Thursday, March 1, 2012

Survay Time: Money Spent on Gaming

A simple question.  One that Aos made me think of in his comment last post.

How much do you spend on gaming in a year? 

The survey is to your right.  And if you want to comment on what determines why you buy or choose what you buy please do.

35 comments:

Dienekes said...

Lol. I saw the plug for your wife's blog and went there only to see that she is talking couponing. Are you trying to justify a little extra money in the gaming budget? Should I do you a solid and estimate high? Just kidding.

Dienekes said...

Btw, I did say 4 to 5 hundred but this particular year is going to be a good bit more as I had to replace the entire ADnD series of books. Throw in a few modules and that was probably 400 by itself.

Il Male™ said...

Last year I sold most of my gaming collection keeping only what gets used at the table and my 2E AD&D manuals (they were a gift). Then I decided not to buy anything new except for exceptionally worth stuff (as Zak's Vornheim) and gaming supplies (miniatures, dice, mats, etc.) Thus, I'll go with the 0-50$ range :)

Mark Gedak said...

I'm at the high end of this scale. I'm a subscriber to the various Pathfinder lines, purchase numerous PDFs from Rpgnow and have become hooked on Loot! (even with its irregular schedule).

ApisFurioso said...

I just discovered OSR stuff after a friend that I used to game with passed and I wanted to play stuff we used to play. So ive spent a bit on fifteenth things trying to find something I liked. I think I'm gonna like ACKS.

Michael Horvath said...

I used to spend $500 easily but I haven't played any online games in awhile. Now I buy maybe PS3 games per year max.

Beedo said...

Man, you shouldn't get people to reflect on this kind of stuff... You realize it adds up! And I just considered RPG products. My oldest kid loves the heroclix, and then there was the trip to Gencon... If I included it all, it would bust the scale.

Joseph Bloch said...

I went with $500 just as a guess. Between miniatures, new games, and the occasional splurge on something from my decadent past (an old SPI or Avalon Hill hex-and-counter wargame) on eBay, that's probably a minimum.

Nobody tell my wife, or I'll never get her to cut down on those damn scented candles.

Aos said...

I'm going to have go with 50$-100 because of this most recent rash of purchases. I think though that I'm right around 60$ every year. I tend to pick up lots of stuff at the Xmass pdf sales. I do try not to buy stuff, but I'm not made of stone.

Dan said...

My budget of $40 a month puts me in the 400-500 range. I try my best to stay in this range however if I go over I try to sell something on ebay or whatnot to offset the cost. I don't include gifts for B-day, Christmas, or gift cards in this total.

ckutalik said...

Honestly if I hadn't sold off a bushel and a peck on Ebay I would have totally busted my budget last year. My problem is more a long, slow and steady accumulation of "deals" on mostly older products. So in the short range I am fairly disciplined about winning things at a set lowbid, but in the long run it's the volume busting me.

All told I probably spent around $800 last year and auctioned about $300. Which is frankly ridiculous and part of the reason I just bought a tablet and am set on concentrating on the vast store of free PDFs I have on hand this year.

Mike said...

I buy items that have been out for a while, and usually only on some kind of sale. I also stick to pdfs, unfortunately, and print off the stuff that I feel like I'm going to use the most.

There is enough free stuff out there that I really focus on tools for the DM toolkit, or adventures that are reviewed to be heavy on tricks, specials, or themes.

Mike

scottsz said...

I'm already $150 in the hole for 2012... the cats are burning me in effigy because I haven't gotten them any new toys.

I'd spend more... but I'm gonna need a coupon!

Dan said...

$200 - $300. I used to spend a LOT more, but I've become much more picky about what I buy.

Boric G said...

I really hate to even try and calculate. I think I'm at the high end of the spectrum. I know I was last year, between miniatures, dice, and Pathfinder books.

If you want to get some idea of the last two months' worth, I've been keeping a running update for the year on my own blog HERE.

faoladh said...

It varies. Going through my Amazon list, I spent about $355 there last year. I know that I bought a few things other than that, so It's probably in the $400-$500 range.

faoladh said...

Er, that's about $355 just on gaming stuff. CDs, books, and such not related to gaming not counted (even when it's somewhat gaming-related, like MAR Barker's novels).

The Dave said...

I went with 0-50 because I'm a huge fan of all the great open source stuff available out there. Most of my gaming goes into dice and minis of my characters for whatever game I'm in. Even with Pathfinder the DM has the books and I use the great d20pfsrd site to build and research my characters.

The Angry Lurker said...

Buy figures every month when i get paid and add a couple of shows....$700+ in a year no problem....

Johnathan Bingham said...

Um, yeah, counting Kickstarters, and the like, I'm off the high end of the scale. I like to support all the cool grass roots hobbyist stuff, and, well there is a lot of it ;).

Oublieditor said...

I think I'm at around the $500 mark but a good portion of that is on miniatures.

John Bell said...

$100-200 (and closer to $200), mainly around the holidays. I've jumped off the supplement treadmill and it takes a lot to get me to buy something, since I'd mainly rather homebrew. I try to look for things that I'll use in a game I'm running or planning to run, rather than buying on spec.

The Happy Whisk said...

Scottsz: Hahahaha.

scottsz said...

@Whisk: Not mocking... my old lady is a black belt with the coupons...

scottsz said...

I'm hoping that I'll have more leverage with 'the boss' if Old School vendors issue coupons!

The Happy Whisk said...

scottsz: That is very cool. I'm not a black belt yet. But I do have this lovely clear plastic grocery bag tied around my waist.

Boric G said...

I need some of those coupons too, Scottsz.... Most of my purchases were made in January this year. February was fairly dry...but I foresee some dreadful expenditures in the coming months.

Lasgunpacker said...

My spending has declined both as a percentage of income and as fixed dollar amount over the last 10 years or so. Partly, this has to do with increasing demands for my money/time (wife, house, child), and partly because my backlog of projects was getting to be outragous.

However, I did spend around $200 in 2011, buying miniatures aimed directly at my D&D game.

scottsz said...
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scottsz said...
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scottsz said...
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Tim Shorts said...

scottsz It is funny. I know the feeling. I can almost buy anything right now as long as I can present a good coupon.

Those that read the blog last year knows I had the running tally for the year and I ended up over $1000. Whisk doesn't mind. It's my one thing I spend money on. I love reading the stuff and seeing what people come up with.

Brendan said...

I spent quite a bit last year (the year I got back into gaming after a ten year hiatus and I literally owned only the 4E core books at the beginning, having previous sold my older books when I went off to college in 1999).

I'm tracking my expenses this year though:

http://untimately.blogspot.com/p/purchases.html

The point is more about not buying things faster than I can read and use them, but saving money is nice too.

Unrelated: your blog comment system seems to have lost the subscribe by email function.

scottsz said...
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Rusty said...

Too much...and, yet, not enough.