Technical questions about Reforged

[MN Lahmar]

Hello guys,

I have a series of technical questions about Warcraft 3 Reforged. (mainly concerning the WE and map making, that's why i posted in this forum.)

1) Can we still protect our maps?

2)When you are connected to battlenet via the internet and you have your unprotected map in the maps folder or on your computer or even if you want to play it solo for testing purposes or while you open it with the WE. Is there a possibility that it can be stolen by others or even by Blizzard without your consent?

3)Any new updates about Reforged EULA? I mean the fact that Blizzard will claim your map without even giving you credit.

4-a)I have Warcraft 3 classic patch 1.26a, which i legally own, that i copied and hid in my computer before upgrading to 1.30. Can i still use it when i have Reforged also installed on my computer?
4-b)I've seen that there will be a problem with the WE concerning the windows registry. Is that fixable? Will i be able to switch when i want to open 1.26a WE then maybe go back to Reforged WE?

5) Can i play offline? If i wanna just play the campaign or solo maps.

 

[Zwiebelchen]

1) You never could. The act of protecting a map was merely damaging it to the point it could no longer be opened in the WE without applying some hackery. That hasn't changed.

2) No. Blizzard can technically steal it as soon as you test it in a private game as it is still hosted on Battlenet, but why would they care?

3) No.

4) I suggest putting your 1.26 install on a virtual machine to avoid registry conflicts.

5) You can only play the campaign offline.

 

[disruptive_]

1) That's something you decide for yourself i guess. The EULA and the Custom Game Acceptable Use Policy are the documents that rule the use of all software and assets we got from Blizzard, including the mods you make with the Editor, and i can't find a disposition that says something about "protection" or using tools ("no cheats" and "no reverse engineering" is the only prohibition that comes close). The Policy doesn't say anything regarding protecting or unprotecting your map but it does say that you can't put and enforce discriminations regarding of who can PLAY it. Maybe somebody can show me the document that says that we can't protect maps.
Legally, i don't see the point on protecting your map anyway, because should you have any IP on it, exceptuating trade secrets and DMCA-equivalent law rights (right to access a copyrighted work that has DRM on it; map protection could arguably be an "effective DRM" that restricts access to the work -source code-), you don't lose them just because your work is accesible to the public.

2) No.

3) No news and it will probably stay there forever and onwards. Nobody will ever know for sure what are the real effects, if any, of that EULA clause, until it is tested on a trial. But the absolute WEAKEST legal interpretation of all is the one that says that you give your IP related rights, specially copyrights, to Blizzard just by virtue of accepting the EULA. My take is that that clause is a promise we make with Blizzard so we assign them our IP, eventually, so we must not mess up in the meantime (like ie. assigning our IP to a third party without the consent of Blizzard). You could get more clarity by reading your copyright law in the "ownership/ownership of rights" section and what rules applies to assignments and exclusive licenses.

Spoiler

On works that are made by one person, INITIAL ownership belongs, AS A GENERAL RULE, to the creator.
Exceptions are "work-for-hire" cases, ie. programmers and artists contracted or comissioned by Blizzard (on these cases the INITIAL owner is Blizzard and not the programmer/artist).
I doubt a judge will say that this EULA creates a work-for-hire relation (ie. we are not getting payed to mod), so Blizzard can't assume INITIAL OWNERSHIP. Blizzard doesn't have the power to create other "work-for-hire" hyphotesis or exceptions to the rule, because Blizzard is not the Congress of your country.
But if Blizzard doesn't have INITIAL OWNERSHIP they could attain SECONDARY ownership by virtue of an assignment (the actual INITIAL owner gives his rights voluntarily to the interested person; think of a good old sale in which the author sells his rights to another person, that by this act, becomes the new owner) which are allowed by most if not all copyright systems on the planet.
The thing is these assignments are often formal acts (ie. in my country these acts recquire the presence of a notary; on other systems they must be signed by the INITIAL author, they might recquire registration on a public office; maybe some of these recquisites are needed or are convenient to prove the existence of the assignment on a trial, etc) and are hardly ever free of charge, as most copyrights systems comprehend rights regarding some kind of remuneration for authors when either licensing but specially when assigning rights (the EULA also doesn't specify that the assigned must be free, and even then, it is understanded that the rights to due remuneration can't be waived).
Since Blizzard can be SECONDARY OWNER, on a potential trial, Blizzard will then need to prove the existence of an assignment. I highly doubt that a lawyer will say to Blizzard: "this digital EULA is enough to prove in court that the modder XXXX assigned his/her rights to us" (because ie. the EULA is not signed, is not registered on any office, there is no prove of actual payment, there is no prove of a certain date, etc). I, for instance, will never recomend that, because if you can't prove ownership on a copyright trial you are simply fucked to death. Also renouncing/waving paternality over a work (the right to be attributed as the author) might no be allowed by your law, so if that is your case, you simply don't have to worry about being forgotten anymore (i know that England allows for waving moral rights, but this is very rare).

4) See the post above.

5) See the post above. You will need to always connect to Battle.net. Once connected you can load the game, tab down, and then disconnect your internet. The game will put you in offline mode and you can play single player custom games also.

 

[Dr Super Good]

1) Can we still protect our maps?

Yes, you can still obfuscate your map and delete editor only files.

2)When you are connected to battlenet via the internet and you have your unprotected map in the maps folder or on your computer or even if you want to play it solo for testing purposes or while you open it with the WE. Is there a possibility that it can be stolen by others or even by Blizzard without your consent?

If it gets upload to their map share server, which I think they now have, then in theory Blizzard has access to it. However it is improbable that they will ever do anything with it, or even care. I guess they could get hacked and it could then be stolen, but the sort of person capable of that would not care about something as worthless as a Warcraft III map.

3)Any new updates about Reforged EULA? I mean the fact that Blizzard will claim your map without even giving you credit.

SC2 operated this for a long time. As far as I am aware no one has run into serious issues with it and Blizzard.

4-a)I have Warcraft 3 classic patch 1.26a, which i legally own, that i copied and hid in my computer before upgrading to 1.30. Can i still use it when i have Reforged also installed on my computer?
4-b)I've seen that there will be a problem with the WE concerning the windows registry. Is that fixable? Will i be able to switch when i want to open 1.26a WE then maybe go back to Reforged WE?

I guess you could run a separate OS install just to run these. Otherwise there may be compatibility issues as Warcraft III was never designed to support multiple installs at the same time.

5) Can i play offline? If i wanna just play the campaign or solo maps.

You probably still need to authenticate that you own Warcraft III by logging in once. But after that for the next month or so it should work offline. Similar to StarCraft II.