Hi,
I started playing Pathfinder just some time ago so bear with me if these questions are stupid or something...
1. I recently got my very first Pathfinder-pdf (APG) and while the quality of the background and artworks is great, I'd really like to have a text-only version which can be used on a cell phone or slow-ish netbook without extreme loading times. Any chance we'll ever see something like that?
2. Are the pdf updated to the newest printing? Say I'd go and buy the Core Rules as pdf now, would this be the errata'd second printing version (or the third one if aready relesed)?
3. Is there a limit to how often I can download a pdf once it's purchased?
Thanks in advance!
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Well, while I can't answer the first bit for you, the second two are pretty easy. Yes, the PDFs represent the most recent printing of the book. Whenever they update the print version the PDF gets updated as well.
As far as download limits go, there are none, at least from what I can tell. Which is nice when your hard drive has a nasty habit of melting down on you like mine does :)
Paizo does not relase "lite" PDFs of their books.
That's a shame, really. :(
The entire APG is open content, and d20pfsrd (sooner) and the official PRD (later) will include the whole APG crunch content.
Yeah, I'm aware of this. But since there's no way of saving the entire SRD, I'd still need some kind of internet connection which is not available everywhere.
Anyway, my thanks to both of you!
I mainly wanted to second the suggestion of 'web-sized' versions of the E-Books. While they look nice on my iPad, rendering a page takes 5-10 seconds on average, which quite a long time when you're 'flicking through the book' as it were.
@Blave; Using Acrobat Reader (at least on a mac, but presumably windows too), you can export the per-chapter PDFs to a text file. It comes out pretty ugly, but I did a few 'search and replaces' to get rid of all of the liscence lines with my name / email on and a couple more to replace any lines that end with a full stop to have a blank line underneath and it's actually come out pretty readable on my phone.
With regards to the pdf's, how does one easily print them?
When I want to print the APG say, it takes half an hour to 'flatten' the document and only then does it start printing. This is (according to some It guys I consulted) due to the different layers of the document (text, images, ... all in seperate layers)
Adobe reader works really hard to prepare it for printing (even on a dual core with 4GB of ram)
Any easy way to make it faster? Any setting in Adobe reader that I should check/uncheck?
Apparently, using the fully licensed Adobe Writer takes even longer as it digs deeper into the layers...
thanks in advance!
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It gotta be online, but I've found the PDF viewer built into Google Docs to be the fastest ever, once the PDF loads which can take a bit, but I've been so happy with it I actually paid $5 to get more storage space and have all my PF PDFs up there for my reference, and it doesn't matter what computer I'm on as long as I can access my account. No more lost thumb drives ...
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It gotta be online, but I've found the PDF viewer built into Google Docs to be the fastest ever, once the PDF loads which can take a bit, but I've been so happy with it I actually paid $5 to get more storage space and have all my PF PDFs up there for my reference, and it doesn't matter what computer I'm on as long as I can access my account. No more lost thumb drives ...
Now that I hadn't considered...
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When I want to print the APG say, it takes half an hour to 'flatten' the document and only then does it start printing. This is (according to some It guys I consulted) due to the different layers of the document (text, images, ... all in seperate layers)
Ditto on this. It takes (and this is no joke) two HOURS to print the four pages of Pregens for Pathfinder Society as it goes from my computer to my (admittedly older) printer.
I love having my awesome PDFs, but Paizo really needs to step up in the "ease of use" department.
Anybody who is still using that colossal piece of bullcrap that Acrobat Reader has become in recent years should stop right now and move to some less resource - killing reader, such as Foxit.
Might be true for a real computer, but on my android phone I acually found the "offical" Acrobat Reader to be the one with the fastest loading times. Still not fast enough to check something quickly (especially since the bookmarks don't seem accessable in any mobile reader I've checked so far) but at least good enough to re-read some class descriptions while being on train or something.
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When I want to print the APG say, it takes half an hour to 'flatten' the document and only then does it start printing. This is (according to some It guys I consulted) due to the different layers of the document (text, images, ... all in seperate layers)Ditto on this. It takes (and this is no joke) two HOURS to print the four pages of Pregens for Pathfinder Society as it goes from my computer to my (admittedly older) printer.
I love having my awesome PDFs, but Paizo really needs to step up in the "ease of use" department.
... wow, I printed 4 copies of the SS Players Guide and the KM Players Guide, plus the entirety of Hell's Pawns on a full color ink jet printer and it only took about 45 minutes. Now it was 2 pages per sheet, but still, it shouldn't take a horribly long time.
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It takes (and this is no joke) two HOURS to print the four pages of Pregens for Pathfinder Society as it goes from my computer to my (admittedly older) printer.... wow, I printed 4 copies of the SS Players Guide and the KM Players Guide, plus the entirety of Hell's Pawns on a full color ink jet printer and it only took about 45 minutes. Now it was 2 pages per sheet, but still, it shouldn't take a horribly long time.
I know there will be questions to the legitimacy of my numbers, so here's the situation. I knew I would be GMing some pre-Gen Con games, so I wanted to print out the entire set of Level 1-7 Pregens. I woke up really early on Tuesday realizing I had forgotten to do so and quickly set out to print out as much as I could before we had to leave one hour later. I was able to get two of the sheets off before we left.
The interesting part is that they were still spooling when I got back and it was quite my surprise when I turned my computer on, went downstairs to watch TV, and came back a couple hours later to my printer spitting out the sixth character sheet (of 12).
Paizo does not relase "lite" PDFs of their books.
That's a shame, really. :(
The entire APG is open content, and d20pfsrd (sooner) and the official PRD (later) will include the whole APG crunch content.Yeah, I'm aware of this. But since there's no way of saving the entire SRD, I'd still need some kind of internet connection which is not available everywhere.
Anyway, my thanks to both of you!
Yea i basically use the prd more often then i use the pdfs even on my home computer, since I have both print and pdf copies of the rules, if I want to oogle pretty art I do it from the print books. If I'm at my compute its usually to look something up. So it's a shame there is no official cut down pdf version.
There is however hope on d20pfsrd.com's download page, and its something that has traveled with a number of my players. The prd turbo. Its a downloadable version of the prd (paizo's not d20pfsrd's). They are likely to include an update when paizo updates their prd, so like I said, hope is there if not an immediate solution to your issue.
There is however hope on d20pfsrd.com's download page, and its something that has traveled with a number of my players. The prd turbo. Its a downloadable version of the prd (paizo's not d20pfsrd's). They are likely to include an update when paizo updates their prd, so like I said, hope is there if not an immediate solution to your issue.
I must admit I didn't even know the d20pfsrd even had a download page. I'll give the downloaded version of the PRD a try and hope it works on my phone. Thanks a lot for the tip!
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With regards to the pdf's, how does one easily print them?
If you're using Acrobat, when you click the "print" button to bring up the print dialogue box, click the "Advanced" button in the lower left corner, then check the "Print As Image" checkbox at the bottom of the Advnaced Option dialogue box. This *should* pre-flatten the pages and print a little faster.
Alternatively, and it's extra work, but you can use the snapshot tool to take a pickture of each page, save as a jpg (or whatever format you like, then print those. You might need to bump up your snapshot resolution to get the pages looking nicer, but it'll work.
-Skeld
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Paizo does not relase "lite" PDFs of their books.
That's a shame, really. :(
The entire APG is open content, and d20pfsrd (sooner) and the official PRD (later) will include the whole APG crunch content.Yeah, I'm aware of this. But since there's no way of saving the entire SRD, I'd still need some kind of internet connection which is not available everywhere.
Anyway, my thanks to both of you!
Well, actually is a way to do this, it isn't hard, but it isn't totally straight forward either: http://www.httrack.com/
This is an app that you point at a website and it will make a local version you can surf as if you were on the web. We've used it at work as some of our requirements come to us in the form of a website, and they like to change it and pretend it was that way all along, so we just make an archive once in a while to compare :)
There is however hope on d20pfsrd.com's download page, and its something that has traveled with a number of my players. The prd turbo. Its a downloadable version of the prd (paizo's not d20pfsrd's).
Thank you very much for bringing that page to my attention!
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...But since there's no way of saving the entire SRD...
It is actually possible to save the entire SRD locally using the application HTTrack or the Google Sites Liberation Java application. Anyone can do the former, only collaborators on the site can do the latter. We also have "offline" versions already compiled into archive packages available for download on the site, as well as a reformatted PDF of the PRD that opens and loads significantly faster than the PDF of the Core Rulebook. The downside though is both of the offline files we have on the site are massively out of date and do not include the APG content. I recommend reading up on HTTrack as its fairly easy to use and you can then save the entire site locally on a USB drive or your hard drive etc then have it wherever you have a PC or laptop, regardless of internet access.
Edit: Oops, I shoulda read to the end of the thread. I see others have already mentioned the PRD-Turbo and other options lol (nevermind!)
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I must admit I didn't even know the d20pfsrd even had a download page. I'll give the downloaded version of the PRD a try and hope it works on my phone. Thanks a lot for the tip!
We have SO much content on the site some stuff gets lost lol I will have to think on ways to improve the visibility of some of the more useful areas.
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When I want to print the APG say, it takes half an hour to 'flatten' the document and only then does it start printing. This is (according to some It guys I consulted) due to the different layers of the document (text, images, ... all in seperate layers)Ditto on this. It takes (and this is no joke) two HOURS to print the four pages of Pregens for Pathfinder Society as it goes from my computer to my (admittedly older) printer.
I love having my awesome PDFs, but Paizo really needs to step up in the "ease of use" department.
I know it's been the better part of a month since this was discussed, but I had to shake my head today about the state of the Paizo PDFs.
I've spent a good part of the day attempting to print off the Pathfinder Society APG pregens (6 pages) as a PDF. I started at 1:50, I have five pages printed out, and I have approximately six pages of canceled printouts that didn't work because they were too big, I've opted to print the document one page at a time to catch errors, and I've downloaded the file twice to confirm it wasn't some kind of file corruption.
Something has to be done about Paizo PDFs. This is a free document, and it's like pulling teeth to get it printed. Yes my printer is older (an HP 1200 LaserJet) and doesn't have a whole lot of memory, but it's a fantastic printer that doesn't cost an arm and a leg to operate, so I'm getting a new one to fix a problem I don't have with PDFs generated by any other company.
The PDF you're talking about really isn't even that complex. Are you using current drivers for your printer, and a current version of your PDF viewer?
Vic, I don't know what you folks use for internal layout tools, but:
You may want to export the PDFs with a setting for "Read Online".
I know both InDesign and Quark have this option - it downsamples all the artwork.
You may also want to just TURN OFF the artwork and background layers before exporting the PDF; InDesign allows you to toggle a layer and export the file, selecting the check box for "Don't export hidden layers".
I don't know if Quark XPress allows this. I know InDesign has allowed this since the early 2000s.
I purchased a netbook specifically so I could use the PDF's ingame, but paging through it takes severals seconds per page, sometimes even longer. And it isn't s netbook specific problem - I have two relatively powerful machines that take nearly as long to chew through the PDF. The APG one is especially slow.
A less resource intensive version of the PDF's would be great.
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The PDF you're talking about really isn't even that complex. Are you using current drivers for your printer, and a current version of your PDF viewer?
Vic,
I just checked; I am using the most up-to-date driver. For whatever reason the character sheets are particularly bad. They are easily the most problematic files I have though. I'd say on average a PFS module takes right around an hour and a half or so to print normally.
I'll admit, the printer isn't new and has fairly low internal memory, but your PDFs are the only PDFs I ever have problems with.
Chief Technical Officer
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I just checked; I am using the most up-to-date driver. For whatever reason the character sheets are particularly bad. They are easily the most problematic files I have though. I'd say on average a PFS module takes right around an hour and a half or so to print normally.
Right now, I'm not seeing the sense in this; the scenarios are pretty much the least complicated PDFs we do on a regular basis. Can you do me a favor and test some stuff for me?
Can you open up PSS 2-03, and print the following, sending them to the printer as single pages, and time each one?
1 (that's the cover), 5, 7, 10, 17, 20 (that's the APG ad), and 22 (that's the chronicle sheet).
Thanks!
-Vic.
.
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Right now, I'm not seeing the sense in this; the scenarios are pretty much the least complicated PDFs we do on a regular basis. Can you do me a favor and test some stuff for me?
Can you open up PSS 2-03, and print the following, sending them to the printer as single pages, and time each one?
1 (that's the cover), 5, 7, 10, 17, 20 (that's the APG ad), and 22 (that's the chronicle sheet).Thanks!
-Vic.
I'm working on it now Vic. Page 17 took nearly 10 minutes, so as soon as I'm done I'll post my results.
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Hey Vic,
Here are the numbers you asked for:
Page 1 - 1:04
Page 5 - 1:38
Page 7 - :40
Page 10 - 1:06
Page 17 - 10:52
Page 20 - 10:02
Page 22 - :11
For comparison I started printing Page 1 of the APG Level 4 Pregens for Pathfinder Society play. Progress is 19.6/22.5 MB and it's been over 22 minutes now (I'll try to update when it actually prints).
Update: Page 1 of the APG Level 4 Pregen Characters took 32 minutes to print.
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Chief Technical Officer
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I gotta say, I'm a bit stumped here. I really can't fathom why page 7 of the scenario printed relatively quickly, while page 17 printed so slowly. If anything, I'd think page 7 would be the slow one of those two. I've considered a bunch of stuff here—layers, transparency, color, number of objects—and I just don't see a pattern emerging.
Does your printer driver allow you to specify whether you send it color data or black-and-white? That is, does it let you choose whether the greyscale conversion happens on the computer side or the printer side? Do you have the option to "print as an image," or something like that?
Do you get similar results for some of those 10-minute-plus pages printing from a different PDF viewer?
Are you on Windows or Mac? If Windows, have you tried both the PS (Postscript) and PCL drivers for the printer?
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Vic,
I'll try to get around to doing this troubleshooting and get you some numbers, but I won't have a chance to do so today, unless of course you'd rather I skip out on our Wednesday Pathfinder game to print stuff. ;-)
I'm running a PC with Windows 7 and a 9 year old HP Printer running two year old drivers (2008 was the last driver update for my printer according to the HP page). I know age has a lot to do with it, but as I mentioned before, Paizo PDFs are the only ones I have problems with.
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I gotta say, I'm a bit stumped here. I really can't fathom why page 7 of the scenario printed relatively quickly, while page 17 printed so slowly. If anything, I'd think page 7 would be the slow one of those two. I've considered a bunch of stuff here—layers, transparency, color, number of objects—and I just don't see a pattern emerging.
Hey Vic,
I'm at work, so I can't give you crusty old printer numbers, but I decided to print on the faster, newer work printer (still just a black and white laser).
Page 7 printed in 13 seconds, page 17 printed in 25, so I do see slower print times even here (although they're reduced dramatically).
I too have been having the issue, unfortunately after looking all over the web it appears to be a windows 7 / HP printer driver/acrobat 9 issue. If you go back to XP and use reader 8 it prints alot faster. I am a system admin by day and have troubleshot (not a real word) this on several different PCs and printers and the only way I can consistently print is from an XP machine using reader 8. Linux is a close second but the ghostscript drivers for HP and reader have been slow for quite a while. At first I thought it was a Paizo issue as I remembered printing out the alpha, beta, and Rise of the Runelords super fast but now I cannot even print 5 pages of Kingmaker in less than an hour. Paizo making an image free version would be awesome and speed things up but the ultimate issue lies with Adobe and HP. It makes me cry inside a little. Maybe an Adobe guru has a fix.
I came across a similar issue when trying to print any high quality PDF (not just Paizo PDFs) through my laptop running Windows 7. Now the particular printer I am working with is a Xerox machine but this might be worth trying as it apparently affects multiple types of printers.
In Windows 7 there is an advanced printer setting that can mess with PDFs when you try to print them. In my case I couldn't print more than a dozen pages before the printer job errored. What you have to do is disable the advanced features when you go to print the PDF. The next time you try printing the PDF click Print, select the printer you want to use, open the properties for that printer and under the Advanced tab disable the ADVANCED PRINTER FEATURES.Then click print. As long as I disable that feature I can print PDFs.
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From my perspective (I've been testing prints lately), updating to PCL6 drivers if you use PCL5 will about halve your print time (from 9 minutes to roughly 4:30). If they exist for your printer, PS drivers may be even better, but since I've been having troubles getting them to run on mine, I can't confirm.
I've had lots of trouble printing out the Pregen character files. Windows XP spooler keeps crashing when I try to print. I was able to print the first three (cleric, rogue, and fighter) using a 'fast print' setting on my HP Photosmart printer, but page 4 (wizard) still crashed the spooler. Printer and computer are both just two years old. I haven't had any other issues printing PDF files to the printer until I tried to print Paizo stuff. I've tried printing all six of the pregen files, and Masters of the Fallen Fortress. All crash. I've updated my printer drivers as well as Adobe Acrobat Reader 9/Professional 8. Any suggestions would be helpful.
-Swiftbrook
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Chief Technical Officer
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I've had lots of trouble printing out the Pregen character files. Windows XP spooler keeps crashing when I try to print. I was able to print the first three (cleric, rogue, and fighter) using a 'fast print' setting on my HP Photosmart printer, but page 4 (wizard) still crashed the spooler. Printer and computer are both just two years old. I haven't had any other issues printing PDF files to the printer until I tried to print Paizo stuff. I've tried printing all six of the pregen files, and Masters of the Fallen Fortress. All crash. I've updated my printer drivers as well as Adobe Acrobat Reader 9/Professional 8. Any suggestions would be helpful.
-Swiftbrook
MisterSlanky's suggestion about looking for PCL6 (or better yet, PS) drivers for you printer might help you....
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So what is a PCL6 or PS driver? Can I get those for my HP-printer as well?
I stopped printing the Journal pages long ago, because they took hours to get printed, and the job didn't even finish.
You should be able to get the PCL6 and PS drivers for your HP printer. If you go out to the HP site and look at the drivers page, you should be able to find one for your printer. Even my 10 year old laser had the appropriate drivers available (albeit a year old).