Quote from: GameDaddy;789333in exchange for a secret Santa gift of comparable value.....

Value is a pretty subjective thing.
I might send something that to me might be considered a real RPG gem them I'm sending off.
but the person receiving might think it's a piece of old RPG gaming history trash.

I expect some people might be disappointed, but still, as long as it's not fairly obvious a con such as sending out a printed PDF or something REALLY crap, it should be taken on faith mostly.

Quote from: danskmacabre;789307OK, well just keep it simple as warthur has suggested,

If you sign up, it means you accept to pay whatever postage to wherever.
It's not like the postage is going to be THAT expensive anyway.

For reference, as an inhabitant of Foreignlandia, it cost me £11 to send a copy of the new Marvel game to Canada a few months ago; sending stuff to most places would be similar for me. It's a cost I'm willing to pay, I'd be happy with "you could be shipping anywhere in the world, don't join in if you're not okay with that". If anyone really wants to join in but postage is just too much, maybe we could pitch in to help 'em out a bit.

For the rest of it organisation-wise, I reckon everyone sends their details to one person, and then that person sends everyone a random other participant - eg, not pairing people off, although I'm sure there's a web service somewhere we could use for this to keep it secret.

Quote from: Rincewind1;789311A swell idea, though my choice of RPG books in actual English is somewhat limited.

That's ok, just agree to be on call 24/7 for Polish translation.

Quote from: Piestrio;789273What do you all think?

No.

I already have been doing this for people who share my gaming interests.

Now that RPGPundit's forum has turned into our site's gloryhole, I agree should have Secret Santa too...and that link goes to the really, really inappropriate music video for Steel Panther's new song.

Shipping costs can be an issue, so I agree people should be broken down by region.

1) Anywhere!
2) USA only
3) Europe only? (Maybe somebody can talk about shipping issues between EU countries and beyond so we have facts about costs here)
4) Country specific only? (Maybe if we have a dozen people from a specific country who want to only keep it in country?)

It would be fun to get local stuff in English (or unusual editions) from people outside the USA.

BTW, since it is a Gift does that avoid VAT and other taxes?

I agree with the Secret Santa idea, but insist that all gifts are shit sandwiches. It's the only gift that fits the tenor of the site.:-)

Quote from: Piestrio;789309That's my thinking. It's not like we're expecting people to ship stuff first class with bottle service on the trip. I used to ship 80-100lbs boxed home from Korea (to the states) and I don't think I spent more than 50USD. And I doubt anyone is going to send 100lbs worth of books.

I just entered a 5 lb box, destination Uruguay (to pick a completely random country), into the USPS rate calculator. The cheapest option that pops up is more than $50.

I don't know if there's a cheaper way to ship, but if so they're hiding it. I'd have to visit the post office and ask, which means I can't even estimate expected costs. But there was a huge hike in USPS' international shipping rates not that long ago, and Kickstarters have started charging $60+ to ship a few books internationally.

I'm no expert, but I think you're vastly underestimating current international shipping costs.

Damn!!! Pat is really right. International shipping costs have gone bonkers.
I did US to UK for the flat rate envelope (4lbs) and its $42.75.

Most sites recommend just buying stuff via Amazon UK instead.

So...Secret Santa PDF swap?

Quote from: Spinachcat;789529Most sites recommend just buying stuff via Amazon UK instead.

So...Secret Santa PDF swap?

POD books sent direct to the victim? DTRPG have printers across the world...

(For buying first-hand stuff for people in the UK and probably the rest of Europe, Leisure Games or Gameslore tend to be better stocked than Amazon, and not too dissimilar in price. But it can vary.)

Would love to join in, but shipping from Canada to the USA is pretty monstrous. With my luck, because I live in Québec the package I send (or the one I'd receive) would get stuck at the border. Blech.

Quote from: Ladybird;789544POD books sent direct to the victim? DTRPG have printers across the world...

That's a good idea. I did not know DriveThruRPG had printers around the world, could you tell us more about how that works? List of countries?

Quote from: Spinachcat;789589That's a good idea. I did not know DriveThruRPG had printers around the world, could you tell us more about how that works? List of countries?

Lightning Source are the printers they use (I presume most of us have some books by them, they do good work). After that, it's just a matter of using the recipient as the delivery address; it has a comprehensive list (Admittedly, I haven't compared it to an ISO country list) and it'll get printed by the closest applicable printer, I presume.

You could do the same thing with any other PoD service, it's really no different to any other gift ordering. I guess customs might be an issue in some cases, but that's kinda unavoidable.

The option to buy something from DTRPG and get it printed in country of the recipient sounds good.

I''d be willing to go on board with that.
However what about those that live in countries where they're not covered with Lightning source?

I guess people could post in here if they want to take part AND their country, it'd be a good start to see how feasible it is.

For me, I live in Australia. I see Lightning source are in Melbourne (Victoria), so I'm OK.

If there isn't a local printer in the country, yeah, you're at the whim of postage again, but I have a sneaking suspicion that their books to outside the US would be printed and shipped from Europe.

Prices seem to hover towards £3ish for my example tests (A PoD copy of Hero Kids) to countries in the middle or far east, but that is the "very slow" option (Like, 5 - 7 weeks at worst). It'll get there, though! You could even send Kim Jong-Un some books. Give him something to do.

There are some countries they don't ship to - I haven't tested all of them, but gut instinct says it would be ones on US export lists (And Antarctica, but penguins are all storygamers anyway). I don't think we have any regulars from Afghanistan, Iraq, etc., but if we did, something else would have to be worked out for them.

If someone in the US wants to have a look as well, that might start getting us somewhere.

it's cheaper to ship this book to russia than it would be to ship it to my house. what the fuck.

I can't believe the shipping options on the USPS website are all they are. I'm going to stop by the post office tomorrow and ask, I hope they're just hiding their cheapbastard shipping.

I'll keep ya'll posted.

As for me I live in the U.S. And would be up for doing 2-3 packages and at leat one overseas even if shipping ends up being high.