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Old 10-26-2017, 01:46 AM   #1
Mike Wightman
 
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Default GURPS Spaceships supplements

Is there any chance at all that the GURPS Spaceships supplements could be offered as pod through Amazon?

Or better yet combined into a single book and offered through Amazon?

Last edited by Mike Wightman; 10-26-2017 at 04:05 AM.
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Old 10-26-2017, 07:04 AM   #2
ericbsmith
 
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Default Re: GURPS Spaceships supplements

I don't think anyone can actually answer that question. The people that work for SJGames usually don't discuss these kinds of projects until they are announced, which will usually be when they're released for PoD type books. The rest of us are just fans, and can only speculate.

SJGames has been reluctant about bundling PDFs for print in the past. This has changed slightly with the release of the DFRPG, since the DFRPG Companion is technically three PDFs in a single volume, but I'm not sure if that's a one-off change or an openness to change their policy in general. Certainly the fact that they are currently setting up books on CreateSpace as PoD shows that they are finally moving forward on PoD, which they had been holding back on (for far longer than they should have, to be honest).


As for what I'd like to see, it would be a 3 or 4 volume set. Spaceships 1 is already available on CreateSpace.

Spaceships 2-4 would be ~134 pages if combined, adding a couple extra pages for a combined index and cover page. Spaceships 5-8 would be ~156 pages; this is a little big for a PoD, but not excessively so (quite a few GURPS 3e softcover books topped out 144 pages, and a couple topped 200, so 152 isn't too bad). Given that Spaceships 8 is Transhuman Space a case could be made to do that separately, which would put Spaceships 5-7 as a single volume ~112 pages, and then make Spaceships 8 a standalone volume.

Whether or not SJGames will do this is anybody's guess, but I think it would make sense to release the companions in PoD as 2-3 volumes like this. There are several PDF series that would work well if combined into a single PoD like this - the Psionics series, Creatures of the Night series, High-Tech Adventure & Pulp Guns, Low-Tech Companions, Infinite Worlds series, Social Engineering, and probably a few others. Then there are the campaign game lines like Dungeon Fantasy, Monster Hunters, After the End, and Action which could also use a similar treatment. A lot of it depends on how well the currently available PoD books are doing and if SJGames can be convinced to bundle PDFs for PoD.


As an aside, a while back I did my own PoD of the Spaceships series on Lulu, where I combined all 8 books in the series plus three issues of Pyramid which added significant material (30, 34, and 40), plus the Designers Notes and my own expansion material. The entire thing came out to almost 500 pages as a hardcover, which was hefty but not horrible.
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Last edited by ericbsmith; 10-26-2017 at 07:19 AM.
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Old 10-26-2017, 10:01 AM   #3
Mike Wightman
 
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Default Re: GURPS Spaceships supplements

Many thanks for the reply :)

I've never used Lulu - do they print pdfs for you?
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Old 10-26-2017, 11:35 AM   #4
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Default Re: GURPS Spaceships supplements

Yes, Lulu prints books from PDFs. They offer a variety of options of book format, including both hardcover and softcover. We've had a number of threads discussing Lulu over the years.
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Old 10-26-2017, 12:46 PM   #5
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Default Re: GURPS Spaceships supplements

The main given objection for a combined printing is the Index and page references would need to be redone. That is a lot of work for just a reprint and increases the cost. However iffanswere okay with multiple books as being one binding, multiple books that issue could go away.
When thumbing threw such a book you would have multiples of the same page numbers but it would still be easy to know which book your in.
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Old 10-26-2017, 01:11 PM   #6
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Default Re: GURPS Spaceships supplements

Quote:
Originally Posted by Refplace View Post
When thumbing threw such a book you would have multiples of the same page numbers but it would still be easy to know which book your in.
I think the DFRPG Companion did a good enough job with this by lettering the books, so that page A23 is in the first book and page C12 is in the third book.
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Old 10-26-2017, 03:55 PM   #7
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Default Re: GURPS Spaceships supplements

Quote:
Originally Posted by ericbsmith View Post
I think the DFRPG Companion did a good enough job with this by lettering the books, so that page A23 is in the first book and page C12 is in the third book.
Yeah that could work, hadnt even noticed it myself. Not had occasion to use the indexe yet.
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