Quote from: Endless Flight;778560So if the people who play D&D don't buy the rulebooks then it must be people who just enjoy reading them?

Is this directed at me?  If so I'm afraid I'm not following.

Quote from: Sacrosanct;778561Is this directed at me?  If so I'm afraid I'm not following.

No, it was based on a previous comment by Blacky. "None of my players buys a rulebook", which brought about my comment. If that was true of all players, then the people buying D&D books do not play D&D, they only enjoy reading the books.

Quote from: Blacky the Blackball;778551I have two groups of five players (although there's an overlap as two players are in both groups). I don't expect any of them to read the PHB except to occasionally look up a spell description.

I certainly don't expect any of them to go out and buy a PHB of their own - unless they're planning on DMing for a different group. The whole "players own a PHB" thing is not something I've ever seen in 35 years of gaming. People only buy a PHB if they're buying the whole set of three to run the game themselves.

The same goes for "splat" books aimed at players. I've never known a player buy one of those. A DM might if they want to include the stuff in it in their campaigns, but a player? Never.

Not my experience sorry. I've never been in a ongoing group where the players didn't have their own PHB. Most had a couple player facing books and the MM also and 10-25% had a DMG at home with that MM.

I wouldn't be surprised if a lot - as in over a third - of people who buy a D&D PHB aren't actively playing.

The ownership breakdown might look something like:

DMs 1/3
Players 1/3
Inactive (DM or Player) 1/3

I know a couple guys who have been playing D&D for over 30 years who have never read a PHB, let alone bought one.

Quote from: Haffrung;778586I know a couple guys who have been playing D&D for over 30 years who have never read a PHB, let alone bought one.

So do I and it sucks when they've internalized certain rules incorrectly.

Quote from: Marleycat;778589So do I and it sucks when they've internalized certain rules incorrectly.

As a referee, I love people like that.  Heh heh heh...

Quote from: Old Geezer;778590As a referee, I love people like that.  Heh heh heh...

I don't, because it's all in a chain of actions and prompts the 'you are doing it wrong' argument.

Quote from: Blacky the Blackball;778551The whole "players own a PHB" thing is not something I've ever seen in 35 years of gaming. People only buy a PHB if they're buying the whole set of three to run the game themselves.

Dear Lord, I have to say our experience is worlds apart.

It's not uncommon for only one person to own the rulebook at first, but within 6 games (so long as it lasts that long), everyone has a PHB. Now, most players won't go much beyond that. I typically see "PHB and a Player's Guide" for most of my players.

When I ran Star Wars d20, everyone had the Main Book. One guy had the Hero's Guide, one guy the Alien Anthology, one guy Starships of the Galaxy, etc. (as the GM and Star Wars completest, I HAD THEM ALL. It's a sickness, really it is...).

The Pathfinder OGC website is probably the reason I filled in my Pathfinder collection the slowest, since almost anything PF can be found there.

But I like books. Even e-books. And Pathfinder has appreciated my business...

Quote from: Sacrosanct;778557I really think this is more the exception to the rule, especially for gamers as a whole, and not gamers who have been playing for 30 years.  I base this not only on the groups that I see personally during cons and at game stores, but by the sales numbers of the PBH.

That might be a factor.

In the 35 years I've been roleplaying, I've never been to a con and I've only ever once played a single session at a game store (which was owned by a friend of mine and he was demoing a new game that had just come out - Deadlands).

And I can't speak for all the players I've ever played with - especially back when I was at university - because I'm no longer in contact with most of them, but certainly for the last fifteen years I've been the only member of my group that ever discusses RPGs on the Internet. The others (it's been a stable group for that long) just turn up once a week or so to play (or sometimes GM).

Quote from: Marleycat;778584Not my experience sorry.

There's no need to apologise for not having experiences as wonderful as mine. It's not your fault.

Quote from: Blacky the Blackball;778638That might be a factor.

In the 35 years I've been roleplaying, I've never been to a con and I've only ever once played a single session at a game store (which was owned by a friend of mine and he was demoing a new game that had just come out - Deadlands).

And I can't speak for all the players I've ever played with - especially back when I was at university - because I'm no longer in contact with most of them, but certainly for the last fifteen years I've been the only member of my group that ever discusses RPGs on the Internet. The others (it's been a stable group for that long) just turn up once a week or so to play (or sometimes GM).

I have the same experience. One other guy in my group is plugged into the RPG scene. The other three just show up and play. If I stopped calling them, they'd probably stop playing. It's a very casual hobby to them, and we're good friends outside of D&D.

I'm heavily involved in boardgaming as well, with different people, and I see the same dynamics. A couple people in the group are heavily involved in reading about, buying, and learning games. The rest just show up and play.

The last time I intensively ran an RPG was Pathfinder a few years ago.
When I started, it was just myself who had the books.
I ran it for about 6 people I think.
 
After a few months, 2 of the players had bought the core rules a a couple of other books.
After a year, most of the players had at least bought the Core rules.
In my experience that's an unusual uptake of book acquisition.

I wonder if this sort of thing is specific to DnDesque RPGs, as they tend to have lots of supplemental books and are often pretty crunchy ruleswise.

Other campaigns I ran either at the the same time or before had a much lower level of book uptake, such as Legend/MRQ2/Elric, although the players seemed to enjoy those games at least as much as Pathfinder.

I don't run RPGs anymore, but I'll still buy the core books at least just for the read.
However if I feel very motivated, I might try to get a Tabletop group going if I can get enough interest.
Interestingly, when I tried to get a Runequest/Elric tabletop campaign going years ago, I couldn't find players for it and I tried for months when I advertised on the usual online places.

When I advertised for Pathfinder players, within weeks I had enough players, so perhaps if I get motivated enough to try and put a tabletop group together, I might have success with that if I use DnD as the name and system itself seems to have broad appeal and awareness out there, by far and above any other RPGs.
Also I managed to get some players from my Pathfinder group playing Elric, which was nice.

I think DnD and the system itself has a lot of pulling power to get people playing and thus buy more books as for some reason in my experience GMs and Players tend to buy into the books at a better rate than other systems.

Going back 34 years to 1980, I don't think I've ever played with a group that didn't have at least 50-66% PHB ownership. Upstate New York, south-central Texas, Philadelphia, east-central Illinois: all groups with heavy PHB buy-in.

Quote from: dragoner;778605I don't, because it's all in a chain of actions and prompts the 'you are doing it wrong' argument.

Ah, but "I am the referee.  This is my world.  I make the rules.  Part of the game is discovering the rules empirically.  By coming to the table, you explicitly agree to this."