terms like "The North", but then again you would really be at the mercy of WotC here...


-Havard

[Dave L]

Given that many of the names on the DA maps are real world names (particularly the DA3 map), it seems a bit hypocritical to copyright everything else, to stop people doing what they themselves have done.

[Havard]

Given that many of the names on the DA maps are real world names (particularly the DA3 map), it seems a bit hypocritical to copyright everything else, to stop people doing what they themselves have done.

I would agree at first glance, but I'm guessing its more of a copyright in terms of context. You would probably get away with using Mohacs as the name of a Hungarian battle field in a R/W based setting, but not as the capital of an empire in a fantasy world...

Havard

[aldarron]

Yeah, I'm not a lawyer - nor do I play one on tv - but I highly doubt any of the general sort of names with real world meanings would hold up as copyright in court if used individually, but as a group they certainly would. Oh well.

I'm perfectly certain you could use "Blackmoor" or Vestfold as names for a fantasy game setting - provided the setting itself in no way resembled Dave Arnesons.

[Rafael]

Sure.
General understanding of copyright law is usually pretty blue-eyed.

Basically, whenever something has a real world base, you can use it whenever you want.

What you cannot do is create an object that bears the danger of being mistaken for the other.

But that is a subject of interpretation; all I can say is that I would be very, very careful in your place.

In this context, you should maybe know that agreements exist between all the big game companies that make sure stuff like this doesn't happen; that's one reason why Blizzard got licenses by both Games Workshop and TSR when they did their Warcraft games.

(IIRC, Warcraft III was actually written based on the OGL/SRD. That's why we have Illithids and Yuanti there.)