Which of you buys PDF products? I, personally, have only bought one or two non-physical products before. I have legitimate PDFs of most of my Indie games, as well as a few of my other games.
How many of you buy PDFs, and does anyone here ONLY buy PDFs?
I don't buy only PDFs, in fact I buy mostly print.
I do have about 15 PDFS though and I bought most of them.
I buy many PDFs.
I don't buy only PDFs. I do consider a print product value added. In fact, it's a hard sell for me to shell out more than 50% or print MSRP for the PDF version of the product.
How many? I count 161 from RPGNow. I probably have about 20 from DTRPG and maybe 10 from ENGS. That's not counting free, review or complimentary products.
I mostly buy d20 supplements. To be fair, many of them are small ( < $2).
I've bought a few PDFs, but I found the copies I had printed out and stuck in a binder to be lacking ... something. This summer I switched to buying hardcopies only. What can I say; I love books.
I bought a couple of the Forge game PDFs to try out, but the narrativist stuff leaves me cold, so there won't be any more of those.
I've bought more PDFs than physical RPG products lately anyway, picking up out-of-print classic games and a few new publications. Their being cheaper, immediately deliverable, and not needing any shelf space has sort of made up for the inconvenience of the PDF format.
Sort of. If I were buying anything I actually expected to use often during game sessions, I'd want a file decently formatted for screen reading, or a book. PDF is grossly inconvenient for reading onscreen and I haven't found printouts all that handy either.
I'm too old-fashioned. RPGs are made of paper, and that's that.
And I'm not about to furnish said paper myself. That's part of the RPG maker's job.
I've purchased exclusively pdfs for new products for the last year, as my post baby-birth budget couldn't keep up with my fav game release schedule buying the print versions.
I've started with the pdfs, and I love the way they treat my wallet (except for the geniuses who keep their prices at 70%+ of the hardcopy, but I make a point not to buy from them.)
They are lacking, though. I get eye fatigue from the screen, and I miss having a big, clunky book in my hands. I'd never get a WFRP book in pdf for just those reasons. DotV or Iron Guantlets, though...
I buy some pdfs. Often I will buy modules or similar game aids (e.g. towns and cities) as pdfs, since I tend to mark them up during play, and I don't feel bad about doing this with a pdf I printed up at work.
As for rules, though, I will only get the pdf if a book is not available, or the pdf is free (e.g. HARP Lite).
I buy PDFs if they are cheap. If something costs more than $10, I'd rather spend more money to get a printed version if one is available. Since PIG has a PDF printing service for our customers (using a high-speed printer), I could easily print them out myself in a few minutes, but that means more work to bind them, etc. and I've got enough to do ;)
I really don't get $20+ PDFs or the people who buy them :)
All the time. I've got.. shit, I don't know exactly how many. A lot.
I do buy pdfs, but usually cheap ones, like the map series from 01 Games and Darkfuries, as well as little supplements I think will be useful for world building. I don't think I've ever purchased a pdf much over $10, if ever. I picked up a lot of old D&D books for next to nothing from RPGNow. DrivethruRPG has some good freebies now and again, but I can't see how folks pay $20-30 for some of those pdfs. :confused:
I have a half-a-dozen PDFs that I purchased. I still have trouble on some internal level with "buying air." I can't bring myself to purchase audio or video content, either. And don't even think of asking me to buy a "ring tone" for my cell phone. I don't use "pay-per-view" figuring that for a little more than double, I can get a DVD that will let me watch the movie as oft as I want.
The idea that people would "buy air" is baffling to me. I am simply not prepared to the "new economy" that is coming based upon paying for content.
Mind you, I've done it. I've purchased PDFs when the game isn't available any other way or, in one unique instance, I purchased the PDF at a low cost, which was refunded to me in the purchase price of the printed product at a later date (though this was personally arranged and not a general practice).
I consider any publisher who charges more than 50% of the printed cover price for their PDF to be deliberately attempting to fleece their own fans and that publisher loses both my PDF purchase and gains my ire (which eliminates any future physical purchases, as well).
I usually buy PDFs but then I don't buy that much stuff any more, having bought everything I need in the past and being remarkably immune to hype.
But having said that $35 for the Great Pendragon Campaign? Fuck off.. Fuck RIGHT off. That's 70% of the dead tree version.
I've bought 15-20 pdfs. There are things that love and things that I hate about them.
Electronic copies are great for editing/grabbing out bits, just paste parts into a word processor for handouts for making lists of allowable extra rules, etc.
They take less space - I can have a whole library on the laptop. They're cheaper some times - I rarely print out more than bits.
Like everyone else I won't buy them when they are near the cost of the print version, >40-50%.
A combination of two factors keep me from buying more. First, the quality of most (but not all) pdf-only products is low, and I'm not talking about the crappy art. Many of them are poorly edited and poorly thought out. The other issue is lack of previews of many beyond a short, poorly worded marketing blurb. With a printed book, I can leaf through to decide whether it's worth it. So, I don't take risks on pdfs from unknown authors (or ones of known dubious quality)unless there is a decent preview of several pages and the table of contents.
Quote from: NicephorusElectronic copies are great for editing/grabbing out bits, just paste parts into a word processor for handouts for making lists of allowable extra rules, etc.
I am planning on buying some PDF's of games I already own in print for precisely this reason: the print copy for casual reading, and the PDF for putting together player handouts. I really wish that Black Library would do PDF's of its products because it would make life much easier for me as a GM. ;)
Quote from: JMcL63I am planning on buying some PDF's of games I already own in print for precisely this reason: the print copy for casual reading, and the PDF for putting together player handouts. I really wish that Black Library would do PDF's of its products because it would make life much easier for me as a GM. ;)
about half of the PDFs I own, I already have a print copy of.
They are great for searching for stuff and you can printout chargen aids and things like that.
The only PDF I paid for in any sense was the PDF of Dogs in the Vineyard, which came with my print order. It's really nice to have it around so I can quickly locate a rule, so I appreciate that "feature" of a publisher's policy.
For me to buy a PDF alone it'd either have to be a game that's only available in that format (in which case, I suppose I might pay up to $10) or much cheaper than the print version (and still under $10).
I'm in the cheap pdf camp. Many things I can do without or would rather have a print version of (if available). But when a company comes out with good maps, then I sit up and take notice (and take out my credit card ;) ). Oone Games, of course, has gotten some of my bucks.
Quote from: pigames.netI really don't get $20+ PDFs or the people who buy them :)
I've seen some very pretty PDFs out there, with all the bells and whistles. Bookmarked to hell and back, text search, multiple layers so you can decide if you want to spend ink in ornate page borders or pictures, etc...