can't they get sued? - Page 5

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http://www.glyphweb.com/arda/e/eldar.html

Don't Elves as we think of them now mostly come from Tolkien? Or am I wrong?|||Quote:








Both

http://www.glyphweb.com/arda/e/eldar.html

Don't Elves as we think of them now mostly come from Tolkien? Or am I wrong?




You're right. Elves as we think of them come from Tolkien. Only thing that does not comes from Tolkien about them is the name "elf". But they are originally called Quendi so I don't see any problem about that.|||Quote:










Anyway, I think that eldars are a kind of elves and not simply another way to call them, just, for example like the avari are, correct me if I'm wrong.




Ofc, but thing is before Tolkien introduced Human race which came into Beleriand no one called them "elves" they were simply called Quendi. Eldar is one of the big factions, you're right about that. :}


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About suing Blizzard, imagine how some people will act if they put an elf as the archer class (which could be awesome)




Haha, they would start whining "OMFG Elves are from Warhammer, Blizzard stole it" :}}}} I always laugh at such naive comments :}|||Quote:








Everything is an altered copy of something else, Blizzard games are no different in that rule.

You are an altered copy of your parents and the environment, and they are of there parents and so on.

Prius is an altered copy of an old, polluting Ford which is an altered copy of a carriage.

The Mona Lisa is an altered copy of cave-man drawing.

Get the picture?




Yikes, that post is an altered copy of a stretch. And this post is an altered copy of a bad joke.|||Quote:








Yikes, that post is an altered copy of a stretch. And this post is an altered copy of a bad joke.




No joke. Just trying to simplify the term pastiche. Badly, I'll give you that |||On the other hand, trademarks do appear where less expected.

On the subject at hand, the word "Hobbit" is actually one of many Tolkien estate trademarks. On the early days of D&D there was an actual threat to sue when the very first edition used 'Hobbit' and 'Ent'.

While these words are definitely Sir Tolkien constructions and non existing on this context until then, my personal opinion is that the trademark is abusive (and most probably against Tolkien wishes, given his strong desire for his work to be seen as the missing Britain mythos).

In any case, just wanted to mention the fact that, unfortunately, not everything is free to grab. Not even under fair use.|||Considering that a great deal of the content in this thread is:

a)hard to read

b) meaningless/poorly thought out

c) both

- it's nice to see some useful information in here.|||How about...

All it takes to sue anyone or any legal entity is the filing fee.

Winning a lawsuit, however, is a whole different ballgame.|||Many of the generic Fantasy tropes that you see in many fantasy games nowadays (Dwarves, Elves, Wizards, Barbarians, Magic, etc) are essentially part of the Public Domain.

Think of it this way: How difficult would it be to write a "Fantasy" story that didn't involve anything you've ever seen in a fantasy story before? The general Fantasy Ideas are not copyrighted material, only the specific instances of those ideas as they were presented in the original source.

Like, if Blizzard decided to introduce Drizzt Do'Urden into Diablo 3, without the express consent of Wizards of the Coast and anyone else who holds the copyright, they can be sued. However, if they decided to make you fight a Dark Elf who just happened to wield 2 swords, and wasn't overwhelmingly similar to Drizzt, there'd be no problem. The same goes for a character like Legolas. If you add Legolas to your story without consent, BAM, lawsuit. If you add a blonde elven archer. No issue.|||Quote:








How about...

All it takes to sue anyone or any legal entity is the filing fee.

Winning a lawsuit, however, is a whole different ballgame.




I like this idea - however I'm guessing you're not gonna get even that far if the case is deemed....worthless to begin with.