The judge, S. Kate Vaughn, has made a ruling denying the injunction to prevent TSR LLC/Dungeon Hobby Shop Museum/Justin LaNasa from further promoting Star Frontiers: New Genesis for the duration of the trial.
While this might seem to be a victory for LaNasa, but it's really more adverting of a disaster - injunctions are inherently difficult to obtain in the civil system and courts will generally err on the side of caution since it something that can have a major (even catastrophic) impact on a party before a full trial is held. Had Wizards succeeded with the injunction, it would have signaled the judge seeing the trial as a near foregone conclusion.


The judge has cited three key areas for the decision denying the injunction.
Dispute over validity of the (very) offensive copy
A key element of the judge's assessment was that there is a dispute over a key part of the evidence, specifically the copy of the Star Frontiers: New Genesis work in progress document that includes the deplorable content such as the "Negro" race and the jokes about making a trans race (referred to as the "Subpoenaed SFNG"). Specifically, Justin LaNasa claims it is not real, and certainly was not to be distributed to anyone.
Wizards of the Coast has submitted evidence that it is real (ie the meta data), but without it being beyond dispute - this makes this the sort of thing that the judge would, later in the trial - either rule on or ask the jury to rule on based on all the evidence and arguments put forward by both sides after full discovery, depositions and cross examination.
It is not unusual for a judge to refuse to decide the facts at this stage in a proceeding - though notably that this is a matter of concern suggests that had the judge been confident the validity of the document, they may have explored the areas of reputational harm.

Lack of danger of irreparable harm
As covered in the final sentence, the judge does consider that the official (under penalty of perjury) disavowal of the material essentially neutralizes all potential harm - particularly since there was also a statement made in the oral arguments that they do not intended to publish a Star Frontiers: New Genesis product until the completion of the court case.
If that sounds like they diffused the injunction by effectively agreeing to it voluntarily, that's because they basically did.
Though the judge elaborates she did not feel Wizards of the Coast has provided "concrete" evidence of potential harm, and seems to doubt the potential of a company that hasn't published anything to harm a mega corporation's products (they also acknowledged the cards as a complaint, but did not feel the playing cards were quite bad enough to require an injunction).

Lack of clarity on the history of the marks
I've left this point until last as it seems to be relatively minor compared to the other two, but is also interesting in that it seems to be a little bit instructional from the judge on how she would like to see the proceedings go ahead.
The judge also cites as a dispute of fact, whether Wizards of the Coast has maintained ownership of the marks - pointing to NuTSR's claim that the use of marks on Gygax Magazine extinguished ownership - to the extent that they apparently raised this point again at oral arguments and so this seems to be a basket they're putting a lot of eggs into.
![A screenshot from the judgement with highlighted text "Counterclaim Defendants dispute Wizards' alleged ownership interest. They point, for example, to the absence of evidence showing Wizards' continuous use of the Marks since its 1997 acquisition of TSR, Inc. or showing Wizards' protection of its exclusive use of the Marks as would be required to maintain ownership. (Mr. LaNasa states: "For example, Jayson Elliot, Ernie Gygax, and Luke Gygax used the TSR Mark... between 2011 and 2019 without any assertion of superior rights by [Wizards] that I am aware of." A screenshot from the judgement with highlighted text "Counterclaim Defendants dispute Wizards' alleged ownership interest. They point, for example, to the absence of evidence showing Wizards' continuous use of the Marks since its 1997 acquisition of TSR, Inc. or showing Wizards' protection of its exclusive use of the Marks as would be required to maintain ownership. (Mr. LaNasa states: "For example, Jayson Elliot, Ernie Gygax, and Luke Gygax used the TSR Mark... between 2011 and 2019 without any assertion of superior rights by [Wizards] that I am aware of."](https://staging.cohostcdn.org/attachment/cbe5de6f-220d-4916-beef-c2060d27c709/Screenshot%202022-12-15%20205956.jpg)
The judge then went on to elaborate on Wizards' response in a manner that suggests she is expecting them to not just put all the eggs in the "evidence of use" basket - and would like them to address this in some capacity.

Obviously the final decision on how much that matters will be up to the jury, but this is probably useful information for Wizards of the Coast to have on hand as they move forward into the main trial. No such titbits for NuTSR other than... um... yeah put off making any Star Frontiers: New Genesis stuff until... where's that schedule again...

Guess they're going to have some time to brainstorm ideas.
