I was refered to RPGNow website and noticed they have copies of serveral modules I would like to read.

Namely:
R4 Doc's Island
RPGA3 Forgotten King
RPGA4 Elixir of Life
R1 To the Aid of Falx
R3 Egg of the Phoenix

It appears to me that they are a legitimate business.  

I was wondering if anyone had any experience with them.  Are the PDFs good?  I still plan to eventually try to get my own copies of these, but I have a lot of other items I expect to get first.

Thanks

I have the R1, R3 and R4 from RPGnow and they are all decent scans (and definitely are legal). IIRC, all the pages are present and the same size and scan quality. I previously bought the WoG folio from SVgames and it was terrible. The R ones are much better and definitely fine for reading the mods. I haven't tried printing them so I don't know about that.

They are definitely a bargain compared to buying the actual modules...
RPGnow sells the pdfs for $5 without a watermark (or its very small). From what I've read, Paizo pdfs are $4 but there's a huge watermark on every page.

DrivethruRPG.com has legal pdfs of Judges Guild...I have the Gamescience Tegel Manor and Book of Treasure Maps I and both are nice and I think were $2 each.

Deadlord39 wrote:If you want to read them for aesthetic reasons, it's worth it. For playability, go get I12.

yeah you just beat me to that, thats what i was gonna suggest.

nothing beats the real thing too imo.

I12 is actually one of the best mods out there imo - also one of the hardest.

Al

Xaxaxe wrote:RPGnow is defeinitely on the up-and-up; everything is legal, they have an actual customer service department, etc. The scans are generally of good quality, but there are some exceptions — read the individual customer reviews for some warnings.

Paizo's wartermarking is entirely too intrusive. I threw away the one PDF I purchased from them, and I honestly can't see their rationale for defacing their products in such a manner. I'm sure they get a lot of traffic from people trying to "save a buck," but their PDFs are useless to me.

i wouldnt get them anyway, but yes, i agree. its totally pointless to deface them in such a way, which makes you then wonder....why the hell anyone would buy anything from them if you know what you are going to get in the end  

Al

Here's the rub: The only PDF's that would be economically feasible to buy instead of the original would be things like the R's, RPGA's, ST1, etc. And since almost all of the "special" or "rare" modules suck ass to use in gaming, I don't see the purpose.

Mbassoc: Well now we wouldn't really want the RPGnow pdfs to be too good, right? It would make for easier forgeries.

R1, R3 and R4 are fine for reading, and they at least have all the pages (I think...) and are in the right order, etc. That's good enough for me for $5.

Think of it this way: because of those pdfs, I'll never consider buying an R1, R3 or R4, thus making it cheaper for you (or anyone else) to buy another copy.

Disjected: Basically, I'd recommend buying one pdf of R1. If you think the quality is okay, buy some more. If not, save your pennies for the real deal. You can get 40 pdfs or one R1 (Guessing at least $200...but actually I have no idea what they normally sell for).

zhowar wrote:Mbassoc: Well now we wouldn't really want the RPGnow pdfs to be too good, right? It would make for easier forgeries.

Forging from a PDF file would be futile. You could never get a real printed copy. You could only get something that looked like a laser colour copy. PDF files do not store data in CYMK format, and they are effectively 'scanned' using the same technology as photocopiers, so the contain the same data flaws as photocopied material and it's built into the file. I have never seen a good PDF file from any of the onlise ESD distributors. I have seen a few that I would consider acceptable, but none that I'd be happy to say 'my company made that'.

zhowar wrote:R1, R3 and R4 are fine for reading, and they at least have all the pages (I think...) and are in the right order, etc. That's good enough for me for $5.

If they save you shelling out $500 for a full set, then fair enough. As a PDF producer, it annoys me when they get the secretary to do it between calls. It doesn't take too many braincells to make a decent PDF file.

zhowar wrote:Think of it this way: because of those pdfs, I'll never consider buying an R1, R3 or R4, thus making it cheaper for you (or anyone else) to buy another copy.

I doubt that PDF distribution has any tangible effect on eBay prices. If anything, knowledge and awareness increase competition and push up prices. I've not seen any product reduce in value as a result of PDFs being available.

zhowar wrote:Disjected: Basically, I'd recommend buying one pdf of R1. If you think the quality is okay, buy some more. If not, save your pennies for the real deal. You can get 40 pdfs or one R1 (Guessing at least $200...but actually I have no idea what they normally sell for).

Yep. You're right there.

faro wrote:

mbassoc2003 wrote:I doubt that PDF distribution has any tangible effect on eBay prices. If anything, knowledge and awareness increase competition and push up prices. I've not seen any product reduce in value as a result of PDFs being available.

Dragon magazines, esp. #30 up, are the most obvious example of a substantial reduction in 'value' following .pdf release. This has been stated before, repeatedly.

I cannot talk wisely about Dragon Magazine values. I'm curious as to why Judges Guild items haven't been affected? I can understand there being no credible impact on the modules with the fold out maps. But what about Thracia and Dark Tower? Those were the first things I bought in PDF. I would have thought preple would have paid $2 as opposed to $30 seing as they have the choice.

MShipley88 wrote:Do you mean the CD compendiums that TSR produced?

Yes.

Strangely enough though, Paizo gave away free copies of Dungeon 1 in PDF form and it didn't have an impact on the price of hardcopies on eBay.