I'm planning to write a book based on a game of Dungeons and Dragons. The rest of the people in my party will get credit as will the DM, who wrote the adventure. If I change the things that were created solely by WotC, such as "Tiefling," and because the idea did not come from one the quest books, would it be considered copyright?
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2\$\begingroup\$ Welcome to the site! You may want to try law.stackexchange.com \$\endgroup\$– SPavelCommented May 8, 2016 at 3:18
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5\$\begingroup\$ I'm voting to close this question as off-topic because this is about publishing a novel, and draws only somewhat on RPG player expertise. This question should be taken to Writing, which offers tags such as [copyright] and [publishing], and is the optimal expert audience to receive a question on book production and publishing. \$\endgroup\$– doppelgreenerCommented May 8, 2016 at 3:57
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5\$\begingroup\$ I've reopened this. We have a [publishing] tag, and judging from precedent we take questions about the relationship between RPG properties and novels, so the tag isn't just for questions about publishing RPG manuals. A few of our most directly-related questions: Is it legal to write and publish a novel based on a pre-existing campaign or setting?, Is it legally okay to blog a D&D 5e story (actual play), Writing a book from D&D adventures? \$\endgroup\$– SevenSidedDieCommented May 8, 2016 at 5:17
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3\$\begingroup\$ Possible duplicate of Is it legal to write and publish a novel based on a pre-existing campaign or setting? \$\endgroup\$– DuckTapeAlCommented May 8, 2016 at 7:38
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2\$\begingroup\$ @DuckTapeAl That one is about wanting to use the setting specifically including copyrighted details, this one is about avoiding using the exact setting while using one's own group's story that was originally in it. Related, but not duplicate. \$\endgroup\$– SevenSidedDieCommented May 8, 2016 at 17:13
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I'm not an expert on copyright law, but I'm fairly sure that there isn't any reason you couldn't write a story based on a D&D campaign. As long as you make sure to change anything that may be specifically owned by Wizards of the Coast (like your example with tieflings) or part of an established cannon(I think the default setting for d&d is the forgotten realms.) An example I would give for something similar to your question would be the webcomic Darken(http://darkencomic.com/) which draws many elements and tropes from D&D and the forgotten realms, but is (to my knowledge) not infringing upon anyone's copyrights.
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2\$\begingroup\$ Many elements and tropes from D&D are not unique or original to D&D... \$\endgroup\$– AdeptusCommented May 9, 2016 at 1:27
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\$\begingroup\$ A lot of people associate D&D with a certain set of fantasy tropes, even if many of them originated with older works, like The Lord of the Rings and Tolkien's writing in general. \$\endgroup\$– JonathanCommented May 9, 2016 at 1:30
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1\$\begingroup\$ If nothing else, works like "Dragonlance" indicates that not only can you base a series of books on your house campaign, you may even be able to publish it as a set of source books... \$\endgroup\$– VatineCommented May 9, 2016 at 9:42
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\$\begingroup\$ @Vatine The IP and copyright for Dragonlance is owned by Wizards of the Coast though. \$\endgroup\$– LaurelCommented Feb 28, 2019 at 4:58