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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Jeysie" data-source="post: 3617977" data-attributes="member: 51817">Mmm. I'm of a few minds on this.On the one hand, I support the idea of mom & pop stores. A mom & pop store done right is a fabulous thing to shop at, and, being a full-blooded USer, I like the notion of reaping success from hard work and ingenuity.On the other hand... and in true octopus fashion, there's a few other hands...1. For every one mom & pop store done right, there's at least ten done wrong. I've seen... and worked at, for that matter... far too many privately-owned businesses and franchises that were run poorly from a business perspective compared to their chain store counterparts (which I've also worked at).2. I'm usually an efficient, "Go in, go to the shelf, go to the register, go home" sort of shopper. If I need "expert advice" on something, I generally ask my friends from the comfiness of my own home, where I can know they're not trying to give me an upsell pitch disguised as advice. (I've worked in retail more than long enough to know all the little tricks.)Mom & pops *are* good for indie and special-order stuff, but usually if you have to special-order it, it's too out of my budget anyway. Plus, many mom and pop stores - around here, at least - are also in an out-of-the-way spot, so it's more convenient to just try to special-order stuff myself... especially if you can get it straight from the publisher/manufacturer.As for FLGSs in specific... chalk me up as another person who learned the hobby through friends and never played in a store. In fact, when I went up to the LGS to see if there was an opportunity to try some face-to-face RP, turns out all they had on their schedule was stuff like DDM and Magic tourneys. <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f641.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":(" title="Frown    :("  data-smilie="3"data-shortname=":(" />3. Geek hobby stuff is already too highly priced, IMHO. It's hard to justify dropping $60 for a game you'll likely play once or twice for 10-15 hours, tops... $30 for a CD you'll like half the songs on if you're lucky... even paperbacks are starting to get up there in silliness, and I never buy hardcovers if I can help it. And what would otherwise be a crazy love of comics was lost long ago to my reading speed vs. price.Core RPG books would actually be a good investment at twice the price, IMHO, but supplements aren't worth it for me. My group will usually use a base class or two and maybe a couple feats or spells, and that's it.So discounts just serve to knock stuff down to a price closer to being actually worth the money to me... and even then I have to ration my rather limited budget. This will push my already rare purchases of new geek hobby stuff down even further.Of course, personally I'm even more worried about how this will affect the stuff you *can't* get away with doing without. As much as I loathe shopping in the likes of K-Mart and WalMart, they *are* a necessary evil for those of us who don't make that much money.Peace & Luv, Liz</blockquote>

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