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This question references dnd-spells.com, which is not an official WoTC and property and has even been temporarily shut down by them in the past.

What is the policy on these references?

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You may link to non-official sites. It's fine. We have for a long time facilitated links to d20srd, d20pfsrd, Fate SRD, dandwiki and so on, where none of those are official. There's no problem here.

The exception is if the site is basically a piracy database. Our stance is to not link to such sites:

When we encounter these sources, revise the post to reference an official source instead — we don't want to appear to support or endorse their existence. I recommend you assume that anyone reading owns the books they need, so a feature/section name combined with a book name and page number will often be enough, and an SRD link would be beneficial if available.

As for legitimate non-official sites you may link to and reference whatever you like.

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    \$\begingroup\$ I wasn't sure if dnd-spells was considered Piracy. I do know that whenever WoTC does their cease/desist that site seems to get shut down and then returns. \$\endgroup\$
    – NotArch
    Jun 14, 2017 at 12:41
  • \$\begingroup\$ @NautArch I'll do some investigation, and for now I'll just revise that post to reference the Heroism spell by name. \$\endgroup\$
    – doppelgreener
    Jun 14, 2017 at 12:47
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    \$\begingroup\$ When we see those, is it best just to change the reference to an official source (PHB, etc?) \$\endgroup\$
    – NotArch
    Jun 14, 2017 at 12:49
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    \$\begingroup\$ Yes. We don't want to lend any legitimacy to piracy sites. \$\endgroup\$
    – doppelgreener
    Jun 14, 2017 at 12:52
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    \$\begingroup\$ We've confirmed dnd-spells.com is engaged in illegal piracy. \$\endgroup\$
    – doppelgreener
    Jun 14, 2017 at 13:45
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    \$\begingroup\$ @doppelgreener, the larger point, imho, is that answers on this site are supposed to endure, and so regardless of the site's policy on piracy, posting links to piracy websites hurts the long-term integrity of an answer. Piracy website links are INHERENTLY unstable, and thus make bad resources for answers. \$\endgroup\$
    – godskook
    Jun 14, 2017 at 15:02
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    \$\begingroup\$ @godskook That is our stance in the link from the middle bullet point, yeah. \$\endgroup\$
    – doppelgreener
    Jun 14, 2017 at 15:04
  • \$\begingroup\$ @dopple Isn't that the stance on all links? That the relevant text should be copy-pasted in to avoid link-rot/death? \$\endgroup\$
    – Exempt-Medic
    Feb 16, 2020 at 4:42
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    \$\begingroup\$ @Medix2 What you describe just now, and what godskook describes in their first sentence, is our general stance on links. But "piracy links are inherently unstable and thus make for bad resources" is our stance on linking to piracy sites: all websites are temporary, but piracy sites have their days numbered in ways other sites do not. \$\endgroup\$
    – doppelgreener
    Feb 16, 2020 at 12:45
  • \$\begingroup\$ And you don't want to paste in everything. Pasting in the full text of every e.g. spell anyone is talking about is pointless and harmful. A hyperlink reference to a game item for someone who wants it is a nicety (and not required), but shouldn't turn into every question having walls of pasted rules text (lest we become a pirate site ourselves). \$\endgroup\$
    – mxyzplk
    Feb 17, 2020 at 18:24

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