A handy thing is the Orc AxE (answers and explanations).
You seem to have linked the wrong page. Here is the correct one.
I'm incredibly disappointed that the licence forces all mechanics into being open. Back when it was first being talked about, the flexibility for creators to pick and choose what of their mechanics they could release was a big part of the discussion.
While I want as many creators as possible to release all of their mechanics for others to use, I also think they should be able to withhold any mechanics that they think are particularly important to their business model. I think creators whose primary creative work is entirely mechanical should be able to profit off of that creation if they want. The inflexible nature of this licence disappointingly simply cuts off that business model as a viable option.
I primarily produce game content of a mechanical nature (spells, magic items, etc.), with very little content that could be considered Reserved Material. With so little to hold back as “mine,” it feels like my publishing strategy gets fewer protections under the ORC than others who have a higher percentage of non-mechanical material they can hold back for themselves. Is there a way I can designate more of my mechanical content as Reserved Material?
No. While creating this type of mechanical content may involve just as much effort as creating Reserved Material, copyright protection is not based on “sweat of the brow.” All users of the ORC License agree to contribute all of their mechanical content to downstream users. If that contribution does not fit your publishing strategy, or you feel that doing so is too generous, it is likely that the ORC License is not the best option for that product.
I don't think there is such thing as a "closed" mechanic. As far as I know, these things are not copyrightable at least in US law.
The bottom line on that matter is: we don't know. It's never been tested in court.
What we do know for sure is that underlying base mechanics can't be copyrighted. You can't copyright the idea of "roll a die and add a number".
But what we as players of RPGs call "mechanics" generally include a large variety of far more creative works. Things that might be protectable by copyright because they're actually more like works of creative expression that actual "mechanics" as the law defines the term. Feats, class abilities, even the basic concept of "characters apply an ancestry at first level" might be copyrightable. If I had to guess I'd say that last one probably isn't, but the specific feats, class abilities, and ancestry statistics probably are protectable.
My opinion is that it's disappointing that Paizo is forcing everyone to open up all the content they've created if they want to use the ORC licence. I wanted to see a world where almost every creator would choose to use ORC to open up a significant chunk of their work, even if they hold back some of it selectively. But if they can't be selective, they may just choose not to use ORC at all, and end up keeping far more closed overall than they would be under a less restrictive ORC licence. This is particularly frustrating as ORC is a viral licence, so users who are offput by needing to make all their creations publicly available will also not be able to create any content for games that are ORC-licenced.
