How do I thin my collection? How do YOU thin your collection?

[crazy_monkey1956]

I avoid the potential "seller's regret" by only selling things that are available digitally. I recently scoured every PDF selling site and compared their inventories to my physical collection. Anything I could buy in PDF (or already had in PDF), went into the sell pile, with the exception of core rulebooks and a few other "collector's items."

 

[Mark CMG]

Locally is the Games Plus auction twice a year, Fall and Spring -

http://www.games-plus.com/auction.htm

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

Not that this should be the deciding factor, but in the US at least, donations are also tax write offs.

Yep.

I don't usually bother, though. Too much a tracking of small $$$ stuff makes it more trouble than its worth.

At one point, I used to raid my Half-Price Books locations for good game books, then I'd go to Lone Star Comics (Irving, Tx location) to buy dice and donate them there- they had a program set up to send stuff to US servicemen serving in the Middle East theaters.* I don't know how many 3Ed Core3 + OA sets I sent, along with some HERO 4th, Ars Magica and GURPS.







* I'd also buy good paperback anthologies or single book novels in the Sci-Fi, fantasy and horror genres for donation at the same place.

 

[Mr. Greengoat]

Thanks for the advice so far. Sorry if this decends into intense gamer navel-gazing.

And good suggestions for charity give-aways, I kinda imagine all those soldiers on tour are out there rolling dice in a tent somewhere. It must be a bitch to get funny dice in some theaters of operation.

I don't think my "anxiety" reaches into mental health levels quite yet, although you would have to ask my wife.
It is more like a subconcious anger that I am slightly preoccupied with where I would put my game books when I have other more pressing vital issues that I should be thinking about in the back of my mind. Perhaps it is a stress response that I learned when I first started buying game-stuff as a teen.

Example:
Should I ditch this system for that? Will I never find someoneone to play 4e with in a year? I only really play basic D&D anyway. Etc.
It is almost as if I want to purge the works to eliminate my frittering attention to it.

Anyway, I have recently moved and I technically have more space for it, but I don't want to be a junk collector. I have approximately 20 tightly packed plastic banker-boxes full of books and crates of some metal miniatures and larger GW games from back in the day. (Adeptus Titanicus was awesome.) Minis are evergreen and I will hold onto them.

My experinces with getting rid some of my stuff:
sold big Car Wars collection (bought it all back later and played the hell out of it)
sold Starfleet Battles (bought it all back later and played)
sold Palladium Books (bought a couple books back and instantly wondered why I did('cause rifts is wacky))
sold original Space Hulk (goddamnit)
sold a bunch of GURPS books, bought a bunch of different GURPS book, haven't played in a long while.
sold a total Hackmaster collection because I play OSR now, no regrets
gave away Traveller reprints, no regrets because of pdfs
gave away good Pendragon collection but then played Pendragon campaign with person I gave it to (good trade)

I think the moral of the story is that for every book I ditch I replace it with something else. I am hoping that I can migrate into a PDF-reading gamer and then limit my fretting to my hard drive.

 

[frankthedm]

If you got any gamer friends who moved away, send them some stuff they liked and you don't use.

 

[scourger]

Noble Knight Games is my current mail & trade shop: http://www.nobleknight.com/
They're great. I've tried my FLGSs, used book stores & eBay, too. It's just easier to ship it for credit and get other new or used stuff I can read, play & enjoy.

For me, the fun is in getting & using game books & products. I don't really enjoy just owning most of it. For past editions, once I was finished playing one, I kept my PHBs but got rid of the rest. Occasionally, I wish I had some of it; but then I remember that I enjoyed it fully and that I am finished with it. Even if the enjoyment was just reading it, I had the entertainment value of it. I have repurchased a few things, but it's a small price to pay.

I have a defined area for my RPG books, too; and that helps keep the size of the collection controlled. Also, not buying every new thing that catches my eye keeps it small. I really think about whether I really will play it or run it before buying it. If not, I still might get it just to read, but the process is deliberate.

I agree that minis are evergreen. But they can get out of hand too. These days I try to wait until I need new ones for an imminent game before I buy them rather than stocking up on cool minis for all those games I would love to run or play just in case I need them later. And I haven't painted in years so I get prepainted ones for the heroes and use others for the foes.

For the OP, it sounds like you're really lamenting all the fun you're not having that those books represent. I know exactly how that feels because I have the same thoughts. But, it's OK to let go of the ones that you really don't see happening. It's also OK to decide to keep some that you value for other reasons--even just nostalgia--if you have the space and it's not a hoarding issue (looks well organized though).

Remember, our possessions are to serve us, not vice versa. If it's not serving you by making you happy, then get rid of it.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

But they can get out of hand too.

My gun-totin' buddies will probably raid my house to take my minis to make bullets if civilization collapses.

 

[Stormonu]

I've had to do some "thinning of the herd" with my game stuff, sometimes to my regret.

For most of my gaming stuff, I sold it through E-bay. Funny thing is that it seems there's a bigger market for RPGs in Europe than the US. The big pitfalls I had with Ebay is getting the shipping right, and generally found media mail USPS to be the cheapest and most reliable (UPS, on the other hand, has been the WORST - if you do UPS make sure you get the option to have it signed for).

One of the things I've learned is to keep the basic rules system books and purge the splatbooks. More often than not, the splatbooks will take a good game and unbalance it or make it unwieldy. Only keep those spatbooks (and adventures) that you feel really add to the game and you would use more than 2% of the content (i.e., one class, feat, ability, monster, etc.) If there is something you really want to keep out of a supplement, but it's like "just one thing", think about photocopying the page(s) you want/need and excising the book.

Also, as someone else mentioned, replacing books with PDF copies is often a great idea. I've found my iPad is ideal for storing PDF copies of rulebooks and with some training, I now tend to use it instead of books. I've eliminated an entire 6' tall bookshelf with it's use (and would probably have reduced more if the D&D scans weren't so horrible - see below). Also, if need be, you can print out sections or the entire PDF if need be for game table use. If you do go with PDFs, make sure you check out the PDF copy before you get rid of the physical copy. I've run into a few PDFs that because of quality or size rendered poorly on my digital device and were unworkable (generally these were older books that were scanned in as big ol' honking images and not cleaned up or OCR'd - Lot5R 3rd ed, I'm looking at you!).

Finally, if you've reached your maximum storage, when you're tempted to buy a new RPG or book, make a pact with yourself to get rid of TWO books that you currently own to make room for it.

P.S.: If you migrate to PDF's, back it all up. Inititally I was backing up to DVD's, but if I got a new PDF, I'd have to make a new disc. Now I keep a backup on (two) USB 1TB drives (Thumbdrives work well too). If, for some reason I lose the one drive, I have the spare kept in a safe place.

 

[Agamon]

PDFs are the best gaming invention ever.

 

[wingsandsword]

About this time last year I cleaned out my collection, a lot.

It wasn't entirely voluntary. I was in a huge financial crunch. My wife couldn't find a job, my active duty orders were over, and my civilian job was paying only a little over half what I had been making on active duty.

So, I started selling off my books. I liquidated most of my GURPS stuff except for the core books, almost all my Old World of Darkness stuff (which I liked as a setting, but knew it would be a long time, if ever, before I played it again), and a lot of random RPG books that I'd picked up over the years.

I didn't touch my Star Wars RPG books, D&D, or New World of Darkness (lousy setting, but a lot more playable as a game).

Selling them off at used book stores got me about $250. Was enough for a big grocery run to last us the month.