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[Psion]

I like PDFs for a couple of reasons.

Most important is that there are so many products out there, and I find that I only actually end up using in the game a fraction of what I buy, for whatever reason. If I only spend $7 on a product, I feel much better about not ever having used it that if I spend say $25 dollars on a hardbound. And if I do end up devouring it and using it anywhere and everywhere, I can print it out and/or buy the dead tree version. In short, I think that a high volume buyer but somewhat lower volume end-user like me really benefits from the preview aspects of PDFs.

Second, I run off of my laptop and find that for quick reference, PDFs are a lot more convenient to refer to during the game than running to my bookshelf, digging for the right book, looking for the right page.

Third, PDFs are very space conservative. In addition to the fact that I am not wasting bookshelf space of books that aren't as important for me to print out yet (see #1 above), if I have to travel with anything, I can carry dozens of PDFs with no additional space.

Fourth, when writing my houre rules and adventure notes and whatnot, extracting OGC from a PDF is a lot easier than hand typing it (or scanning/OCRing it) from a printed book.

I do like having hardcopies for things I frequently reference, and especially things that the players will have to handle. But PDFs do have their advantatages.

 

[dagger]

I have a program that allows you to take a jpg, bmp, gif or other type file and treat it as a text document..... So basically you take a screen shot and blam-o, you can copy and paste. Of course you can't alter that pdf files, but pdf’s are easy to make.

So there are ways.... but I don’t see how its an issue with gaming products.

open my 256 bit key-encrypted pdf, they will see gibberish until they type a rather large sentence Ive memorized as a password,

 

[Arnwyn]

1) As mentioned, it's difficult to browse PDFs before you buy them. I won't pick up an RPG book based solely on the cover and blurb without at least a quick flip-through, unless it's something I already know I want.

2) Part of me rebels at the notion for paying for a product that I can't hold in my hands. I know that, in this day and age of the Internet, that's at least somewhat an outdated notion, but it's still there, nonetheless.

3) There is, of course, the convenience issue; even if the total cost may be lower, I don't want to have to print out 60 pages to reference the book during a game. And no, I don't have a laptop, and would refuse to use them during the game even if I did.

4) Perhaps the biggest impediment, however, is the fact there's no assurance of quality on a PDF.

Wow. Put me down for a big "ditto", here. mouseferatu pretty much got exactly how I feel bang-on.

Well, not quite. For me, I don't have any perception of poor quality for pdfs (heck, I'm a member of ENWorld - I've been educated enough, thanks!). I'm sure they're just like a printed product on that front.

However, the big thing for me is that I *despise* pdfs. Or any "book" in electronic format. Regardless of what people might try to tell you, the currently existing technology is just not ready to allow people to read books comfortably from a screen. I hate pdfs, and avoid them like the plague because I just don't read things on-screen. I value my eyes, thankyouverymuch.

Further, I *will not* buy something if I don't get a physical item. I don't buy 0s and 1s, nor will I ever. Send along a CD or something *when I pay* and I'm there, though. (No, I'm not using my own.)

See mouseferatu's excellent post above for all the other reasons why I avoid pdfs. Generally, though, content quality is less of a concern than the format itself.

So am I a dinosaur? Maybe. But thankfully I have the majority of the civilized world to back me up. Sure - pdfs (or electronic books) will become much more popular in the future. But certainly not in my lifetime. The book industry is here to stay for the foreseeable future.

 

[Umbran]

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

Sorry, chatdemon, but you're starting on really weak ground here.

My dictionary has, "diatribe, n. a bitter, abusive denunciation".

I can't see as Morrus sounds at all bitter. I don't think he's being abusive, and when the focus of the piece is to support online products, I think you'll find it hard going to get folks to agree that he's denouncing anything.

To my eye, your tone tends to put you in a "pot calling the kettle black position". Your writing seems like more of a diatribe than his.

As for the statement on fan material - as the saying goes, 90% of everything is crud.

 

[EOL]

For all those who are never going to buy a pdf I have a question. What if the PDF did something that you could never do in print?

[Full disclosure I am a PDF publisher and my PDFs do something that you can't do in print, so obviously I'm not a very objective party.]

Say you find an adventure you like down at the FLGS. You love it, you want to run it, but it's written for 4 8th level character and you have 7 11th level characters. If you want to run it you're going to have to make quite a few modifications or your party is not going to have any fun because the adventure is way too easy.

Let's say that there was a PDF company (there is but that's not the point) who allowed you to enter the APL the number of characters, the amount of treasure you wanted, etc. And then generated the PDF dynamically and took care of all of the scaling for you. So that the adventure you bought is now designed for 7 11th level characters and you didn't have to do any modification by hand.

So the question would be would that benefit or a similar benefit (i.e. getting something with a pdf you can't get with a hard copy) be enough to overcome your dislike of PDF's (and electronic publications in general) or is the printed book always superior to the electronic?

Or perhaps stated even more succienctly is there something you could envision which would make you change your mind about PDF's some feature, function, cost issue, etc.?

Also if someone could change the title of the thread (an admin or the thread author) so that it's more descriptive, as it is someone browsing the forum would have no idea what the topic of this thread is (I had to have it pointed out to me).

 

[Arnwyn]

For all those who are never going to buy a pdf I have a question. What if the PDF did something that you could never do in print?

*shrug* It depends. I certainly wouldn't rule it out. (I am quite aware of Dire Kobold, and while intriguing - it's pdf.) See below for further comments.

Say you find an adventure you like down at the FLGS. You love it, you want to run it, but it's written for 4 8th level character and you have 7 11th level characters. If you want to run it you're going to have to make quite a few modifications or your party is not going to have any fun because the adventure is way too easy.

I don't think I'm your target market. I *love* adventures (buy them anytime I can), but if it doesn't fit my group, it just goes into my shelf until it does. Beside, I have *so* many print adventures that I haven't even had a chance to read yet (limited time, y'know) that pdf doesn't get a look from me.

So the question would be would that benefit or a similar benefit (i.e. getting something with a pdf you can't get with a hard copy) be enough to overcome your dislike of PDF's (and electronic publications in general) or is the printed book always superior to the electronic?

Not likely. For me, printed is always superior to electronic. Though it depends what that "something" is. I have yet to see (or even conceive) of what that might be.

Or perhaps stated even more succienctly is there something you could envision which would make you change your mind about PDF's some feature, function, cost issue, etc.?

Possibly - I wouldn't outright rule it out. But I can't think of anything that would make me consider a pdf over print. And with this d20 glut (woo!), I have enough print choices that pdf doesn't even get a blip on my radar. It would have to be *absolutely* something I could not get anywhere else. Adventures, for example, I can get anywhere else. A book on kingdom building and running domains, on the other hand, is something that I can't get in print (yet), and would seriously consider a pdf (to be honest, Magical Medieval Society was the *only* pdf I have ever bought - and while I like it, I cringe everytime I have to turn on my computer and stare at the screen to read it).

Too many little things add up for me to make pdfs a choice that I usually won't consider. But that's just me.

 

[chatdemon]

I can't see as Morrus sounds at all bitter. I don't think he's being abusive, and when the focus of the piece is to support online products, I think you'll find it hard going to get folks to agree that he's denouncing anything.

Do you get cookies when you toe the line like that? Or maybe credits toward your next pdf purchase...Nah, I doubt that, no money in enworld's pocket that way, huh?

 

[Umbran]

Let's say that there was a PDF company (there is but that's not the point) who allowed you to enter the APL the number of characters, the amount of treasure you wanted, etc. And then generated the PDF dynamically and took care of all of the scaling for you. So that the adventure you bought is now designed for 7 11th level characters and you didn't have to do any modification by hand.

While doing something that could not be done in print might interest me more in pdfs, this particular feature I wouldn't trust very far. Balancing encounters is still as much art as science, and I don't trust a computer to do it well.

 

[Emiricol]

While doing something that could not be done in print might interest me more in pdfs, this particular feature I wouldn't trust very far. Balancing encounters is still as much art as science, and I don't trust a computer to do it well.

Actually, I can vouch for DireKobold's modules and their scaleability. I haven't seen an error yet, but if I did, I'd rather have to apply the "art" of balancing the encounter to one encounter than to an entire module.

For the DM who just loves to make adventures, it probably isn't the right kind of resource, but for the type who buy modules (and don't mind PDFs) it is a fabulous resource.

 

[barsoomcore]

With a similar caveat to Ross' -- that I have in fact written an adventure for scaling in exactly that way -- I want to add my voice to Emiricol's and urge DMs to check out Dire Kobold. Their offering is very slick and very useful.

But I'm already on the PDF bandwagon so that was an easy sell.