Is TTRPGing an "Expensive Hobby"

[Distracted DM]

Is it expensive? It doesn't have to be, but it can be.

When we were kids it was cheap because we played with what we had. When I got older and had disposable income, I spent it on cool miniatures etc. which DO enhance the experience for me.

 

[The Soloist]

Only if you have no self-control and cannot help yourself and constantly buy the 'shiny new thing' presented on your computer screen on EnWorld!

 

[Cadence]

I think the initial cost is part of what makes people think it's expensive to start. Even if the actual cost is low, there's an up-front cost that can feel imposing. In that sense, starting an RPG hobby is more like starting a video game hobby than a sport or board game hobby.

Consider:

If you want to play a friendly, introductory game of bowling with your friends on a weekend, everybody spends a small fee to rent a lane and shoes. You play a round. Anyone who gets serious eventually buys their own shoes, ball, etc.

If you want to play a friendly, introductory game of basketball/soccer/rugby on a weekend, one person buys a ball. Everyone else shows up at a park. You play a game. Anyone who gets serious buys their own ball, shoes, gear, etc.

If you want to play a friendly, introductory game of D&D with your friends on a weekend, often at least one person buys ~$150 worth of books (PHB, DMG, MM). If people don't want to have to share PHBs, multiple people buy copies. A bunch of people buy dice. The startup cost to try the game out can easily be over $200.

If they either googled a bit, or asked someone at the FLGS, or went to Walmart or Target they would find that they could try it out with an essentials/starter kit for around $20. $20 is less than the total for three people each paying for a single game of bowling and renting shoes around here, and is less than the cost of a lane for an hour (without the shoes).

Saying the startup cost to "try the game" is $200 might be what someone who didn't look into at all thinks - just like a person who thinks they need to buy there own shoes and ball to go bowling, or own soccer nets and soccer shoes and shin guards to try soccer.

And I note that if they want to try bowling for a few hours on each of a few weekends the group of three or four will quickly blow past $150.

 

[Bagpuss]

If you want to play a friendly, introductory game of D&D with your friends on a weekend, often at least one person buys ~$150 worth of books (PHB, DMG, MM). If people don't want to have to share PHBs, multiple people buy copies. A bunch of people buy dice. The startup cost to try the game out can easily be over $200.

You can get the D&D Starter Set for between £15-£20, it has dice, rules and an adventurer to start.

If you don't fancy D&D, then you have plenty of options

• Call of Cthulhu's Starter Set - £25
• Pendragon Starter Set - £25
• Runequest Starter Set - £25
• Aliens RPG Starter Set - £35
• Tales from the Loop Starter Set - £30
• Cyberpunk Jump Start ser - erm yeah don't buy it, it is out of print and over priced.

Anyway you get the idea, there are plenty of other starter sets, each one of those has dice, characters, rules and adventurers to get you started and cost no more than a group of four going to the movies or bowling. That's before you look at the countless other RPGs that are considerably cheaper than D&D to get into.

 

[dragoner]

At one convention I almost bought dice made from a brontosaurus bone, but then I realized I'd be spending a lot of money on something I'd never roll.

I watched for a minute, it was a guy having them engraved for his spouse it seemed. Dinosaur bone? That is a special material, for sure.

 

[BookTenTiger]

There's some expense in getting the initial supplies - rule books, dice, board, minis, etc. - but nothing crazy.

Once you have those initial bits you're good to go for life, other than having to reload on pens and paper now and then.

This is my experience, too. Once I have the core books I'm pretty much done. I'm still using the same dice, miniatures, etc that I bought 15 - 20 years ago. And since I make my own adventures I'll drop a few bucks on some grid paper and pens, but that means I'm spending $20 a year on D&D.

A friend of mine, on the other hand, likes to buy every book, all the online subscriptions... So to them it is an expensive hobby.

 

[MGibster]

At one convention I almost bought dice made from a brontosaurus bone, but then I realized I'd be spending a lot of money on something I'd never roll.

I came to the same conclusion about every weird custom dice that are out there. I spent $50 on a set of metal dice for some reason and they just sit in my dice bag. They're so heavy, I don't want to roll them on anyone's table.

This is a difficult subject because expensive seems to be in the eye of the beholder. I've had people look me in the eye and tell me Warhammer 40k isn't an expensive hobby. If you want your own viable army, even a small force, you're looking at spending a few hundred dollars on miniatures, rules, paints, and painting supplies. That might get you a 500 point army, but a lot of games are played at the 2,000 point level so you're going to spend more money to get to that level if this is something you enjoy.

As I posted earlier, RPGs have always been an inexpensive hobby. That doesn't mean its free, but overall I'd have to say it's not expensive. At least not for your average person living in the western world.

 

[GrimCo]

Some of my friends started playing D&D back in 96/97. War just ended year prior, unemployment rate was around 17% ( real rate much higher), and average salary was around 380$ net/month ( exchange rate from 96). Oh, did i mention you needed to go to another country to buy books? And with all that, even then, it was dirt cheap hobby. Whole group would chip in for books and dice set, and then to the copy shop or give to someone whose parents worked in firm with access to copy machine so they can photo copy books for everyone on the table. Everything else was DIY. 25 years later, with internet, it all became much more available and cheaper. You can set up games with almost zero investment.

As for dices, my ex gifted me very nice set of metal dices that collect dust on the shelf. They are beautiful, but highly un practical. And they weren't cheap ether (around 30-40e).

 

[Velderan]

I came to the same conclusion about every weird custom dice that are out there. I spent $50 on a set of metal dice for some reason and they just sit in my dice bag. They're so heavy, I don't want to roll them on anyone's table.

Luckily there's a solution in case you haven't spent enough on the metal dice: you can also buy a dice tray. I use a set of metal dice and I always roll in a tray so I'm not leaving marks on my table. If metal dice weren't expensive enough, there's stone dice. I bought my wife a set of amethyst dice a few years back for her birthday because she loves amethyst. I think those were around $250 for a complete set.

The simple answer is the hobby is as cheap or expensive as you want it to be. Currently, I'm running a PF2e campaign on Foundry that I paid for the adventure path module. So $50 for a Foundry license, $60 for the AP module, and $5 a month for hosting on Forge (though I could just self-host for free if I wanted to) with nothing else required for my table of 6 players to play and that will keep us busy for 18 months probably. No additional books NEED to be bought with Archives of Nethys providing all of the rules. I think the most any of my players has spent is $5 for the bottom tier of a Humble Bundle to get a PDF of the Core Rulebook. I'd consider that cheap for a hobby.

Then I went and bought physical books because I prefer to have them for reading through. I've also bought a bunch of the Lost Omens line of books to learn more about Golarion. I've bought all of them from either Paizo directly or a FLGS so I'm paying the full retail price. Because of my preferences, I've spent well above what the viable minimum to play is. But that's a choice I've made.

 

[aco175]

I usually ask "compared to what" when asking questions like this. D&D can be cheap. I guess one can find free rules and adventures online and make dice like people in prison do to play. I would guess a 'player' needs to invest 100-200$ to really get going with some books and dice and a few figures and some peripheries such as a dice bag or rolling tray and a good set of pencils and such. It can be 100's of dollars like others have said above as well.

I like to play golf and D&D is way cheaper each year, and likely over my lifetime of playing 40 years. I guess golf can be rather varied in expense as well with a started set with all the clubs and bag and such for $300, but then you still pay for playing each time. I would guess an average bag of clubs with more name brands being about $1800. I mean a new driver is $600 and a putter is $300 nowadays. A lot of places charge $50 just to walk around the course each week.