Lets assume that for one reason or another (or a dozen) you need to downsize your RPG collection.

So lets run a few scenarios and see how we would deal:

1) You only need to trim. Say maybe a quarter of your current levels. What would go? How do you prioritize?

2) About half needs to go.

3) 3/4 needs to go.

4) Really drastic. You can only keep a small backpack full of games, so figure 3-5 books and some dice, etc...

Let us know how PDFs factor into this as well.

This question is somewhat hard for me because I don't have a clear idea what is in my library. About 90% of it has been sitting in storage for 2+ years so it's all a bit fuzzy.

If you can be more detailed please do so

Quote from: Piestrio;6356681) You only need to trim. Say maybe a quarter of your current levels. What would go? How do you prioritize?

At this stage I'd look to get rid of supplements rather than whole games. I'd ditch a lot of my Champions, GURPS, and AD&D 2e supplements and try to replace them with PDF. I'd also try to get rid of some games that I have minimal investment in, so a few corebooks I've never cracked would go too.

Quote2) About half needs to go.

I'd be a little more choosy about supplement culling and look to get rid of whole game lines. So I'd probably ditch all my WoD and 3.x/4e stuff outright and then toss supplements as above until I got where I needed to be.

Quote3) 3/4 needs to go.

Whole game lines HAVE to go. Let's say WoD, 3.x/4e, Champions, Alternity, L5R, the Retro clones, Palladium/RIFTS, etc... I'd try to not touch my AD&D and GURPS stuff. I'd also try to get rid of singles that I've never used.

Quote4) Really drastic. You can only keep a small backpack full of games, so figure 3-5 books and some dice, etc...

I'd keep the GURPS core set and the 2e PHB, DMG and MM.

And then cry. A lot.

I'm actually going through this right now.  Boxes of stuff (mostly picked up at a con years ago, for cheap, and never used) is getting shipped off to people I know will use it.  Now if only I could convince my wife to get rid of much of her White Wolf collection...

I'm paring down to the bare essentials.  I am never going to use that copy of Feng Shui and don't even remember why I bought it.

When I'm done I'm hoping the shelf looks like this:

Labyrinth Lord & AEC
AD&D reprints
handful of OSR-type books I dig
small handful of TSR-era D&D stuff I intend to use this year

And that's pretty much it for dead-tree.  Pdf is a whole different matter, I have no qualms about storing something forever when it doesn't take up any actual space.

Out the door go random copies of Dragon and Dungeon, vintage stuff not slated for use (I have it in pdf anyway), etc.  Will I still pick up the odd old Dragon at the shop for funsies this year?  Sure I will.  And when I'm done reading it and mining it, it'll go in the Big Box for next year's giveaway purge.

1) Stuff that I have never played and am not likely to. Like the DC and non-SAGA Marvel RPGS, some old D&D stuff, that sort of thing.

2) Same, but now we're getting into just keeping Marvel SAGA, BASH Ultimate Edition, everything I have for Savage Worlds and Deadlands and probably my Unisystem books, and the Third Eye Games books (Part-Time Gods, Wu Xing and Apocalypse Prevention Inc.) as well as Midnight and Ravenloft.

3) There goes anything for Unisystem and the Third Eye Games family. Probably Ravenloft. I'm down to Marvel SAGA, Midnight and Savage Worlds/Deadlands at this point, I think.

4) Savage Worlds it is. I'd even let the Classic Deadlands stuff go in a pinch, because any time I'm running Deadlands from here on, it's Deadlands Reloaded anyway. (Savage Worlds, Deadlands Reloaded, maybe hold onto Marvel SAGA and Solomon Kane).

PDFs are a trickier issue. In theory, I have a MASSIVE PDF library...in practice, almost none of it is on my computer because I haven't had time to sit and redownload it since my computer crash in January.

I'm afraid I can't suspend disbelief for this fantasy premise.

they'll have to pry them from my cold dead hands.

Yeah, I'm not parting with my books, much less putting slime down on them.

I have gone through some RPG stuff purges over the years.  At the time I was so glad to see so much of it go; many times it has been helpful (I sold off a half-dozen D&DGs with Cthulhu and Elric for $30 a pop not too long ago, f'rex).  In retrspect I wish I'd kept most of it.  The effort of selling it off and the benefit (usually $10 here or $20 there) was rarely worth it.

Quote from: Piestrio;635668Lets assume that for one reason or another (or a dozen) you need to downsize your RPG collection.

So lets run a few scenarios and see how we would deal:

1) You only need to trim. Say maybe a quarter of your current levels. What would go? How do you prioritize?

2) About half needs to go.

3) 3/4 needs to go.

4) Really drastic. You can only keep a small backpack full of games, so figure 3-5 books and some dice, etc...

Let us know how PDFs factor into this as well.

I actually did this a while back. I probably had ~$10,000-$15,000 worth of RPGs.

In the end, I got rid of everything except my 2e stuff.

But I got rid of Combat and Tactics . . . because it was proto-3e.

harhahrhrahar

Quote from: 1989;635699I actually did this a while back. I probably had ~$10,000-$15,000 worth of RPGs.

I had kind of a test run at this when I moved to Korea a couple years back (hence why most of my stuff is still in storage):

I ended up taking:

AD&D core
Starblazer*
Dresden Files*
Legends of Anglerre*
WEG Star Wars
Call of Cthulhu

The only books that ended up getting used were AD&D and CoC. Though I really wanted to make Star Wars happen I just didn't have the time.

*This was back when I thought I could really like FATE. Turns out I don't.

I've transported my entire collection in boxes by bus one at a time over a week-long period. But honestly, nest to my book-book collection, the RPG-book coolection is pretty meager. Only takes up two bookshelves of 18.

I only have four or five games on my shelf right now, so any slimming down (I hope sliming was a typo) is probably out of the question. I could lose 3:16 without tears I suppose.

Quote from: Piestrio;6356681) You only need to trim. Say maybe a quarter of your current levels. What would go? How do you prioritize?

Stuff that doesn't get played. I have some old Masterbook stuff, some older BRP stuff I never use, maybe the various "indie" games I picked up and came to dislike.

Quote from: Piestrio;6356682) About half needs to go.

GURPS 3e supplements. I would stock up on PDFs. SJG seems to be bringing them back in a steady stream, and I do most of my game prep on a computer anyways.

Quote from: Piestrio;6356683) 3/4 needs to go.

All GURPS (*sniff*) because it's too much for most players. I'll probably never get to run it. CoC stuff, as I rarely use it or run it. Unisystem stuff would go (have PDFs).

Quote from: Piestrio;6356684) Really drastic. You can only keep a small backpack full of games, so figure 3-5 books and some dice, etc...

BRP Gold Book, my RuneQuest 6e book, and everything Eclipse Phase. Everything else goes.

Quote from: Piestrio;635668Let us know how PDFs factor into this as well.

I am already a proliferate PDF buyer. As long as I could boot up, load up, and read a book, I would be golden. Probably am looking at getting an android tablet soon with a large screen just for this purpose (and Kindle).

I would lose my non-fiction reference library before I let go of my RPG library. My RPG collection is pretty much central to my most favorite things.

I've been doing this for a while, slowly culling my game collection which has also been combined with buying less. Other than a couple of cheap pdfs for systems I am actively running I've not bought any roleplaying stuff in over a year.

I'd say I have already hit the 1/4 mark, having got rid of a lot of the more speculative purchases, often just supplements for some odd ball system I thought I might be able

I would certainly keep my ICONS, Bulldogs!, Barbarians of Lemuria and my own homebrew Fate related stuff as that is what I am running mostly these days.

I'm still hanging on to some of my TSR era Gamma World stuff (though I did give away the entire 3rd edition books and adventure a few months ago), my WEG D6  gamebooks (Star Wars, Bloodshadows and assorted others), D&D Rulescyclopedia, Ghostbusters and TSR's Marvel Superheroes as I've enjoyed these games a lot in the past, the time may come to revisit them. Most of these are out of print so while in the bunch there are probably the odd book I could lose without really feeling it, I'd have to be have to be careful because not all of it would be easy to replace.

I've got Savage Worlds and a few adventure and world books for it. This could probably go as I've not actually run Savage Worlds yet (I've played it, I like it well enough) and it's all readily replaceable should I change my mind, but this really a big category to start with.

Then there is there is the oddball category, a bunch of games or game related products which I don't run but I keep for inspiration or because I like the art or because, even though I don't use it, it was hard to find in the first place or some other not really practical reason. I could get rid of all of these and I probably should.

Have had two purges. The first sliced my collection in half, and I burnt out on taking stuff down the post office for what amounted to a couple of quid per book, and losing out on some stuff. The Battletech stuff (wargame and RPG bits) went for less than I paid for it. Second purge was more considered, and I put a reserve on each item, making it clear it wouldn't be relisted. Most sold and I was ok with getting my money back for the most part.

If I were to do another purge?

Keep BECMI, probably two sets - one nice and one battered which was used 'back in the day' for nostalgia purposes. Slim down to two RCs. A good one and the 'banana ruined' copy which I would be too ashamed to sell. I have 1e-4e, some in multiple (albeit battered) copies. The lot can go. B/E can stay. If I were smart I'd ditch the RCs I have (two or three... or maybe more - haven't been in the loft for a while) and a couple of boxed copies of BECMI before they are reprinted and worth less.

Runequest can go. I'd keep T&T as I don't have too much of that, and its shelf-lite.

Sell every science fiction game aside from XXVC and maybe the Star Wars core books (D6), a copy of each. Ditch the rest. I sold then re-bought quite a bit of Traveller and Spacemaster stuff, but god knows why.

Any OSR-like stuff (Dungeon Crawl Classics and so on) I'd have to take on individual merits. One book solutions stay. They rest would never be played, most likely.

My weakness is supers games. I have most of the games out there, including some right garbage that will never be played. If I *had* to prune I'd keep DC Heroes (everything, ever), Golden Heroes, Marvel Universe RPG (Diceless) and maybe Marvel Saga. The rest I should think could go. Can't see me ever revisiting Mutants and Masterminds or Hero system, though nostalgia might have me hanging onto Champions 3e and V&V. Scratch that. V&V can go too. Marvel Heroic would be gone with nary a shrug.

Call of cthulu, any kind of horror game, a few old FGU games and anything in a modern non super era would go. Toon, Ghostbusters, anything quirky or unusual, gone. Most licensed games. I don't have much in the way of Warhammer or MERP, so maybe the corebooks would stay. Rolemaster, gone.

Any Palladium books are near worthless second hand (I know, I've tried to sell 'em), so they'd go to a charity shop or in the bin. I'm not saying they are complete crap, just that no one seems to want to buy them and those are the alternatives I'd have. Thankfully I only have a few.

I need to catalogue what I have. Seems after every purge I binge on cheap stuff, take a look and realise why its cheap (a lot of it is crap)

PDFs? I have lost a pile. My hard drives seem to die in twos and threes. Some die weeks after the warranty runs out and its a scramble to get off what I can.

The quest for speed has left hard drives unreliable. The old stuff (from the 90s) is mostly still going, albeit in tiny capacities that you couldn't fit windows on.

I see no reason to purge PDFs. The seller might yank them at ANY time. Take Mongoose and the Lone wolf books recently. WOTC the first time round. Licenses changing hands (supers being sold for instance).

I'm getting reasonably proficient at self printing/binding and have a duplex laser printer for that reason only. It won't need toner for another 8,000 pages, which is a lot of books, and I have enough thick card/board for around 20 hardbacks.