The BIG Taboo!
Post new topic Reply to topic Page 3 of 712, 3, 4567
Author

User avatar

Grandstanding Collector
Acaeum Donor

Posts: 8011
Joined: Jun 23, 2003
Last Visit: Mar 18, 2024
Location: DFW TX

Post Posted: Tue Sep 27, 2005 6:24 pm 
 

GraysonAC wrote:Old thread :P But still a good topic.





As for migration away from paper, I think Mike hit on it perfectly - paper will remain as the dominant medium as long as there is no better technology available. If I could get a little headpiece that would project the image of books onto my eye, and could use that without eye strain or signifigant effort, then sure, I'd consider switchign to that from paper. If "tablet PC's" get advanced enough (as I expect they will) to generate an 8.5"x11" image that's easy to read and easily portable, sure, I might try those. But until that day, which I don't forsee coming anytime soon, paper will stick around.




I'm running a campaign right now using the "Against the Giants: Liberation of Geoff" Greyhawk module.  I have a PDF of it, which I use to cut and paste descriptions, print out maps, etc.  But the first week I ran the adventure, I felt uncomfortable without a physical module in my lap to refer to, just using the notes I printed from the PDF.  So the next session, I brought my "real" copy of Against the Giants, and everything felt alright again!  Not that I even referred to it more than once or twice, guess I'm just a dinosaur though.  

   BTW I now have a system where I can pull all three 2nd edition core reference books (PHB, DMG, MM) up on my laptop from the Core rules 2.0 CD, which sits on a chair beside me at the table, all at the same time in their own little window, and for me at least it's vastly faster and superior to thumbing through the books to find a rule, monster stat or spell.  So I'm not a total Luddite I figure. Hell, my co-gamers won't even use cool pre-printed character sheets, they still use laboriously hand copied pencil written sheets, which takes forever to update when you have a party full of 10-12 level characters, but they don't care.



Mike B.

 WWW  


Active Collector

Posts: 53
Joined: May 27, 2005
Last Visit: Aug 09, 2006
Location: OD&D and OAD&D DM somewhere north of Columbus OH

Post Posted: Thu Oct 06, 2005 10:07 pm 
 

I don't think that pdfs make much if any difference in the market. If there is something within my budget range I will buy it and if there is not I just pray that there is a pdf available that I can buy. The only things I really want will never be within my price range and they will never be available on pdf either :(   And the thing is, is that I don't even care if it is an original or a pdf or a reprint. If WOTC would issue a reprint of printing 1-4 of OD&D, the first two printing of each supplement and all of the other stuff printed pre 1977 I would buy all of them if offered at a price I can afford. Since I will never be able to afford the thousands of dollars the originals would cost and WOTC doesn't have the marketing smarts to do reprints, I would gladly buy a pdf or a kinko copy even if it were available. I am not interested in violating copyrights, but if you can't buy something without mortgaging an expensive home then you can not be too concerned about it, but it is a moot point since those items I mentioned are not going to be offered in any way (legal or illegal) that I could ever buy them anyway.



It is really a shame that WOTC is run by a bunch of incompetent bunglers. They could easily make a few hundred dollars off of me over a 3 year period if they would reprint things that I want to buy. Then I have two 13 yrs who will want a copy. And I have 11 other people in my gaming group who would also buy copies.  That is about $2500.00 they could make off just one little group of friends. I want the info to play with not collect to resell or store in a vault. $15,000 for an original or $10.00 for a reprint, an easy choice for me. At the very least if WOTC were smart they would be selling well made pdfs of every thing TSR/WOTC has ever published.



It is really a shame the way the copyright law is written. What is should be is that anything in constant use like Mickey Mouse has a copyright that runs for a neverending period as long as it stays in use and in print, but anything that goes out of print (like D&D books for instance) for a period of 5 years and 1 day creates a permanent transfer to the public domain. Copyright law should force copyright holders to keep their products available for sale in return for long copyright periods, no sale no copyright.

  


Prolific Collector

Posts: 751
Joined: Jun 29, 2005
Last Visit: Feb 02, 2023
Location: Vancouver, BC, Canada, eh?

Post Posted: Fri Oct 07, 2005 3:11 am 
 

Llaurenela wrote:
It is really a shame that WOTC is run by a bunch of incompetent bunglers. They could easily make a few hundred dollars off of me over a 3 year period if they would reprint things that I want to buy.




Honestly, I couldn't disagree more. WoTC is run by some very smart people. Folks who would buy reprints of old stuff are a small minority. Very, very small would be my guess. I'd buy some myself, but I don't think many folks would. It's hard enough to make money selling books, trying to sell to a small corner of your niche market isn't a good business deciison.



WoTC doesn't fragment it's own market by offering multiple editions of D&D at a time. They want folks using 3rd Edition, and that's all they'll sell until 4th Edition comes along. They increase the number of folks that can produce stuff by using the d20 license, which grows the hobby with almost no work on their part. Extremely smart move, and something TSR never would have done. TSR failed from a business perspective - they put too much faith in modules particularily. WoTC has avoided that, and stuck to selling the core books.



PDFs are a losing market as well - file sharing makes them almost worthless. It'd be an easy thing for them to produce, sure, but it would make them almost no money, and they wouldn't offer PDFs and hard copies of the books.

 WWW  


Active Collector

Posts: 53
Joined: May 27, 2005
Last Visit: Aug 09, 2006
Location: OD&D and OAD&D DM somewhere north of Columbus OH

Post Posted: Fri Oct 07, 2005 6:35 am 
 

GraysonAC wrote:
Llaurenela wrote:
It is really a shame that WOTC is run by a bunch of incompetent bunglers. They could easily make a few hundred dollars off of me over a 3 year period if they would reprint things that I want to buy.




Honestly, I couldn't disagree more. WoTC is run by some very smart people. Folks who would buy reprints of old stuff are a small minority. Very, very small would be my guess. I'd buy some myself, but I don't think many folks would. It's hard enough to make money selling books, trying to sell to a small corner of your niche market isn't a good business deciison.



WoTC doesn't fragment it's own market by offering multiple editions of D&D at a time. They want folks using 3rd Edition, and that's all they'll sell until 4th Edition comes along. They increase the number of folks that can produce stuff by using the d20 license, which grows the hobby with almost no work on their part. Extremely smart move, and something TSR never would have done. TSR failed from a business perspective - they put too much faith in modules particularily. WoTC has avoided that, and stuck to selling the core books.



PDFs are a losing market as well - file sharing makes them almost worthless. It'd be an easy thing for them to produce, sure, but it would make them almost no money, and they wouldn't offer PDFs and hard copies of the books.




Well they don't make any money off of me the way it is. I bought the 3rd ed core books, looked at them and found out that it is so rules heavy that it takes hours to create a character, so I got rid of it. There was nothing in the core books worth porting back to AD&D. So when 4th ed comes out I won't even take a look because I have no interest in rules heavy and I am sure I am not the only one out there. There is no proof whatsoever that people who like a fast easy to play game are a small niche. I discovered OD&D this spring and it is a breath of fresh air. Time to create a new character 5 min tops. A little more if you want to rough in a background and then play. Time to prepare to DM a game, as much as you want to take or zero if you want to fly by the seat of your pants and either works equally well. I have no interest in d20, I won't waste my money on it. C&C looks promising and some of the new Gygax involved products are good, but the bottom line is for me it all gets ported back to AD&D or OD&D. It will not get played as is.



Personally if you like what WOTC is putting out right now and you actually think that no one except a few idiots like me would buy a rules light easy to play fun game then your opinion doesn't seem to been based on anything factual to me. A lot of people want to claim that we are a niche market, but until there is a product to buy that is rules light and good, like OD&D it is just your theory not the truth.

  


Grandstanding Collector
Acaeum Donor

Posts: 6455
Joined: Dec 13, 2004
Last Visit: Apr 20, 2023

Post Posted: Fri Oct 07, 2005 6:58 am 
 

Llaurenela wrote:I don't think that pdfs make much if any difference in the market. If there is something within my budget range I will buy it and if there is not I just pray that there is a pdf available that I can buy.




No disrespect, but I think that you contradicted yourself in your first 2 statements.  :)   This is exactly why pdfs would hurt the market.  If you cant currently afford to buy an original then you would settle for a copy, and thus would never attempt to spend the money to buy an original. When yu end up having thousands of people buying copies and not the originals that is thousands less people who have a need or desire to have an original and therefore in the long will cause a decrease in price.



Llaurenela wrote:What is should be is that anything in constant use like Mickey Mouse has a copyright that runs for a neverending period as long as it stays in use and in print, but anything that goes out of print (like D&D books for instance) for a period of 5 years and 1 day creates a permanent transfer to the public domain. Copyright law should force copyright holders to keep their products available for sale in return for long copyright periods, no sale no copyright.




I could not disagree more with this stance. Why should a publishing company who has already paid millions of dollars to produce and print book(s), lose their right to make a profit on books that they have produced that they are not actively printing after 5 years?  This really doesn't specifically D&D becuase WOTC at this point clearly has have no desire to sell old product, but what about some other publishing company. For example lets say XYZ publishing company sells "How to" books, and they have a large overstock of books and due to decreasing sales they decide to avoid flooding the market with them that after the market cools down 6 years down the road, will start to sell them again.  Out of Print does not pertain to not selling any more, it means that they are no longer actively printing said book(s) and so why should they lose their ability to profit from that.  Hell, whos to say that WOTC sometime down the road does have a stash of OOP 1st edition product that they plan on selling? Its not very likely, but it is possible and under your proposed 5 years and a day copyright law, that would not be possible because of the fact that the market would already be flooded with copies and pdfs.  Just my $.02. :)


"He who fights with monsters might take care lest he thereby become a monster. And if you gaze for long into an abyss, the abyss gazes also into you." -Neitzche

  


Prolific Collector
Acaeum Donor

Posts: 144
Joined: Apr 26, 2005
Last Visit: May 03, 2021
Location: Rhosgobel

Post Posted: Fri Oct 07, 2005 7:25 am 
 

I know my opinion has not a great value since I'm not a reseller and I'm an atypical (i.e. un-expert) collector, but ...



I can't say if the diffusion of PDFs have an influence on the market but, from my point of view, getting PDFs of the rares means nothing.

With my mates, I play a sort of mix of various edition of D&D. This is to say, I know I will never play "The Palace of the Vampire Queen" nor "Up the garden path" or what you want ...

So, having a copy (PDF or Photocopy as well) of a rare item, if I can't have the original, has no real value to me.

I, as a collector, want to get an original ST1 only to have it.

I bought an OB3 in Shrinkwrap and I'll never touch it: what was important is to have it.



Maybe I'm little ill ... or mad, as you prefer. But the possibility to have a PDF of the rares item does not influence at all my attitude towards these items.



I don't know if the market reacts as I do.

But this is what I think and the way I act.



Thank you for your time.

Have a nice day



Giorgio

  


Active Collector

Posts: 53
Joined: May 27, 2005
Last Visit: Aug 09, 2006
Location: OD&D and OAD&D DM somewhere north of Columbus OH

Post Posted: Fri Oct 07, 2005 8:17 am 
 

bclarkie wrote:
Llaurenela wrote:I don't think that pdfs make much if any difference in the market. If there is something within my budget range I will buy it and if there is not I just pray that there is a pdf available that I can buy.




No disrespect, but I think that you contradicted yourself in your first 2 statements. :)  This is exactly why pdfs would hurt the market. If you cant currently afford to buy an original then you would settle for a copy, and thus would never attempt to spend the money to buy an original. When yu end up having thousands of people buying copies and not the originals that is thousands less people who have a need or desire to have an original and therefore in the long will cause a decrease in price.




Ok explain to me how the fact that I can not afford to pay thousands of dollars for a first printing OD&D and selling me a pdf of a first printing would hurt the market. There are hundreds of thousands of people who can not afford to pay the price for a first printing OD&D and selling any of us a pdf will not affect the rich collectors who trade in those items. In fact you could put 100,000 reprints on the market of the 1st printing and there are still only 1000 1st printings in existence and still only the same pool of people that can afford to buy one either way. If I was someone who collected and $15,000 was pocket change, I might be interested in a reprint if I wanted to use it to play, but I would still be buying the rare items to hide away and no amount of pdfs or reprints would change that. For the hundreds of thousands of us that can't even swing the starting bid on an item on day one of a 7 day listing it is a moot point we are not bidding on those items anyway.  I will tell you another thing, if I have choice between a pdf and a not rare item I will pay up to about twice or maybe three times the cost of a pdf to get the not rare item, these are the things that typically bidding starts under a dollar and sell at $1.00 to about $10.00, but sometimes will go over $20.00. If things are priced over that I will get the pdf or if no pdf is not available then I will do without. If you buy stuff you can't afford at sucker prices then you are doing something that makes no sense. I will not attempt to buy something that starts out of my price range to begin with. That would be stupid on my part. I will pay up to about $50.00 for a 6th printing OD&D or about $60.00 for a 5th printing OD&D, anything over that is out of a reasonable range for me. I got my copies before this recent hyper inflation started. A 4th printing or lower will likely never be in my price range. So making a pdf or reprint available is only going to sell to people like me and that affects the market not a bit. I do not agree with you at all on this.





Llaurenela wrote:What is should be is that anything in constant use like Mickey Mouse has a copyright that runs for a neverending period as long as it stays in use and in print, but anything that goes out of print (like D&D books for instance) for a period of 5 years and 1 day creates a permanent transfer to the public domain. Copyright law should force copyright holders to keep their products available for sale in return for long copyright periods, no sale no copyright.




bclarkie wrote:I could not disagree more with this stance. Why should a publishing company who has already paid millions of dollars to produce and print book(s), lose their right to make a profit on books that they have produced that they are not actively printing after 5 years? This really doesn't specifically D&D becuase WOTC at this point clearly has have no desire to sell old product, but what about some other publishing company. For example lets say XYZ publishing company sells "How to" books, and they have a large overstock of books and due to decreasing sales they decide to avoid flooding the market with them that after the market cools down 6 years down the road, will start to sell them again. Out of Print does not pertain to not selling any more, it means that they are no longer actively printing said book(s) and so why should they lose their ability to profit from that. Hell, whos to say that WOTC sometime down the road does have a stash of OOP 1st edition product that they plan on selling? Its not very likely, but it is possible and under your proposed 5 years and a day copyright law, that would not be possible because of the fact that the market would already be flooded with copies and pdfs. Just my $.02. :)




I don't really care if it is actively printing or not as long as they have a stock that they are actively selling. BTW the only cost for OOP D&D is the printing cost, they sued away the just royalties to those products a long time ago. The fact is Gygax & Arneson should be getting a royalty for everything that is ever printed that has the D&D name on it including 3.5 and for that matter all of the d20 stuff anyone publishes. When a D&D 4.0 is published they should have a cut of that too.



Under your scenario about they would start reselling after the market cools down. Well how many years has it been since the three books were printed and sold. I think we can safely say that the market has cooled down and it is silly not to sell a grognard edition reprint for fans of the original game. To argue that that would hurt the price of the original items or hurt the sales of 3.5 does not hold any water with me. I flat out do not believe that there is any truth to it whatsoever.



That exact stance is why I keep reading that the market has declined from its peak, (yes, I know there are other strong factors, but this is also a strong factor)  I am sure that I am not the only one out here that wants to buy things that nobody is selling at a reasonable price that is in the average persons range. I do not agree with the stance that OD&D and other OOP items should only be available to those that make about 5-6 times what the average person makes. The average income person happens to be or could be the largest part of the market. Just because you don't make a lot of money doesn't mean you are too stupid to play a good rpg.  Even if I liked the current 3.5 D&D it is cost prohibitive to buy. I am not a fan of the hard back craze. I take care of things I own and a paperback cover will last me a long time. Printing it in hardback increases the cost quite a bit and it has no benefit for me. With the current business practice of WOTC and the soaring costs of the OOP items, the market will only continue to shrink. This may be of great benefit to the hardcore collectors in the upper income brackets who buy for investments and for whom price is not a factor, but it is at a great detriment to those average income people whose only interest is in playing the game.

  

User avatar

Grandstanding Collector

Posts: 8241
Joined: Jan 21, 2005
Last Visit: Mar 24, 2024
Location: Wallasey, Merseyside, UK

Post Posted: Fri Oct 07, 2005 8:25 am 
 

radagast wrote:
Maybe I'm little ill ... or mad, as you prefer. But the possibility to have a PDF of the rares item does not influence at all my attitude towards these items.



I don't know if the market reacts as I do.

But this is what I think and the way I act.



Thank you for your time.

Have a nice day



Giorgio




i got given a few PDF's of some rares a while back, but being very honest, they are still sat on a CD that i havent bothered to look at. in the same way that Giorgio says above, they hold no value to me and mean even less than that.



sure if you cant afford it and well its the only way, then whatever floats your boat :D



me personally, i dont have that many rare things, but i really treasure what i have. my PotVQ for me is amazing and i take great pleasure in having it. but i will never utilise it to play it - jeez god forbid!!! someone did a copy for me somewhere anyway, so i would use that instead. but to have a rare is just that, it meanssomething to you as a collector (in whatever level a collector that you are)....



and another thing, having Tim Jiardini's R1 is like having the Queen's crown jewels :) i am the only person in the world who has it, so for me, the value is priceless.



i guess all the collectors feel this way about the real treasures that they have.



sure i sell things too, but there are things i will not sell and i will keep forever as a part of who i am, whether ppl think i am a loon or not :D



Al


Are we nearly there yet?

  

User avatar

Grandstanding Collector

Posts: 8241
Joined: Jan 21, 2005
Last Visit: Mar 24, 2024
Location: Wallasey, Merseyside, UK

Post Posted: Fri Oct 07, 2005 8:32 am 
 

Llaurenela wrote:. This may be of great benefit to the hardcore collectors in the upper income brackets who buy for investments and for whom price is not a factor, but it is at a great detriment to those average income people whose only interest is in playing the game.




i am about as far from the "upper income brackets" as you get really :)



i think PDF's and anything of the sort are just wrong. its a cheap imitation and just doesnt rub right, whether it helps someone who cant afford the item or not. there will always be things in life you cannot afford and you will always dream about. without that in life, what would a dream be?



there are plenty of things i cannot afford, but i will always watch and wait and one day, i will have my moment.



in the end, a PDF is just a photocopy and thats it. its just not right.



Al


Are we nearly there yet?

  


Prolific Collector
Acaeum Donor

Posts: 189
Joined: Dec 19, 2004
Last Visit: Nov 22, 2012

Post Posted: Fri Oct 07, 2005 8:38 am 
 

bclarkie wrote:I could not disagree more with this stance. Why should a publishing company who has already paid millions of dollars to produce and print book(s), lose their right to make a profit on books that they have produced that they are not actively printing after 5 years? ...

Its not very likely, but it is possible and under your proposed 5 years and a day copyright law, that would not be possible because of the fact that the market would already be flooded with copies and pdfs. Just my $.02. :)




Originally US copyrightright law only granted monopoly to print a book for 14 years with a renewal period of 14 more.http://arl.cni.org/info/frn/copy/timeline.html




1790: Copyright Act of 1790

The First Congress implemented the copyright provision of the U.S. Constitution in 1790. The Copyright Act of 1790, An Act for the Encouragement of Learning, by Securing the Copies of Maps, Charts, and Books to the Authors and Proprietors of Such Copies, was modeled on the Statute of Anne (1710). It granted American authors the right to print, re-print, or publish their work for a period of fourteen years and to renew for another fourteen. The law was meant to provide an incentive to authors, artists, and scientists to create original works by providing creators with a monopoly. At the same time, the monopoly was limited in order to stimulate creativity and the advancement of "science and the useful arts" through wide public access to works in the "public domain." Major revisions to the act were implemented in 1831, 1870, 1909, and 1976.  




This was intended to allow the author ample time to reap the benefits of thier hard work and to encourage the author to produce more works.

caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/data/constitutio ... article01/



Article 1 Section 8 US Constitution powers granted to Congress

To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries;




If the early laws and held and matched the intent at the time of the writing of the constitution it would now be possible for another company to reproduce many of the early works from the 70's.  TSR/WotC/Hasbro would then have to compete with other companies if they decided to re-release the old works (an unlikely possiblity), and would most likely stay the course with third ed.  



I don't think this would hurt the collectable market much, but I have to agree value would drop a bit, those who would collect-to-use would just wait for the reprints, taking a good deal of discretionary money out of the market (hurting sellers but helping buyers).  I think the high end items (PotVQ, ST1 etc.) and First Prints would go relatively unchanged, but the commons would suffer.



Just my thoughts,



~jeff

  


Active Collector

Posts: 53
Joined: May 27, 2005
Last Visit: Aug 09, 2006
Location: OD&D and OAD&D DM somewhere north of Columbus OH

Post Posted: Fri Oct 07, 2005 8:44 am 
 

I guess that is the difference between me and those like me. I don't buy things to collect, I buy them to play with and I treat them with kid gloves because I respect books, that is the way that I was raised. That is why I like rules lite games so that I can easily memorize the rules and I create cheats sheet of tables and such. But to buy something to hide it away from everyone and it sits in the dark. I personally would never buy something for that reason, no matter how much money I had.



As for pdfs, if that is the only thing I can buy then I will print it out and play with it. If you think I am wrong for wanting to play a great game and wrong for using a printed pdf file if that is my only option, then I reject your insult an am baffled by your attitude. I always prefer books. Given an honest price, I will always buy the book instead of the pdf. Given that I am not fortunate enough to make enough money that $15,000 or $20,000 is pocket change, some things I just can't buy. Unlike you I don't view that as a good thing. Achievable dreams are good things, unachievable dreams are a burden. But hey, I hear some people like pain in their lives, if having things that are out of your reach forever makes you happy then more power to you, it just doesn't have that effect on me, I don't find that to be a fun thing, especially when it is completely unnecessary.

  


Active Collector

Posts: 53
Joined: May 27, 2005
Last Visit: Aug 09, 2006
Location: OD&D and OAD&D DM somewhere north of Columbus OH

Post Posted: Fri Oct 07, 2005 8:51 am 
 

GamersRest[FNG] wrote:


Originally US copyrightright law only granted monopoly to print a book for 14 years with a renewal period of 14 more.http://arl.cni.org/info/frn/copy/timeline.html




1790: Copyright Act of 1790

The First Congress implemented the copyright provision of the U.S. Constitution in 1790. The Copyright Act of 1790, An Act for the Encouragement of Learning, by Securing the Copies of Maps, Charts, and Books to the Authors and Proprietors of Such Copies, was modeled on the Statute of Anne (1710). It granted American authors the right to print, re-print, or publish their work for a period of fourteen years and to renew for another fourteen. The law was meant to provide an incentive to authors, artists, and scientists to create original works by providing creators with a monopoly. At the same time, the monopoly was limited in order to stimulate creativity and the advancement of "science and the useful arts" through wide public access to works in the "public domain." Major revisions to the act were implemented in 1831, 1870, 1909, and 1976.




This was intended to allow the author ample time to reap the benefits of thier hard work and to encourage the author to produce more works.

caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/data/constitutio ... article01/



Article 1 Section 8 US Constitution powers granted to Congress

To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries;




If the early laws and held and matched the intent at the time of the writing of the constitution it would now be possible for another company to reproduce many of the early works from the 70's. TSR/WotC/Hasbro would then have to compete with other companies if they decided to re-release the old works (an unlikely possiblity), and would most likely stay the course with third ed.



I don't think this would hurt the collectable market much, but I have to agree value would drop a bit, those who would collect-to-use would just wait for the reprints, taking a good deal of discretionary money out of the market (hurting sellers but helping buyers). I think the high end items (PotVQ, ST1 etc.) and First Prints would go relatively unchanged, but the commons would suffer.



Just my thoughts,



~jeff




Exactly and one major reform of copyright law is to change it so that only authors can hold copyright to a work. Businesses/Corporations should be forbidden to hold copyrights. I do not believe that in house workers should have no rights to their creative work. The person or persons that write something should hold the copyrights and corporations should rent the use for a maximum of 5 years at a time and it should be renogotiated every 5 years. This would go a long way to curbing the current abuses. The author of something is more interested in selling his work to as many people as possible.

  


Prolific Collector
Acaeum Donor

Posts: 189
Joined: Dec 19, 2004
Last Visit: Nov 22, 2012

Post Posted: Fri Oct 07, 2005 9:10 am 
 

Llaurenela wrote:
Ok explain to me how the fact that I can not afford to pay thousands of dollars for a first printing OD&D and selling me a pdf of a first printing would hurt the market. There are hundreds of thousands of people who can not afford to pay the price for a first printing OD&D and selling any of us a pdf will not affect the rich collectors who trade in those items. In fact you could put 100,000 reprints on the market of the 1st printing and there are still only 1000 1st printings in existence and still only the same pool of people that can afford to buy one either way.




You are incorrect, the 100k reprints if they are a physical artifact would cause overall prices to drop, if they were in similar form as the original.  If they were in a "compilation" style book that could easily be distinguished from the originals then it would effect the market less, but it would still effect the market.  I cannot readily afford, in cash, the high end items, but I have credit which would enable me to buy any of the high end items if I so choose.  Value of an item is largely impacted by scarcity.



Llaurenela wrote:If I was someone who collected and $15,000 was pocket change, I might be interested in a reprint if I wanted to use it to play, but I would still be buying the rare items to hide away and no amount of pdfs or reprints would change that.




Hmmph, hyperbole aside, if 15k is pocket change then you probally care little for market forces and would be better off paying someone else to take the required steps to further your collection.  This kind of example does not reflect the market, or the current actors in the market.  Few if any of us fall in this group of ultra rich collectors.



Llaurenela wrote:For the hundreds of thousands of us that can't even swing the starting bid on an item on day one of a 7 day listing it is a moot point we are not bidding on those items anyway. I will tell you another thing, if I have choice between a pdf and a not rare item I will pay up to about twice or maybe three times the cost of a pdf to get the not rare item, these are the things that typically bidding starts under a dollar and sell at $1.00 to about $10.00, but sometimes will go over $20.00. If things are priced over that I will get the pdf or if no pdf is not available then I will do without.




.pdf forms of damn near every TSR item are already out there FOR FREE, you just have to be willing to violate copyright law to get them.  If you pay for a .pdf then you are a fool in my opinion (note I have bought pdfs from drivethrurpg so yes I am a bit of a fool).



Llaurenela wrote:If you buy stuff you can't afford at sucker prices then you are doing something that makes no sense. I will not attempt to buy something that starts out of my price range to begin with. That would be stupid on my part.
 



Supply and demand rule the market, "sucker prices" would be those set by people who wish to prey on the uninformed (creep comes to mind).  But the prices on ebay currently reflect the demand accruately (though supply in sometimes in question).



Llaurenela wrote:I will pay up to about $50.00 for a 6th printing OD&D or about $60.00 for a 5th printing OD&D, anything over that is out of a reasonable range for me. I got my copies before this recent hyper inflation started. A 4th printing or lower will likely never be in my price range. So making a pdf or reprint available is only going to sell to people like me and that affects the market not a bit. I do not agree with you at all on this.




Those would be nice finds at those prices, they do not reflect the market however.  The availability of the 6th print pdf has not effected the market, it is freely distributed,  I should point out at this point that I do not believe pdfs hurt the market, but re-prints do have an effect, pdfs are not scarce and as such have little to no value.  And as a collector I prefer to have the artifact itself over a collections of magnetically recorded 1s and 0s.





Llaurenela wrote:I don't really care if it is actively printing or not as long as they have a stock that they are actively selling. BTW the only cost for OOP D&D is the printing cost, they sued away the just royalties to those products a long time ago. The fact is Gygax & Arneson should be getting a royalty for everything that is ever printed that has the D&D name on it including 3.5 and for that matter all of the d20 stuff anyone publishes. When a D&D 4.0 is published they should have a cut of that too.




That would depend on thier contracts, and whether or not they held the copyrights or if TSR held them.



Llaurenela wrote:Under your scenario about they would start reselling after the market cools down. Well how many years has it been since the three books were printed and sold. I think we can safely say that the market has cooled down and it is silly not to sell a grognard edition reprint for fans of the original game. To argue that that would hurt the price of the original items or hurt the sales of 3.5 does not hold any water with me. I flat out do not believe that there is any truth to it whatsoever.




Producing two or more competing rules sets would hurt Hasbro/WotC, it would split the market for the game.  A bad fiscal move.  So it would indeed hurt them if they reprinted.  As for a third party hurting them, it would simply be competition for the same discretionary cash, which could help or hinder sales, there is no way to predict this.



Llaurenela wrote:That exact stance is why I keep reading that the market has declined from its peak, (yes, I know there are other strong factors, but this is also a strong factor) I am sure that I am not the only one out here that wants to buy things that nobody is selling at a reasonable price that is in the average persons range. I do not agree with the stance that OD&D and other OOP items should only be available to those that make about 5-6 times what the average person makes. The average income person happens to be or could be the largest part of the market. Just because you don't make a lot of money doesn't mean you are too stupid to play a good rpg. Even if I liked the current 3.5 D&D it is cost prohibitive to buy. I am not a fan of the hard back craze. I take care of things I own and a paperback cover will last me a long time. Printing it in hardback increases the cost quite a bit and it has no benefit for me. With the current business practice of WOTC and the soaring costs of the OOP items, the market will only continue to shrink. This may be of great benefit to the hardcore collectors in the upper income brackets who buy for investments and for whom price is not a factor, but it is at a great detriment to those average income people whose only interest is in playing the game.




I believe due to the scarcity of the artifacts for sale that most go for a "reasonable price", they sell for market value. The collecting market is as close to a true free market economy as one can get.  Just because you are not able to currently afford the prices does not make them unreasonable, it just means you do not place them same value on owning the items.



~jeff[/quote]

  


Grandstanding Collector
Acaeum Donor

Posts: 6455
Joined: Dec 13, 2004
Last Visit: Apr 20, 2023

Post Posted: Fri Oct 07, 2005 9:17 am 
 

Llaurenela wrote:I guess that is the difference between me and those like me. I don't buy things to collect, I buy them to play with and I treat them with kid gloves because I respect books, that is the way that I was raised. That is why I like rules lite games so that I can easily memorize the rules and I create cheats sheet of tables and such. But to buy something to hide it away from everyone and it sits in the dark. I personally would never buy something for that reason, no matter how much money I had.



As for pdfs, if that is the only thing I can buy then I will print it out and play with it. If you think I am wrong for wanting to play a great game and wrong for using a printed pdf file if that is my only option, then I reject your insult an am baffled by your attitude. I always prefer books. Given an honest price, I will always buy the book instead of the pdf. Given that I am not fortunate enough to make enough money that $15,000 or $20,000 is pocket change, some things I just can't buy. Unlike you I don't view that as a good thing. Achievable dreams are good things, unachievable dreams are a burden. But hey, I hear some people like pain in their lives, if having things that are out of your reach forever makes you happy then more power to you, it just doesn't have that effect on me, I don't find that to be a fun thing, especially when it is completely unnecessary.




First off, I do not know if you found my post insulting, but it was not intended to be.  I can also respect your desire to want to use the materials for play, but I am sorry that is not justification for you to have to pay less to get the same material that I have paid for because you are willing to settle for a copy.  I, like Al, am by no means anywhere near rich.  However, I chose to pay a fair amount to get the stuff that I want because it is my hobby.  As far as paying an honest price for material you are basically saying that even though that there were only 1000 printed 1st print Woodgrain box sets 30 years ago of which many were detroyed over time so who know how few actually exist now that the going rate is not a fair price.  IMO if you want it bad enough, you will pay the going rate to get it, if you dont want it bad enough then you wont.  If you find that insulting then I really dont know what to say. I mean shit why bother to set different prices for homes, cars, appliances, etc., because I would love to live in a mansion instead of an apartment, I would love to drive a Mercedes instead of a Cavalier, and while I am at it, I also want a 60" LCD TV with a full Dolby Surround sound system.


"He who fights with monsters might take care lest he thereby become a monster. And if you gaze for long into an abyss, the abyss gazes also into you." -Neitzche

  


Prolific Collector
Acaeum Donor

Posts: 189
Joined: Dec 19, 2004
Last Visit: Nov 22, 2012

Post Posted: Fri Oct 07, 2005 9:20 am 
 

Llaurenela wrote:Exactly and one major reform of copyright law is to change it so that only authors can hold copyright to a work. Businesses/Corporations should be forbidden to hold copyrights. I do not believe that in house workers should have no rights to their creative work. The person or persons that write something should hold the copyrights and corporations should rent the use for a maximum of 5 years at a time and it should be renogotiated every 5 years. This would go a long way to curbing the current abuses. The author of something is more interested in selling his work to as many people as possible.




You have to agree to a contract in order for someone other than yourself to hold copyright to your creative works, why should it be forbidden to do this?  Why should writers not be able to sell thier efforts and works to a corporate entity, or for a corporate entity to buy or contract the works of writers?  



~jeff

  


Prolific Collector
Acaeum Donor

Posts: 189
Joined: Dec 19, 2004
Last Visit: Nov 22, 2012

Post Posted: Fri Oct 07, 2005 9:23 am 
 

I ditched my cavalier for a Pontiac Grand Am when the head gasket blew on the old cavalier...which is one of the reasons I had to curb my habit...damned car payment.



~jeff

  

User avatar

Grandstanding Collector

Posts: 8241
Joined: Jan 21, 2005
Last Visit: Mar 24, 2024
Location: Wallasey, Merseyside, UK

Post Posted: Fri Oct 07, 2005 10:25 am 
 

saying that tho...like a few of the ppl on here....you can get some more rare items cheaper...just that their conditions are not as good. but hey, you would still have them!



johnhuck has his woody 3rd up which is a bit mullered, but then, there is no chance whatsoever i could compete with the big guns for one of them, or even afford it anyway, so this one will do me just fine as its more in my price range. that the box is mullered? so what....at least i will have one. having one is far better than not having one.



thats kinda the view i have with things. work at it slowly, and if youre canny enough, you will get there.



Al


Are we nearly there yet?

  


Long-Winded Collector
Acaeum Donor

Posts: 3066
Joined: Jul 09, 2004
Last Visit: Apr 30, 2015

Post Posted: Fri Oct 07, 2005 11:42 am 
 

killjoy32 wrote:saying that tho...like a few of the ppl on here....you can get some more rare items cheaper...just that their conditions are not as good. but hey, you would still have them!



johnhuck has his woody 3rd up which is a bit mullered, but then, there is no chance whatsoever i could compete with the big guns for one of them, or even afford it anyway, so this one will do me just fine as its more in my price range. that the box is mullered? so what....at least i will have one. having one is far better than not having one.



thats kinda the view i have with things. work at it slowly, and if youre canny enough, you will get there.



Al


Eh! Quit givin' away all my little secrets!   :lol: (Still looking for a low-grade ST1...)

 YIM  
PreviousNext
Post new topic Reply to topic Page 3 of 712, 3, 4567