It seems to me there are two kinds of RPers. There are those who buy the source books and those who don't. In my mere 10 years of RPing I've generally come across more non-buyers than buyers. I am a buyer (although I have been known to have a few gigs of PDFs here and there).
Keeping up with books can be tough. Wizards seems to release them faster than I can read them. On the other hand, sometimes you want to play an out of print game and then you have the trouble of finding anything usable. Right now I am running/playing D&D4, GURPS 4 and Scion. Thanks to DDI I don't need every D&D book, but I have more than as it is (9 books, 1 module and a DM screen). I have both Basic Set books for GURPS and as far as Scion goes I have 3 out of 5 books. I am hoping to own all 5 within the next few months.
Why do we feel the need to buy (or ... obtain) these new books? Are we often so blown away by a new book that we can't live without it? Since I enjoy running games I can justify these purchases (or in some cases torrents) to myself and other gamers. My wife, on the other hand, doesn't get it.
Kristina is a gamer, though. On occasion we have seen a book and have agreed it would at least be an interesting game. Where my impulse is to buy first and try later, Kristina's is more of a use what you already have. I think her view goes beyond simple pragmatism. What is wrong with what we have already?
When we come across a rule we dislike, don't we work around it? Surely as RPers and DMs we can find ways to make old materials fresh and new. The vast majority of games I've played have been home brewed. So why do I throw money at new books?
I guess I'm part of the crowd that's just duped into thinking that a new book will change everything just because it's new and shiny. If that's the case then just keep 'em coming, boys. I'll probably buy it any way.
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