What is your opinion of PDFS?

[Storminator]

I much prefer a physical book for reading. I much prefer a pdf for looking things up during adventure prep.

In theory the Compendium is good enough for a lot of my adventure prep. In practice I find I need to look up a lot of rules that are either not there, or I simply can't find them when I search.

PS

 

[Elf Witch]

I have a lot of PDFs most legally though I have downloaded some PDFs of books I legally own because there was no where to buy a PDF legally. I have also downloaded some out of print PDFs.

I don't have a tablet or a laptop so I mainly use hardback books at my games. I can't wait until I do because the ability to have all my books available at the game would be great. We never play at my place I don't have a table and I don't have the room.

What I enjoy about the PDFs is my ability to just print out things I need from the books I don't normally carry with me. Also I don't loan books so if I have player who wants something out of a book he does not own then I can just print out what he needs. My old gaming books have damage from being spread open to copy on a copy machine.

There is also the fact of space on bookshelves is limited.

There are a lot of game resources that I find interesting but would not use that often so I don't need them taking up space on my shelves.

I do wish that WOTC and Pazio would also make their products available in E reader format.

 

[Obryn]

I'm a lot cooler with PDFs now that I have a Nexus 7.

When it's my laptop or main PC, or (god help me) trying to parse PDFs on my (non-Fire) Kindle, I don't care for them at all.

As for the illegal PDF issue? I prefer to buy books and support authors. However, I don't like the idea that I should have to buy a book twice if I want it in two formats.

-O

 

[Balesir]

For reading rule sets - especially the more voluminous ones - I prefer a physical book, but PDFs have a solid place in how I play. In the most basic case, this is as a more portable, convenient way to store my game systems. I can carry a complete library on my Transformer, and access it anywhere.

At the more sophisticated end, I am a fan of what Kelestia Pubs, producers of Hârn material, are doing with PDFs, using their capabilities more extensively. I'm not just talking hyperlinking, but the maps they do that use layers to mix geography, settlements, vegetation, climate zones, prevailing winds, tidal gyres, plate tectonics, trade routes, annual rainfall, language zones, historic borders, present borders and more all in the same map (you just turn layers off or on to see the information you want to see). Smaller scale maps have GM-only stuff on separate layers - as well as different floors of buildings, etc. Select the layers you want, then print out or just use on-screen. Lovely jubbly!

 

[Alarian]

When it comes to reading books, I prefer my tablet, or if I'm looking for a canned adventure or some ideas for an adventure I'm preparing, I find it invaluable to be able to scan through my collection of PDF's for info. That said, once I have an adventure in mind (if I'm going to run a pre-made adventure). I MUCH prefer a hard copy version. I tend to take notes, make changes on the fly as well as scan back and forth constantly while I'm playing, and trying to do so on in a PDF just doesn't work very well. It's very slow and frustrating for me. The same is true for reference books like a DMG or Players handbook. Having to scroll through 200 pages looking for what I need is way slower in a PDF than it is to open a physical copy of the book and quickly fan through it looking for what I need.

I went through a phase a few years ago when PDF's were first being released where I thought they were the next great coming and I bought a ton. In the end, if I don't own the physical version of something I'm going to use, I tend to print it out and use the print out instead. This is even true in my on-line games that I play in and run. I have the print out sitting next to me as I run the game on the computer. (And I have 3 24" monitors, so screen real estate is not a problem at all).

 

[Grogg of the North]

I have some pdfs that I purchased or got for free (LEGALLY!).

Between the two, I really prefer the hard copy book though. Maybe its just the way some of the pdfs have been laid out, with columns as opposed to regular text, but I find it much easier to scan a book visually and much easier to flip through the pages if I'm looking for something.

 

[El Mahdi]

deleted

 

[Jester David]

I do 90% of my adventure writing and planning at work, during my breaks and lunch hour (and whenever I have those awkward 10-minute lulls between tasks when I don't want to start anything because I'll just get interrupted and half to stop halfway).
As such, I can't carry my gaming library with me (or access the PF SRD at work), I rely on a stack of PDFs on a memory stick and a SRD app on my iPad.

Back when I was running 4e, this was actually a huge hassle. I'd do 50% of my writing and then have to stop because I couldn't access any of my content, nor could I access the DDI tools, even if I brought my iPad/laptop to work. The lack of PDFs made my prep harder and cut into free time at home.

 

[Lindeloef]

to me, it really depends on the context in the pdf. I hate to read big walls of text on a screen, but i am fine with stuff like monster books and such.

but a full text search is always handy

 

[BriarMonkey]

For game prep, I will use PDFs if I have them for the books I need.

Otherwise, I prefer the actual hardcopy book.