PLEASE DO NOT BUY BOOTLEG MATERIALS!

[torilen]

Tonight, I ran across someone selling their HQ sets.
Out of curiosity - to see if they were trying to pawn off something they had 3-d printed
as the real thing, I checked out their seller page. Granted, it all seemed legit for the most
part, but they WERE including a print-off of all of the questbooks to "make it easier to flip
through the pages, instead of having to hold the questbooks down with weights".

This is a nice gesture and all, but it is a huge copyright violation and highly illegal. As I am
sure the rest of you here at the Inn feel, we would like to continue to bring others into the
wonderful Heroquest family and explore all of the thoughts and ideas we all have for the game.
We cannot do this with a clear conscience if people come here and get away with breaking the law.

Further, I went to eBay to check things out...I, personally, am horribly afraid to buy any HQ stuff
on ebay anymore, not knowing if it is real or not. Sure enough, I found a single seller selling their
own questbooks. Is this a problem in and of itself? Not really. However, they were using copyright
images from the original HQ game and questbooks and rules book. Again, highly illegal, and if
nothing else, it greatly diminishes all the work we have done here in preserving all of the REAL
HQ material in its original form.

I would just like to implore all of you here, please, if you see something that appears to be fishy,
check it out. If it is counterfeit or a fake, please do not buy it. If it includes something that is fake
or counterfeit, please do not buy it. If you have the chance, report the items.

Short story - a friend of mine...the guy who owns Inked Adventures...had some of his stuff ripped off...
someone from somewhere in Asia was selling a rip off copy of his work on ebay. He loses money by
someone doing that, and his reputation and the reputation of his quality of work could be hit hard
if someone buys the rip off and it is not up to standards.

I'm sure no one here wants something like that to be a regular, everyday thing, right?

[lestodante]

Well, I agree with you about vanishing the works and the effort someone else did.
There is an Italian seller who sells lot of Italian cards downloaded from the Italian forum, including WOM cards. MAny users reported this to ebay by they are still selling without any problem.
On the other side, I understand people buying reproduction of the WOM cards, they are so rare, especially in their Italian vesrion that not all players could afford them. Of course they can download the pdf from many sites (wich is also illegal) but then they are not able to print them in a decent way. SO they prefer to buy them from people who already printed them in a (almost) professional way. In other words, they are buying the printing service and the time spent to find the correct way to print them. But of course... it is still not legal because we are talking about copyrighted stuff.
But seems Hasbro is not caring of this or all the HQ forums should be contacted to ask to remove their downloadable files.
So if the owner itself do not care of this, why should anyone else do?
It is a different matter with custom stuff, even if using HW logos, they should ask permission to its creator to reproduce it.

[torilen]

You do make some great points, and to be honest, I'm often on the fence about this
sort of thing myself.

But, think about this: Gary Chalk did a lot of the original artwork, right? He is still
alive I believe. I know he would not get any royalties from third-hand copies of
anything being sold, but if NEW material was being produced, he should be
getting credit and should be getting paid. This is why several people here at
the Inn have actually contacted him about using his artwork for various products...
to make sure he is okay with it.

Again - I'm on the fence about it, myself - especially when it comes to older stuff
like this...like some of the older, out of print D&D stuff...like some of the old
and semi-old movies and television shows that were never produced on VHS OR
DVD.

But, copyright is copyright - trademark is trademark. I know some of the mods think
that if there was going to be a problem with the Inn, it would just be with the Inn itself
and how EVERYTHING is posted here. But I think those of us here understand it is here for
the community and for furthering the good of a game that will never be produced again.
No one here - that I am aware of - just takes stuff straight from MB and/or Games Workshop
and tries to sell it. Thantos (is that right?) has created mini's and is selling them - they are
new ideas and new products, though. I took the game, reworded stuff, expanded it, changed
it, and made my own thing. Others have done the same.

I certainly get what you're saying about the fact that people cannot find third-hand copies
without paying a hand and leg - and printing it off at home just doesn't seem the same.
And...that is one of those areas where it is hard to make a decision one way or the other.
It is a complex situation, for sure...when you take a lot of other stuff into account.

(Of course - laws outside the US are quite different, as well).

[Goblin-King]

Copyright doesn't really care about your intentions.
Some slimey scumbag selling bootleg stuff on ebay is just as illegal as friendly community members producing free content for all to enjoy.
The only difference is that companies will usually hunt down those who profit, as it's percieved they are making money the company should be making - and because people who are selling are usually more visible.
I think it's a bit of a double standard to frown on ebay sellers while we are frequenting a site that has an entire archive of copyrighted material.
And I get it... fan stuff should be free, and with the inflated price on HQ stuff it's hard to symphatize with ebay sellers. But personally I can't hate them just for selling print-outs or custom quest books.

But, think about this: Gary Chalk did a lot of the original artwork, right? He is still
alive I believe. I know he would not get any royalties from third-hand copies of
anything being sold, but if NEW material was being produced, he should be
getting credit and should be getting paid. This is why several people here at
the Inn have actually contacted him about using his artwork for various products...
to make sure he is okay with it.

Frankly, if anybody cares about artists, stop playing a dead game and buy the new Games Workshop games. They employ lots of artists who need to make a living.

[defttitan]

I understand how one can be on the fence about this.
I 100% agree that ripping off somebody's content and selling it in any way shape or form is shady, and i don't want to support that.

This view is my own, but I don't see any ethical issue with making a copy of official content to replace a broken part of your own game, especially considering that it's out-of-print and you cannot get a replacement from the original manufacturer. No selling it though!

[Thantos]

In my view, if someone was recasting and selling some of our models. Ones which were no longer in production for .. various reasons. https://i.ibb.co/DGWWxtJ/DSCN0181.jpg for example
I wouldnt be too pissed about it.
But some people have recast our current range of models which we are trying to make a living from... another guy hacked some of the 3D files and passed them off as his own creations for free downloads for everyone. (yea.. thanks robin hood of the miniatures world...)
That's annoying. It damages sales, among other things.

[Nicodemus]

Is The Sheriff and the Frog still around? His stuff was going on eBay since the early 2000s and was all re-printed. I still don't understand how it got away with it for so long.

I also caught a number of sellers over the years with printed version of my The Gathering of the Horde and The Destruction of the Tomess expansions for sale on there. Only happened maybe 4-5 times, but in only once instance did I ever hear back from the seller themselves and receive an apology. Some folks are just disappointing.

[lestodante]

I remember the Sherif and the Frog.. he was used to sell a couple of Barbarian and Elf Quest Packs each week. But I don't think they were reprinted.

[Anderas]

This thread makes me thinking. As much as I love to expand my heroquest with my own cards, I don't want to be mistaken as original.
Imagine I sell one of my Heroquests one day, and put some of my own cards inside because I have a new variant of them, still I don't want that anybody thinks this is anything but fanmade content.

I should place a remark on my own playcards. Like "Anderas HQ" where normally there is "Copyright MB 1990"

[Goblin-King]

This thread makes me thinking. As much as I love to expand my heroquest with my own cards, I don't want to be mistaken as original.
Imagine I sell one of my Heroquests one day, and put some of my own cards inside because I have a new variant of them, still I don't want that anybody thinks this is anything but fanmade content.

I should place a remark on my own playcards. Like "Anderas HQ" where normally there is "Copyright MB 1990"

I don't think this is a bad idea at all. But some random dude who buys your stuff won't know what "Anderas HQ" means.
Literally write "fan-made content" or "not official content" or something explicit like that.