https://paizo.com/community/blog/v5748dyo6si7v?Paizo-Announces-SystemNeutral-Open-RPG-License
So I get the feeling from the ORC license announcement that Pathfinder 1e development is at an official end. Since the language "1.0a products are fine" is the way Wizards wants to put it, I feel the door is closed on further game development. I hope the books are left in print at a minimum, but that status may be doubtful.
The company is pushing forward with its own Pathfinder 2e game, and 1e is being left to history.
Despite all its flaws and messy design, I still play 1e and love the game, and I know it is broken at the higher levels in many ways. The feat taxes of class builds and imbalances are notorious, and a part of me just wants to move onto 2e and look forward. Pathfinder 1e is a great game, but it shares all the deep flaws of the original OGL and SRD implementation.
I can see why Paizo loves their original 1e game, but I can also see why it is time to move on. This entire OGL mess is creating a new golden age for Paizo and breaking people out of their "5E or nothing" mental bear trap.
Thank you, Wizards, for forcing the world to walk away. In a way, they can have their small group of loyal mobile-game customers and create their "billion-dollar brand" from cellphone gaming. The rest of the world can have something "not D&D" and support the traditional tabletop experience. Both sides will come out on top here.
The 5E rules? Probably the loser here and the children in the breakup.
The 6E rules? Wait until the mobile game developers get their hands on this and start simplifying the game because "that would be too expensive and user-unfriendly to handle on a phone as written." I know software development, and when they start building the VTT, you will likely see tons of 5E rules and content tossed out the window because "it doesn't work in VTTs too well" or "it would wreck the schedule to implement."
If VTT is the game's primary focus, I feel a lot of 5E is getting tossed in the bin for 6E, just out of cost and time concerns. Especially if they want to release a complete experience next year. Do they know software development? Do they know that games can slip years behind schedule? Do they understand that cut-down experiences will generate so much user anger that it is not even worth releasing? Ask any AAA game developer; they know.
Not to mention server bandwidth and launch issues. I sure hope their team is staffed and ready for this. They would be better off partnering with a company (Blizzard, Daybreak, etc) that can do massive launches with an experienced support team. No MMO-style company launches in a year with shoestring support from a bunch of game designers; that is a disaster waiting to happen.
Wizards will either succeed hugely or go down in flames. There won't be a middle ground.
This is a messy customer divorce, but we need this to make both sides happy.
And better, the tabletop community walks away in case it is a disaster.
My goal still playing 1e was to use it for a "dark fantasy" campaign, while Pathfinder 2e was more the traditional light-hearted "adventure fantasy" game. I may be better served by switching my dark fantasy game to GURPS Dungeon Fantasy and leaving Pathfinder 1e entirely.
Pathfinder 1e has many excellent dark fantasy elements, but at this point, everything D&D-aligned leaves a bad taste in my mouth. Part of me needs a fresh start and a non-d20 game to express myself. GURPS can do horror exceptionally well, and the game is relatively well-balanced, has lethal combat, and it has optional rules for just about everything.
I am still dealing with my feelings and the fallout of this mess, which has turned my gaming world upside-down. Part of me feels this is for the better.
I need to move on.
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