[coremoff]

compounded by, in D&D's case, the fact that most of their core material uses completely generic terms; fighter, cleric, strength, wisdom.

Excepting a few, most of their monsters are generic fantasy monsters too or random combinations of "let's stick this head on this body".

The stuff that is copyrightable they do a terrible job at monetizing (Forgotten Realms, Greyhawk, Eberon, various planes, higher powers, etc.)

[thatguy0900]

Funnily enough, a lot of iconic dnd monsters like rust monster and owlbear was Gary gygax buying bags of random plastic toys and giving them statblocks. So they were themselves just statblocks for others copyrighted works.