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[Breakdaddy]

Paranoid much?

No, seriously, computer protection is fun stuff. I just don't see how 'security' is an issue when it comes to gaming products.

LOL! You are absolutely correct here, I was just trying to dispel the "security myth" that was being propogated here!

 

[zenld]

in general i am one of the people who likes to hold a product. reading on the screen is difficult for me and not nearly as satisfying as picking up that tome. however, the ease and convenience of online material, coupled with the lower price have made me a dedicated downloader.

now someone mentioned problems with acrobat reader on PC. how old is your machine and how much ram do you have? i have a full version of acrobat that loads quite quickly, in fact faster than one friend who is using reader on a laptop.

as far as quality goes, there is no difference in the quality of the product between print and pdf. some are good. some suck. thats just the way the cookie crumbles.

not that this adds anything to the discussion. i just felt like posting something.

 

[beta-ray]

Being on Mac OS9 PDFs are dog slow and a bear to view... I prefer the binding of books, though I admit Kinkos is a viable solution.

*shrug*

 

[Emiricol]

PDFs are nice for a lot of reasons (searchable, can read them at the office without raising eyebrows, etc), but ultimately I find that I just simply understand the material better when I read it in book form, without having to scroll pages and stuff. Every time I have to click the page down button or mouseclick it screws up my "rhythm."

 

[Trainz]

now someone mentioned problems with acrobat reader on PC. how old is your machine and how much ram do you have?

It's a P3 800mhz 256 ram 7200 40meg drive... not a dinosaur quite yet. Yet.

Sometimes I see freebies in PDF and Word format. I go "thank god" and download the Word one.

Personally, I would more readilly buy cyberbooks if I could get the Word one with the PDF. I know the quality is inferior in Word, it is just a personal preference.

BTW, I waited until Tournaments, Fairs and Taverns was in book form, went to my FLGS, bought it. I love this book.

Thanks Natural 20 press !

 

[Darrin Drader]

I just want to add my voice to the pro-PDF argument. I do understand wanting to have the printed copy, and I sometimes hold off on purchases if I know a print version will be out at some point myself. I haven't bought a Monte PDF since the Demon God's Fane. I always wait for his printed products.

I'm actually surprised no one has yet mentioned RPG objects. Let me tell you, these guys are great. First of all, I find their Darwin's World products excellent. Blood and Space was no stinker either. What's more is that they're the only company that I'm aware of that will charge you an upgrade to print option rather than charging you again for the printed book. In fact, I stopped by the booth at Gen Con and was given the upgrade price for Blood and Space - even though they didn't have their rates handy, and they couldn't check to verify that I had bought the PDF (I have bought it, by the way).

What about the classic TSR product PDFs? How many out of priont books can you get in electronic format? Most of them, and they can be purchased either through RPGNow and SVGames. What about that book you loved back in highschool but foolishly gave away? Can anyone say Temple of Elemental Evil? I wouldn't have that in my collection had it not been for the PDF format.

One final point is that the argument that you can't browse through PDF products before you buy isn't true. RPGNow! has their free magazine download that has excerpts from many of the PDFs they sell.

 

[trancejeremy]

There are various reasons why I don't like PDFs:

Mostly, I don't think the PDF format is that great for reading on screen. In most cases, the layout is a vertical rectangle, while the computer monitor is a horizontal rectangle. You generally can't see the whole page and have to use the mouse to move up and down. (I know some companies do use landscape format for easier reading, but they are in the minority).

It is also very very slow and on my computer, buggy - it frequently crashes or locks up. Which is ridiculous, as I can play most modern PC games. Used to be that you could turn off the large images (which is the big bog down), but they removed that option in Acrobat Reader 4 or so.

I've gotten a few offers of review copies of PDFs, but after the first one, I've always turned them down, because I really can't read them well enough to use or review properly.

I didn't really notice this until I got the print version of Blood & Space. Being able to sit down and read the book from cover to cover, I realized I missed a whole lot of stuff in the PDF.


I've always thought PDF was more for desktop publishing, as it is good for printing. I'd like to see companies use a format for reading on a monitor, like microsoft's Lit format. That's very easy on the eyes, very stable, and doesn't stress the computer a lot. Or just in Rich Text or Word format. Just having one column is so much easier to read than a PDF with 2 or 3.



Also, as there is basically only one source of PDFs, and no secondary market, the price is constant.

I probably buy most of my RPG stuff online from either a discount seller (like FRP Games), or ebay.

Generally speaking, on Ebay, as a product gets older, the more the price drops. You can get most older d20 stuff for 20%-35% of cover price or so on Ebay. For instance, I just got a bunch of S&S hardbacks (including Tome of Horrors and Necropolis) for $10 each (with shipping).

Given there is a ton of old stuff I want that I don't have, and can get cheap, it's hard to justify buying a PDF. Unless it's something really cool and not available in any other format.


Anyway, I think that once portable ebook readers or somesuch get cheap and popular, then e-publishing RPGs will hit it big. But until then, it's always going to be a somewhat niche market...

 

[chatdemon]

What bothers me about that front page diatribe is the less than subtle insinuation that all fan material sucks.

As someone who works hard to promote and maintain a website (www.canonfire.com for the record) that is something more than a facade for a money making venture, I find the remarks made here by Morrus extremely offensive and condescending.

The ONLY difference between fan sites and pdf publishers is the fact publishers charge for their material. There is the same spectrum of quality and the same mass of devoted people working endlessly to create the material.

Furthermore, without the massive online rpg presence that the fans created (god knows TSR tried to kill it and Palladium is following suit) there would be no WotC online presence and arguably, no D20 license (the mechanics of trying to make that happen without an internet community are mind boggling).

Remember those in whose footsteps you are following, and as they say, don't squat where you eat.

 

[Argent Silvermage]

My 2 cents

I'm slowly getting into PDF files.
I especialy like the SRD PDF file that was recently made.
I look at it this way. I love my books and have a library in my house. (I love all this space!) But I and many of my gamer friends have thier characters and all sorts of Character information on our Lap Tops. Having the PDFs on my laptop is like haveing all my books handy but taking up no space.

Just as a Player I use...
1) the PHB
2) Masters otW
3) MM
4) DMG (for my items)
5) Faeries (By Bastion Press. My favorite book at the moment)
6) Savage Species

That's an awful lot to lug around along with dice and my minis and the character information
(Playing a high level druid rocks but there's so much paperwork!)

with the PDFs I have now I can cut that down by 3 books minimum and more to come.

 

[Voadam]

I prefer pdfs to print material.

I have tons of books and my bookshelves are full, I hate getting rid of stuff and it is easier to store stuff on my HD and CDs.

I use stuff from a lot of sources and make custom files for my game.

For my characters I make a document with all the relevant information including full text of spells known in my wizard's spellbook. It is a lot easier to copy and paste than to do data entry.

I like printing out the few pages of monsters I plan on using in a night so I don't have to lug around more books than necessary.

One of the guys in our group always brings his laptop so we can have access to tons of pdf material at the game without hauling tons of books.

Free errata and version updates are great.

We do some of our gaming by e-mail in between live games and it is more convenient to have stuff on another screen rather than a pile of books for instant reference.

Copy and pasting a suggested paladin feat from a book and sending it by e-mail to the party paladin for consideration is more convenient than lending him a book when he lives one state away.