How Much Do You Spend a Year on RPGs?

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How much do you spend only on RPGs per year?

  • $0/year (cheapskate!)

    Votes: 1 1.2%

  • $1-100/year

    Votes: 15 18.3%

  • $101-250/year

    Votes: 24 29.3%

  • $251-500/year

    Votes: 15 18.3%

  • $501-1,000/year

    Votes: 14 17.1%

  • $1,001+/year (MY PRECIOUS!)

    Votes: 13 15.9%
  • Total voters
    82
Endless Flight

Endless Flight

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I’ve seen some crazy numbers thrown around here the last five years about how much people spend on games. Figured I would start a poll.
 
I've toned down some. Mind you, I've spend nearly $500 on RPGs since Christmas, so maybe I should have gone top drawer.
 
I think I spend about $200 a year on RPGs, average. I think the most I might have spent was back in the early 00s when there were a lot of hardbacks I would buy. Those days are pretty much past as I usually buy PDFs that aren’t as expensive.
 
I think I've toned it down. I'm much more PDF than before but I think I am enticed more to get things I won't play because the price is cheap.
 
I'm only up so much because there's been more than one dead tree pre-order, which is really uncommon for me. I haven't even ordered CY BORG yet. :grin:
 
Probably about $100-$150 per year, for the past few years. Almost all of that is PDFs; until this year I don't think I had purchased a hardcopy in nearly a decade.
 
In August I am going to step down from my current position back to my old one and then I will make about half as much, so I have cranked it up a bit this year. I've picked up more hardcopies than normal and backed some kickstarters I probably wouldn't have otherwise.
 
I think this past year, I picked up about 5 kickstarters about $40 to $60 each, and then a few other RPG books. I'd put it somewhere about $400, maybe.
 
I guessed an average of $100 a month, so that's 1200, but that seems conservative, especially if we're counting Kickstarters and tangentially related stuff like miniatures, Warhammer, etc
 
I picked $500-1000, but if I did a detailed look, it wouldn't surprise me if I'm over $1000 for this year.
 
Really hoping to go the other direction this year and sell most of my physical stuff, but I still spend too damn much on RPGs. Especially for someone who isn't even playing or planning anything. I put $501-1000 but that's probably very conservative for what I actually spend in a year. I'm sure it's much, much more, especially if I take KS into account, I just haven't collected my receipts.
 
$380 at DTRPG in the last year. That’s most of my purchases. I am probably $425 with a couple other things

edit: forgot humble bundle and bundle of holding which almost certainly shoots me over $500.
 
Whatever it is, I don't get my money's worth. Anything I buy that's not D&D or Savage Worlds is pretty much just tossing away cash. I haven't even read a bunch of the stuff all the way through.
 
I just downloaded my PayPal from last year, and the items I identified as gaming totaled over $300 so there I am. There are probably some gaming stuff either paid directly by credit card or I may have missed some PayPal payments. Note that $108 of that is Scribd. I should really cancel that...
 
Maybe I am not a real gamer, but my gaming expenditure is very, very modest, I rarely buy anything and when I do I often don't even read it. Mostly I purchase short adventures - I got quite a few ICONS adventures - or products with adveture generators. I wouldn't even know how to spend $500 in roleplaying games.

I did buy a physical copy of the Dune rpg last year, but it was a present for a friend's birthday. I didn't even take a peek dispite the book sitting idle at my place for weeks.
 
Back in 2020, I passed the $1000 limit on a single RPG kickstarter. :sweat: However, usually, as under 2021, I need to combine bundles, pdsf, KS, and physical books to get over that.

So... far too much :clown:
 
I tend to ask for rpg books for birthday/Christmas. Given the infrequency of play nowadays it's difficult to even self justify spending big money on them.

Counting the value of presents and my impulse purchases, I'm in the 101-250 bracket, but go a while back and it was 501-1000.
 
My spending habits on RPG's is dysfunctional. As in I buy more games then I can realistically run or play. Games are my "comfort food" if you will. I buy games the way my wife buys handbags. This is they way it has always been and will always be.

Unless I get therapy, but that costs money I could be spending on games.

Already spent close to £200 on rpgs so far this year. All physical hard copies. I rarely spend money on PDF's these days. The only downside of working from home because of covid is losing access to the work printer!

I nearly picked up the new One Ring starter box and core book yesterday, but remembered that I have a complete run of the previous edition that never got played. ("Why don't we just play DnD?", was the response when I pitched it. sigh.)

Part of my spending is down to FOMO - rpgs from smaller publishers (and not so small!) all seem to go out of print so fast these days. And not everything is made available as POD. 2nd hand prices are just crazy now for things. So I am buying things I know my current group won't play, but I like the idea of the game and I may have players in the future that will try it. Well... thats what I tell myself anyway!
 
Well there has been many years where it was zero because of life, interests, no place to put extra, etc. So that has to affect my average. And I don't do minis, dioramas, etc. And pencils, folders, index cards, printer paper, & other stationery I don't really feel qualify. Nor do I count travel & food or remote conferencing tools.

I've also realized, even with .pdfs saving space, I am oversaturated with systems and settings that I'll never play to my complete satisfaction. So I try to maintain restraint, especially as I get older and realize it'll all go away (luckily to used/donations, likely to trash) sooner than I anticipate.

So I don't spend much. But that applies to most things, even when I have abundant disposable income. Outside of events to which I know I cannot return (and then I will spend OK), most other things -- as much as I may love them -- will end up as discarded grains of sand in my hourglass, unlikely to pass onto other loving hourglasses. :angel: You only borrow before you go, so be gentle and teach the next to appreciate the sand they walk on.
 
I used to be in a (much) higher bracket, but as my gaming group is slowly disintegrating and as GW is taking the bulk of my games budget, I'm only 250-500$ for rpgs now.
...I think; so many small stealth purchases...
 
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The only gaming stuff I have bought in the last year was ... paper. Which still has other uses, so I voted zero.
 
StonesThree said:
Games are my "comfort food" if you will.
...
Part of my spending is down to FOMO
Click to expand...

This is exactly it for me. In fact, a few hours ago I dropped $179 on a bundle of shit that will never hit my table. Ever. I just wanted to have it and it was such a nice bundle... That's in addition to the $124 I spent on Saturday on three items - two that went to my wife as gifts and one that went straight to the bookshelf, which I'll probably give away within the year because it will also likely never hit the table. I should have just bought the PDF, which is readily available but damn near as much as the hardcover. The only reason I picked it up is because I want to read it some day and when I'm done the HC can be handed off to someone who may actually play it.
 
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It's hard to say, but I chose the 3rd category. For one I am expecting to make a purchase when the Blade Runner RPG drops, so that probably pushes it up more than most years.

I find I'm spending more picking up RPG adjacent stuff, Loke Battlemaps, other scenery items, paper minis etc. that have wide utility. I tell myself it puts me in position to play games I otherwise wouldn't, but I'm not so sure I'm not just throwing money away on something else that won't see use.

I have tended to pick up missing swashbuckling RPGs, but I've come to the conclusion that is just so I can mine them, I'm not really going to play most of them, although I would like to.

I am getting more stubborn as I get older, something really has to appeal to get it in print (and I won't play from PDFs in 99.9% of cases).
 
Tommy Brownell said:
Whatever it is, I don't get my money's worth. Anything I buy that's not D&D or Savage Worlds is pretty much just tossing away cash. I haven't even read a bunch of the stuff all the way through.
Click to expand...

Same in a lot of ways. With me parting ways with my gaming group last year my spending dropped dramatically, and finally reading stuff I bought just to run for the group, I’m shaking my head at some of the stuff I spent money on.

i’ve dropped around $30 on gaming stuff this year, and I may just ignore Kickstarter and DriveThruRPG the rest of the year to top it off at that. I’ve got plenty to read I haven’t cracked open as it is.
 
Speaking of the devil... :ooh:

I just got two separate deliveries today of RPG stuff I ordered last year. One for FFG Star Wars(card deck, but only got one of two), and one for Mongoose Traveller 2ed (four books).
 
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I spend something in the region of $100 (about £73) each year on RPGs. Normally that translates into 3 dead tree RPGs. I do play most of them once, but we normally latch on to one that gets a good thrashing for a couple of years. Most of the group will also pick up whatever game we end up running with long-term. Some of those games are for research purposes, so they are tax deductable as I declare my writing income.
 
There was that time when I was an engineer, and single, and collected the entire series of Basic D&D Mystara Gazetteers, most of the RuneQuest 3 Glorantha publications, and more. Now I’m a married teacher with kids, and firmly in the $1-100/year camp, though there’s certainly more than $100 worth of stuff on my to-buy list! This year I sold some of my RPG books for Christmas gift money…
 
Most years I'm in the 200-300 range max, as I generally buy PDFs and I own so many games already that I don't have a pressing need to add stuff unless it looks super cool. The TOR and Trophy dead tree bundles were more of a blip that my usual. I very expensive blip. :grin:
 
Probably around $200 or so, because I mostly get bundles and sales. (And if TristramEvans TristramEvans is allowed to leave off his wargaming expenditure for the purposes of this I am as well).
 
I realized long ago, that I have far too many games, settings and adventures than I can ever hope to use. So therefore, I more or less stopped buying new stuff. Now I only buy stuff, if it's something I'm actually going to play or very rarely something I'm really curious about.
So last year I only bought the following stuff. Vampire: The Masquerade 5E and Trinity Continuum Core Rulebook, both in physical. I also backed the A|State Kickstarter.
I think it really helps me, that I don't follow trpg stuff on the internet. Basically you can't suffer FOMO, if you don't know what your missing out on.
 
Black Leaf said:
Probably around $200 or so, because I mostly get bundles and sales. (And if TristramEvans TristramEvans is allowed to leave off his wargaming expenditure for the purposes of this I am as well).
Click to expand...

If I include everything that I would consider "Gaming purchases", I'm looking at probably an initial estimate of 5K a year (and I've way cut back in recent years)

If we up that to include any hobby purchases, like comicbooks, leatherbound books, art, etc...

Probably about 1/3 of my annual income.
 
TristramEvans said:
If I include everything that I would consider "Gaming purchases", I'm looking at probably an initial estimate of 5K a year.

If we up that to include any hobby purchases, like comicbooks, leatherbound books, art supplies, etc...

Probably about 1/3 of my annual income.
Click to expand...
I don't do the big LARP events, but anyone who does is easily matching your expenditure I suspect.
 
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