Quote from: Pat;972840You're mistaken. The AD&D 1st edition core books were $12 to $15, or even cheaper. While hidden, in the later books the MSRP is embedded in the item code. Which in my copy of the Monster Manual II (1983) is on the back cover below the ISBN, and says 394-53519-OTSR1200. Those last 4 digits are the price, $12.00. This jumps to $15.00 in later books, for instance the Manual of the Planes (1987). And it doesn't appear on the PH, DMG, or MM, so they may have been even less expensive (inflation was in the 2 digits between 1979 and 1981, thanks to the tail end of stagflation, so prices jumped pretty frequently). Converting to 2014 dollars, the MM2 becomes $28.52 and the MotP is $31.26. Comparatively, $20 in 1989 (2e) becomes $38.18, and $30 in 2000 (3e) becomes $41.24 (yes, the 3e PH was initially released at $20, but that was a promo price for the first printing). The 1e books are clearly the cheapest, though they are in black and white and much thinner. The 2e and 3e books are comparable. The 5e books (2014) at $50/each are more expensive, but not excessively so. You can make a good argument that RPG books have been underpriced, and inflation calculators don't adjust for specific changes like the hike in the price of paper or the size of print runs. And with online retailers, it's a lot easier to get a discount than it was in the 1980s or 1990s. For instance, the 5e PH is currently $30.77 on Amazon, which is 1e-era pricing. Except the 5e book is much thicker, and full color.

Go by page count and production quality and the new stuff is a vastly superior deal.

Quote from: Hermes Serpent;972964A book with purely player content that only players need to purchase.
A book with only GM content that only GM's need to buy.
A book that contains all the creatures needed to play the game.

If it was one 900 page book the cost would be horrendous, not to mention the weight. Plus the GM would not then be able to hide monster stats from players and the players having the GM's guide would know who or what is behind the curtain.

False dichotomy. There are other ways to provide the info surely than the 3 book format they have chosen.

Quote from: Biscuitician;972974False dichotomy. There are other ways to provide the info surely than the 3 book format they have chosen.

Well fuck you. I was trying to be helpful but you just pissed me right off so you can go screw yourself.

Quote from: Hermes Serpent;972976Well fuck you. I was trying to be helpful but you just pissed me right off so you can go screw yourself.

You're offended by what I said to the extent you needed to post and be abusive?? :O

The average cost of a movie ticket is about nine bucks, for about a ninety minute movie.  Nine cents a minute for entertainment.

At the same rate it takes only 28 hours of reading and playing to pay for a full set of D&D books.

Quote from: DavetheLost;972988The average cost of a movie ticket is about nine bucks, for about a ninety minute movie.  Nine cents a minute for entertainment.

At the same rate it takes only 28 hours of reading and playing to pay for a full set of D&D books.

That's fine, but it's not really going to be a pertinent analysis if you can't afford it to begin with. DnD may give me all the entertainment value in the world, but £80 is still £80

It is pertinent. You just can't dismiss others saying that their are more expensive things to spend money on simply because D&D is expensive. While I agree to some extent that the books are. Going out to eat a decent quality meal will set one back at least 30-40$ if not more. If one is lucky maybe in the 20-25$ range. If a person goes out to eat 2-3 times a week it can get expensive. Hell going to Starbucks everyday can get expensive. Now if one buys the core set and lets it rot on the shelf than the money spent is wasted. If they play on a semi-regular-regular basis they get their money back as they are using the product. Food and coffee tends to be flushed away the next day.

Quote from: Biscuitician;972974False dichotomy. There are other ways to provide the info surely than the 3 book format they have chosen.

Yes and no.

Sure they could have gone the Pathfinder route with the PHB and DMG yet unless one buys it from Amazon the price will only be slightly less expensive. Publishers are not stupid in that even if the format should make the book cheaper they still will charge as much as they think people will pay for it.

Size is a factor. Just ask Hero Games where their 6E was so dense a read and big that it scared off some interested in the rpg. Gamers usually don't want big books. More importantly if I'm a player and I don't want or need the information on how to run a game. All I need is the information needed on being a player.

Tradition I think plays a part. D&D from 1E onwards always had a PHB, DMG and MM. Don't underestimate the nostalgia factor.

Quote from: Biscuitician;972974False dichotomy. There are other ways to provide the info surely than the 3 book format they have chosen.

Products are priced based on market expectations and the price people are willing to pay. Changing your format means changing your formula - which is always a risk if you've already established expectations in the market. (A)D&D has followed a specific, three book format. It set similar expectations for the market, though companies have broken with that (typically from the start).

The three book format works really well. You lower the relative cost-of-entry by making the player book affordable, and the other books optional. Assuming the GM is willing to make a greater investment, the other books are 'less' optional. And better, the more they invest in 'stuff', the more likely they are to buy your other 'stuff'  that is more optional.

There are also some physical limitations in working with books, based on their size and weight.

There are a lot of ways you can ship a product, especially now with all the different digital formats. But there are fewer ways for companies to do it sensibly based on their customer base.

Quote from: Biscuitician;972974False dichotomy. There are other ways to provide the info surely than the 3 book format they have chosen.

Yes there may be other ways, but the three core book format is D&D way, and stop calling us shirley.

Quote from: Biscuitician;972993That's fine, but it's not really going to be a pertinent analysis if you can't afford it to begin with. DnD may give me all the entertainment value in the world, but £80 is still £80

Then don't fucking buy it. Find a cheaper game. There have been plenty of suggestions offered for much less expenses sources of entertainment but you are only interested in bitching. You could have been playing something by now.

Well... Adjusted for inflation, D&D is not expensive at all, especially compared to other forms of enterntainment.

in 1977 I paid $10 for the white bookset, $8 for a Holmes Bluebook Boxed set, and 2.99 for Judges Guild ready Ref Sheets. Gamma World was $10 in 1978, Traveller Black Box was $10 in 1977, Highguard & Mercenary were $3.50 each. A movie Ticket cost $2.25 or $1.50 for a Matinee showing. Minimum wage was $2.30 hr. You could get a good use car for $1,000 and an awesome new car for $7,000

Today, D&D 5e is free (I have the PDFs which are printed), 5e DMG $35. 5e PHB $39.99, 5e Monster Manual  $35. 1e DMG $15. 1e PHB $16, 1e Monster Manual  $20.  3e DMG $8.75 3e PHB $7, 3e Monster Manual  $10. so $50 or so for a 1e set and $25 or so for D&D 3e.
Movie Ticket $6 or $4 for a matinee (Prices have actually come down in the last year! Probably due to a lack of attendence). Minimum wage is $7.25-$12.50 depending on where you live in the U.S. so 3x inflation since 1977 for stuff is norm. Now you can get a good used car for $15,000 and a decent new car for $30,000 cash. So used cars are 7-15x more expensive and new cars are 4x more expensive than they used to be and at least 1.33x more expensive now then they were in 1977 after adjusting for inflation.

What is stupidly expensive is the original books....
D&D 74 White Bookset today would be $30 retail but it is out of print so a good copy goes for 10x as much @ $300 right now
Original Gamma World 1e also out of print, retails for around $95 now or 9.5x it's original retail price
Picked up a used copy of Traveller 1e black box a couple months back for $35 so only slightly inflated @ 3.5x its original price.
Rules Cyclopedia 1987 $12 and now $60- $100 so 5-6x more expensive than original.

D&D 5e hardbacks are about 5x more expensive than the white bookset and 2x more expensive than 1e when it was released. Much higher quality artwork though, and the new books are several magnitudes of size larger than the original white bookset and has almost 2x as much content, pagewise, as the 1e books.

Quote from: Exploderwizard;973010There have been plenty of suggestions offered for much less expenses sources of entertainment but you are only interested in bitching. You could have been playing something by now.

Pretty much. Numerous suggestions made, some for free, all rejected = not actually interested in playing.

The last time they experimented with alternative inexpensive formatting, it went ... poorly. (4E Essentials.) Now, there are a whole lot of reasons aside from the formatting it may not have done well, such as losing about half of your targeted retailer market just as you launch it , but between that and the self-conscious traditionalism of 5E, the 3-book hardcover formatting was pretty much a given.

  I raised the same concerns about entry-level price point when we first heard about them back in the day (I started quite the kerfuffle about it on both EN World and TBP), but a) those concerns were alleviated by the robust Starter Set and Basic options, and b) history has shown the game to be a success despite that.

Quote from: Hermes Serpent;972964... the players having the GM's guide would know who or what is behind the curtain.

Is that so bad? Don't most of us play and DM? I've been of the mind in the past that maybe more DM material should be in the PHB. In addition, 900 pages includes a lot of filler. I mentioned "For Gold and Glory" earlier; a 2nd ed retroclone. The rulebook, which contains all of the rules, as well as 140 monsters, weighs in at 370 pages and less than $8 on lulu.com. It's possible to do.

Now, I am not saying 5th edition should only cost $8. A retroclone takes very little in the way of paying developers, commissioning art, playtesting, advertising, merchandising, etc. And I can't fault 5th ed. for the free SRD, though it is very stripped down. What I would like Hasbro to do is maybe release their own softcover, black and white, low art rules compendium after a year or two after a new edition drops. It would certainly be easier to get new players and especially DMs into the game.

Part of the appeal is that DnD is the most popular and (hopefully) well supported game. I like that. I could be persuaded by 13th age, which i might check out tomorrow, but DnD has that pedigree. Unfair? Perhaps.

It doesn't really matter since that's the product I was interested in and that's it's price. Nevre really understood why the DM needs an entirely separate book though - one that doesn't contain a bestiary.

It would be interesting to see WotC experiment with alternative formats through the DM's Guild and their PoD service. But I'm partially saying that because I would love to see the Japanese Rules Cyclopedia published with English text. A pipe dream, I know.