I recently joined D&DI and decided that I would print the entire Scales of War adventure Path in color. Well, at 40+ pages per installment that is a lot of paper and a lot of ink.
The problem is that I have ran out of red ink twice and I am not done. (Actually, dark rd and almnost maroon.) It is basically the color of the uneven border at the top of every page. that is a lot of ink in the form of a block.
Anyone else encounter this?
Is there any chance they are going to break that up? Maybe switch colors or something?
Is this something that should go to CS?
If so, does anyone else feel the same?
I can copy and paste the text into a word document , but it's half an hour or so for even a relatively short adventure, due to formatting. I originally thought that the articles might be worth keeping a subscription for, but since I don't use my laptop for DM'ing any more, they aren't doing me much good; I'll probably let my subscription drop and just use a friend's Character Builder.
You can print in Greyscale if you want to conserve your color ink.
But it's really bad for the black ink
.The best would be a white background, black text with only the most relevant pictures, IMO.
My problem is that there is a 1/2" (at least, although it is irregular) border on the long side of every page. So, when printing out the first 4 issues of Scales of War, it is about 170 pages. 170 pages with a 1/2" strip the length of the paper/page is 10*17 pages with a 1/2" thick strip which is 11 inches long /page. That is 10 'pieces' 8.5" X 11" of solid ink in borders alone, all the same color. Ten 'pieces' each the size of one page. So, one out of every seventeen pages is a solid sheet of ink. Each page using the same color. This does not count how much ink is used in the art.
That is too much ink for nothing but a border. I have a great color printer and want to use it for the art, but that is ridiculous.
have you considered printing the text only from the pdf and then printing the art separately? it would allow you to show the art to your players without accidental reading on their parts.
Interesting thought.
I am not DMing now and have not for a long while.
I have only played the Friday Night Dungeon Delves and ended up DMing that one time, the sole exception to the previous sentence.
I'm not a 'baby of the digital age'. (By 'baby' I don't mean whiner but rather someone who grew up without the internet.)
I want to pack them around and read them.
I appreciate the thought though. It does give me an option.
However, computer savvy is not a description that applies to me.
Is there an option I don't know about in adobe reader that lets me print the two separately, or would I have to 'copy' each individual art pic to print it? If the latter, it is something I am not willing to spend time doing.
I just think that so much border is troublesome since it is not really art. I think it is just there to give the 'hard' look of a worn edge as opposed to the 'sodt' look of a hard edge that would be given by an irregular line.
But it's really bad for the black ink
True - but currently, there's not really a good solution and black ink is usually cheaper than the colour ink.
Cheers, LT.
Reading on a laptop is not that great, I think.
Same here, I spend too much time looking at a screen to want to go home and do it some more while relaxing.
As for printing text only: That would work a lot better if they didn't intersperse info boxes in the middle of things. A display mode designed for cheap printing doesn't seem like an unreasonable request, given that I am paying for these articles.
Edit: Also, I can't seem to find a "print text only" option any more, but I'm tentatively assuming that I'll trip across it later.
Until they realize this, there are a few things you can do.
1: Print in greyscale.
2: Get yourself a PDF Editor, such as Foxit's editor. Then go into the PDF with your adventure or what ever you want to print. Save that article seperately or the entire PDF (so you don't accidently save over the issue.) Then go in and remove the boarders, they take up a tun of inc, remove any pictures and anything else you think will take up unneeded ink. I like to remove the page numbers as well. Every bit counts. Convert any pictures left, like dungeon layouts, etc, to greyscale. You might want to also remove the colored in boxes from any side-text (though I keep the boxes for mob statistics, just make them greyscale.)
Save it separately and print. You'll find it wastes FAR less ink and you've basically made a customized 'printable' version of the adventure. No boarders, no bright multicolored pictures, just the necessary text and images.
It doesn't take long. Though on a 40 page adventure it will be some time before you manage to do this for every Scales of War out at this point.Same here, I spend too much time looking at a screen to want to go home and do it some more while relaxing.
Yea for 3.0/3.5e I was GMing a great deal of high level adventures and because of the prep time and the shear number of statistics needed (I am BEYOND happy that 4e mobs don't have the same stat system as PCs, that was a good idea in 3e but at high lvl was simply to much. An hour to make a custom enemy is to much.) Anyway I pretty much needed a laptop. I didn't mind it, but it took away some of the 'table top' feel of the game.
Since 4e came out I'm loving that I have zero need for a laptop anymore. My players and I agree it feels more like playing 2nd ed in that everything you need is right in front of you and you don't need to spend hardly any time book-flipping and it's as a whole just a more interactive experience.
As to printer friendly versions of each adventure, just follow my suggestions in the post above. I just had to comment on the 'bring a laptop' issue. I completely don't recommend it.
WOTC, give us Printer Friendly versions of your articles/adventures. It don't take long to do it our selves with the proper tools, but we shouldn't have to do it!