How big is your RPG collection?

[crazy_monkey1956]

A question for those with the Gargantuan collections - do yo do a lot of DMing/GMing? Do you primarily use your own home brew world or a published world?

My answers:

[sblock]
I DM about 90% of the time or more, and have an expansive home brew.
[/sblock]

My collection wishes it was Gargantuan so I'll answer anyway.

I DM about 95% of the time when I'm gaming. I homebrew almost exclusively and use published campaign setting material for ideas and inspiration.

 

[DaveMage]

A question for those with the Gargantuan collections - do yo do a lot of DMing/GMing? Do you primarily use your own home brew world or a published world?

For many, many years, I mostly DMed - it's only lately that I'm finally a player.

I would not have anywhere near as large a collection if I did not DM.

 

[SethDrebitko]

I own very little physical products. I own my Alternity books, Dangerous journeys books, 2 third party 3.5 books, Besm books...thats it. Come to think of it since I prefer M20 I don't even own standard 3.5 books anymore.

 

[Crazy Jerome]

I'm in the large group, but not sure I would make it if it weren't for the 50 odd Dungeon magazine issues. I'd be close without them, but I tend to give away or otherwise get rid of stuff that I no longer use, especially older editions that are effectively superseded by later stuff. I've also lost several things over the years, for various reasons.

 

[grodog]

Holy crap... that's some collection Grodog!

I'd need a second house to contain such a collection.

When we bought a house, I was able to move a good chunk of the collection there from my parents' home in NJ: most of my minis were still there, along with other boxes of stuff, too. I probably owned ~60% of it prior to 10 years ago, and accumulated the rest as I worked to complete my Greyhawk and Pagan Publishing collections, picked up spares here and there in lots, etc. I hope to purge ~30% or so, perhaps more, once I finished getting organized (and I'll be using the $$$ to help fund more Black Blade books ).

p.s. These Colossal collections truly amaze me. I've been gaming for almost 30 years, and GMing for most of that, but even if I had the money and space for to buy them, I could never see myself owning that many RPG books--where would I ever find the time to read them all?!?

I can't say I've read all of the books, but I have read many of them. And I've been a collector on some level almost since I started playing, since I began looking for older issues of The Dragon soon after I discovered a bookstore that carried it, so that I could get the scoop on those old Greyhawk articles.

A question for those with the Gargantuan collections - do yo do a lot of DMing/GMing? Do you primarily use your own home brew world or a published world?

I DM most of the time, although I haven't for the past 2 long campaigns I've been involved in (I'm not our current DM, and when I was still living in CA, I DM'd a short 3.0 GH campaign, but then another GH DM took over the reins around the time of 3.5's release).

I play in (wait for it ) Greyhawk predominantly, but I also have a homebrew work that's Greyhawk's "sister world" (they're planarally "close"). In the past, I have played many non-D&D RPGs, so I've done a lot of homebrewing or world building across many systems. I also like good settings, so even if I don't play a game (a statement usually appearing with "yet" after it), I'll buy the rules/setting in the hope of a) getting good ideas to steal for other games, and b) playing it later. Eclipse Phase falls solidly into that latter category for me (it and Sunward sit on my bedside table for nighttime reading, among others).

Ok, grodog wins...

...but only because he has the "Six Million Dollar Man" game.

Thanks Dave: that's actually a gift for my brother, so thanks for the reminder that I need to pack it to take to NJ for Christmas

 

[Scurvy_Platypus]

I think this thread makes it obvious that the RPG industry really makes its money on the collectors.

To a certain extent, perhaps. Probably more _now_ than it used to be.

However, the secondary market throws a big spanner into the works. For example, a fair chunk of my books came from scrounging deals on EBay and other stuff like that. So while the book value is a decent amount for my collection, the actual dollars paid is significantly less. And the rpg companies don't see a dime of the secondary market sales, so some stuff has been passed around a few times.

Digital distribution of product is changing (to an extent) the nature of the collectors as well. While some people truly embrace the digital (I don't buy physical product anymore, instead I used my Ipad), a larger percentage of the digital population is just cheap; they buy pdfs because it's cheaper but have a variety of reasons for why they turn around and print out the product themselves.

So where you'd have collectors previously that were more about the "I believe in supporting this game line because I love it so much" or they desire to have a "complete collection", collectors these days appear to either have been collecting for a decent chunk of time and that's how they've built up their collection, or the collecting of rpgs is itself part of (or a replacement for) their rpg hobby. They've either got money to burn so they collect, or they collect because they used to play/GM a bunch but with where they are now in life, playing rpgs just isn't possible. So their collection allows them to still feel connected to the hobby regardless of whether they get to play/GM or not.

 

[spades1013]

Grodog, you and I both know you have always had one of the largest (and best) private collections on the planet.

In fact, I believe we've done business together on some OD&D books a few years ago.

I just have to say, your collection seems to get more impressive by the day.

The only reason I've slacked off is that I have no interest in 4E and, otherwise, I've got just about everything I've ever wanted (and a wife who will allow the bedroom to look like a library)

 

[spades1013]

A question for those with the Gargantuan collections - do yo do a lot of DMing/GMing? Do you primarily use your own home brew world or a published world?

My answers:

[sblock]
I DM about 90% of the time or more, and have an expansive home brew.
[/sblock]

I DM a Ptolus campaign with my wife and whoever walks in.

I find that large, urban campaigns make one-on-one or walk in games easier.

I, generally, play 1E games.

Being that I no longer have a regular group, I tend to stick with the one-on-one 3E Ptolus game with my wife.

 

[Darrell]

I used to be in the "Gargantuan" range; but I sold it all off. Nowadays, I have only the "B/X" D&D boxed sets, some basic Dungeon Tiles sets, and a small collection of D&D Miniatures ... and my homemade "shelf copies" of my permutation of Microlite20, if you want to count that ... less than 6 inches of bookshelf space (down from a maximum of five entire bookshelves back around 2003-ish).

Regards,
Darrell

 

[coyote6]

I voted Gargantuan, but it might be Colossal. It's mostly in boxes right now. I should've counted when I packed.