Could you theoretically see yourself paying for a very small PDF product, 1-4 pages? Even if it was just a dollar or two? I know there have been products like this on OBS, and some of them seem to have done rather well. I wonder who the audience for them would be?
Greatly depends on the writer.
Are you doing market research?
If I knew the designer's other work yes. I would gladly pay for Michael Prescott's one-two page dungeon/adventure/locations.
Sure, depending on content. Dyson Logos' 1-4 pages maps w/locations are worth that. So are 1-4 page detailed magic items, monsters, spells, for your game of choice. Kind of like buying a Dragon Magazine for the one article, but cheaper.
I've got a number of character classes on OBS, which are like 2 pages of class description, plus another page for the advancement table for 1e, 0e, and B/X.
Amusingly, they make more money than any of the adventure modules I've made (save the one about the Mi-Go, people really like Lovecraft) which are generally 10-30 pages and take a lot more work and usually involve $10-15 of stock art.
Mind you, I'm not talking about major money. 4 of my 6 modules have yet to bring in more than $10 (the Lovecraft one about $300 in 3 years, the other about $25 total), but the classes pull in $30+ over their lifetime. So I use the money from the classes to subsidize the stock art for the modules.
Depends on cost and content. A well regarded writer would certainly tip my opinion.
Absolutely and I have done so on multiple occasions. If somebody has an idea, rule, or nifty table of value for me, he gets a buck.
I can just about imagine coughing up a $ for a 1-page dungeon from a well regarded writer like Dyson Logos. It would have to be something I really needed Right Now.
I would, and have.
I don't quite understand why this is even a question. We want creatives to continue offering their creations to us, yes? Then we need to reward them for their efforts. Game designers deserve to be paid.
I have paid for very short pdfs from OBS in the past, though it has been more about niche-product than the writer.
I would if the content was good enough and it added something useful to the game.
I don't even use the ones I've gotten for free, so no. PDFs are not for me. I would have to print it out and put it in a folder for it to be of any use.
Quote from: The Exploited.;963478I would if the content was good enough and it added something useful to the game.
I'll go with this.
Think the most I have paid for a small pdf was $4, maybe a little less than that, can't recall, but it was for 14 pages. The game was a lot of fun and gave a lot of bang for the buck, so it was worth it.
Quote from: RPGPundit;963437Could you theoretically see yourself paying for a very small PDF product, 1-4 pages? Even if it was just a dollar or two? I know there have been products like this on OBS, and some of them seem to have done rather well. I wonder who the audience for them would be?
Sure. Depends on what's in it and whether I want that or not, of course. I don't remember how long it is, but I bought the one on "rope" in RPGs. I think I even bought one for a friend. I'd buy one if it was full of useful art, like a counter sheet, or a character sheet layout I liked, or a well-done quick-reference card for game tables I use, or a cool set of equipment tables, or a cool map, or a concise reference for the full GURPS medical rules including bleeding etc... especially if I could edit it for my house rules. ;-)
Quote from: RPGPundit;963437Could you theoretically see yourself paying for a very small PDF product, 1-4 pages? Even if it was just a dollar or two? I know there have been products like this on OBS, and some of them seem to have done rather well. I wonder who the audience for them would be?
I once bought a game called ADVENTURERS! It's a 4 page game - 2 for the players, 2 for the GM. I even bought more 4-page supplements for it. The price was $1 or less IIRC. It's quite neat, a very tight, functional, trad little system.
I'll also add that "my game is only 2 pages long!!" will grab my attention WAY quicker than "My game is a complete universe in a 600 page TOME" these days. :D
I am more likely to 1 page pdf than a 300 page one. I have no interested in complicated rule and detailed settings.
Yes.
In computer game design, I call this the "Go Problem". Go is an incredibly good game, and the rules can be taught in five minutes. They don't look interesting on paper, and certainly don't look like something you should pay for.
I would absolutely pay for the RPG equivalent of Go. The amount of work to get an RPG to the point where it can effectively be described in a single page? That's a hell of an achievement.
It'd have to be some pretty impressive top level passwords.
Not a fan of buying 1-page adventure hooks. Too LITE, no matter the price.
0.50CDN no more.
No.
There is far too much A grade free stuff available.
But the caveat is I love creating my own stuff so between me & the free, its hard to justify why I'd pay for stuff. Yeah, its a buck, and I really shouldn't be a cheapass, but I would pay $10 for a POD of 10 really cool dungeons, but not $1 for 1.
And I know this is a me thing, but I have a hard time paying for PDF. I have done so, but its more about tossing cash at somebody I like, that any sense I am getting value. Yes, I know that doesn't make sense.
Also, I am FAR more likely to toss cash for a PDF on Kickstarter than anywhere else. Yes, I know that doesn't make sense either.
Quote from: RPGPundit;963437Could you theoretically see yourself paying for a very small PDF product, 1-4 pages? Even if it was just a dollar or two? I know there have been products like this on OBS, and some of them seem to have done rather well. I wonder who the audience for them would be?
Depends entirely on what it is, both type of content
and quality (there's a
lot of cheap and free crap on OBS). Assuming I think it's something I'd actually use, for 1-4 pages my cap would likely be a buck,
maybe two.
If it's good, absolutely.
1-4 pages to do what?
If it were an expansion to a game, perhaps. Let's say you made an Arrows of Indra or Dark Albion expansion, Age of Sail, that told a DM everything important about shifting the timeline forward a bit, and added naval warfare rules*. That's the kind of thing I'd see put into a 4 page pdf.
*I have no idea if this example would be pertinent to your games, just using them as an example
Probably not, because I'd have to do a lot of wading through a pile of PDFs to find the ones I wanted. And something that small is unlikely to get reviewed or otherwise grab my attention if I don't do the wading. But getting me to even look at any PDF has to overcome a lot of inertia.
Now, something more in the range of, say, 16-32 pages, is more likely to grab my interest. That's small enough to still be focused and cheap to print. I'm seriously considering buying a few PDFs in that range right now, after reading some reviews.
Well, the question here was regardless of the subject, so I guess part of the question would be "what kind of product could you imagine paying $1-2 for a 1-4 page PDF of"?
Quote from: RPGPundit;963867Well, the question here was regardless of the subject, so I guess part of the question would be "what kind of product could you imagine paying $1-2 for a 1-4 page PDF of"?
For me, mostly:
* Useful tables
* Sub- or alternative game systems for established games
* Microsettings like towns, adventure sites, dungeons, etc.
The magic section of Dark Albion would be a good example, even though that's more pages. There was a guy who made a PDF for "Goetic Magick", which I liked.
If it's a simple system that only takes a few pages, I will drop a dollar or two on it. An adventure, absolutely. But if I'm paying for content, I expect content. If I pay for a 4 pages class document, and even 25% is art, I'll get irritated. When you have a very small page count, it should be very sparing on the decoration and focus on the actual meat of what the author wants to convey.
If you want to release something like a regular digest of useful ideas, rules, classes, adventures, etc., then you need to keep that content excellent, and begin (slowly) reducing the price of older works, to keep interested consumers as subscribers.
This is, in essence, what gaming magazines used to be though, right? Pay a fee, get some articles, micro-adventures and content.
If theres some thing that interests me and enough of an idea / content I can see it but not over a buck or 2
Quote from: RPGPundit;963867Well, the question here was regardless of the subject, so I guess part of the question would be "what kind of product could you imagine paying $1-2 for a 1-4 page PDF of"?
Very little. It has to be very well produced.
Definitely if it's a dollar or two and contains sometime useful/cool/adaptable to my game at hand. Ideally with some sweet art to boot.
Quote from: RPGPundit;963437Could you theoretically see yourself paying for a very small PDF product, 1-4 pages? Even if it was just a dollar or two? I know there have been products like this on OBS, and some of them seem to have done rather well. I wonder who the audience for them would be?
Maybe.
It would have to be something that I know I would use and have outstanding production values.
The audience would be fans of the author and the occasional, dead cat. If the writer has somewhat of a name it might work. It will work better if the author plans to produce more than one, 1-4 page PDF, or the publisher/producer plans to enlist other well known authors and create a line of sorts. A sale might lead to sales.
As far as what the product would be, I have no idea. Whatever It was, it would have to be good. Nobody want's to pay $2 for four pages, and think to themselves afterward, "What was I thinking? It was only four pages!"
Though... I recently reviewed Strange Stars by Trey Causey. It's 32 pages at 10 bucks. The production value is excellent, the writing is decent, but it's a splat book, not as it is subtitled a "Setting Book." It has some good ideas and as I said very nice art, but if you bought it thinking you were going to get, or even hoped to get a setting "treatment" (given it's 32 pages and accomplishing a setting would be difficult) you might be sorely disappointed. After I read through I was compelled to give the reviews over at drivethru a read... And to my surprise most of them were very positive. I'm aware Trey has a following of sorts so yeah, In order of importance:
Author
Production Value
Content
And just to be clear, the order of this isn't what I would want it to be. In fact, you could flip the list on its head and that would be my preference.
Quote from: Snowman0147;963438Greatly depends on the writer.
This. I usually never buy without previews. I'd buy if DwD Studios published it.
I also bought all the 1PG systems from Heyoka and Deep7. I think I got the first couple during a sale after reading lots of review, and ended up buying the rest to check them out.
Quote from: RPGPundit;963437Could you theoretically see yourself paying for a very small PDF product, 1-4 pages? Even if it was just a dollar or two? I know there have been products like this on OBS, and some of them seem to have done rather well. I wonder who the audience for them would be?
I might, but looking through my purchases, you have the best odds of it happening if it was PWYW, and I considered it worth paying after reading;).
I pay for articles for the w.o.i.n. system through Patreon, a dollar an article (I max at 10 bucks a month). They are about 1 to 4 pages each with some being larger adventures. They tend to be small rules expansions.
No. I would not. I don't think it is worth it to a consumer to pay so much for so little.
If you look at your average big hardback game book. They just give you far more for your dollar.
Quote from: Darrin Kelley;964137No. I would not. I don't think it is worth it to a consumer to pay so much for so little.
If you look at your average big hardback game book. They just give you far more for your dollar.
That is the epitome of debatable based on the "big hardback game books" I have seen. So much gloss, so little useful content. There are surely exceptions but most seem to be chock full of nothing I will ever use, and poorly edited and organized to boot.
Quote from: Dumarest;964166That is the epitome of debatable based on the "big hardback game books" I have seen. So much gloss, so little useful content. There are surely exceptions but most seem to be chock full of nothing I will ever use, and poorly edited and organized to boot.
Not long ago. I bought the new D&D 5th Edition rulebooks. All of them in one pocketbook jarring jolt.
Every one of them has things I would use in them. Every single one of the 5 hardbacks, and the DM's Screen. And I feel my money was well spent.
This is the first time in a lot of years where I am actually excited and engaged by D&D. Of all things.
Third and Fourth Edition really didn't bring me that kind of excitement. Because of being way too bloated and overly complex.
5th Edition brings me back to what I loved about BECMI D&D. The simplicity.
And I will repeat it again: I do not believe paying a dollar for a one page PDF is reasonable. There just isn't enough information it could possibly contain that could convince me otherwise. It reeks of author entitlement to me.
Quote from: Christopher Brady;963992Very little. It has to be very well produced.
And how would you define "well produced"? Because well-written, well-organized, good layout are all things that can be viable there, but for example if you add art to the product, it would be almost impossible (unless the art was just some kind of free piece) that it would be able to sell for under $2.
Quote from: RPGPundit;964433And how would you define "well produced"? Because well-written, well-organized, good layout are all things that can be viable there, but for example if you add art to the product, it would be almost impossible (unless the art was just some kind of free piece) that it would be able to sell for under $2.
Sadly, I'm a highly visual person, which means I'd LIKE some art, but well-written, well-organized and a good layout are mandatory if I'm spending money on a piece of writing.