"Why are Ospreys sold so much in the market?" Topic

Do they print too many?

Do people tire of them?

Simple rules with pretty bling to catch your eye…and gamers are attracted to shiny new rules like crows to tinsel…

Osprey books are a resource for giving a fair to accurate idea of how to paint my shiny new toys and a bit of background.
Never touched their rules…

Ospreys get you up and get you going then you change period for something different, buy some more Ospreys, sell some old Ospreys, rinse and repeat.

For me I am downsizing my collection of books/figures etc. That is why I sell them.
Paul

A lot of long-time gamers have pretty big Osprey collections. It is something that is easy to cull to create shelf space if you feel the period has run its course for you. Also, they are easy to cull if you have really gotten into the period and bought better reference material. They are good gateway books.

I've always found Ospreys are a great starting point as uniform guides. The plates are excellent and, in general, they tend to cover the basics of unillustrated uniforms in the text – usually in the form of easy to follow tables.

Furthermore, they are nearly always available at an affordable price – especially if you shop around for second hand copies. This isn't true of other hard copy colour plate uniform guides which are often much more expensive when in print and ridiculously expensive when out of print.

The campaign series is also pretty good and if I want to refight a battle they cover, it will be the book I read first. Fairly well detailed, and plenty of maps.

My collection of Ospreys is fairly focused (on my personal wargame periods) so it's middling at a little over a 100 books.

Osprey – first port of call when starting something new, IMHO. Great toilet reading.

Lots of Osprey rules. They aren't all equally useful, and sometimes you have to buy one to find out. You'll find lots of non-Osprey rules for sale, too.

As for the uniform guides--well, apart from sometimes having to buy duplicates because a copy wasn't accessible, some of us come to a point in life where we realize we aren't going to build and wargame the entirety of military history, and there's a thinning out.

The Osprey histories I think are mostly purchased by mistake. Seldom enough detail to let the purchaser game something out, and for sketchy history, there is always Wikipedia. But mistakes are what flea markets are for.

They are a good starting point, until you can spend the bigger dollars for more in depth information.

I just put some out in the marketplace.

I too am clearing out over 50 years of collecting and will be putting out a lot more books and other things in the future.

Addressing the OP. Assuming the OP is speaking of the various Osprey series books and not Osprey rules (need to be clearer on this.)

I think there are four reasons people sell these books.

1. The seller has lost interest in the period.
2. Osprey has put out a better book on the same topic.
3. The book(s) was an impulse buy at a convention or show and was discounted. Seemed like a good idea at the time.
4. Making more room on the bookshelf or clearing out the clutter.

I have owned quite a few Ospreys; many for uniforms and many of the Campaigns series to have concise battle books. Sold off many.

Osprey is a little like Wikipedia with pictures. If beginning a new project it's a great place to start. Similarly, some entries are more useful than others. I would guess my Osprey pile at just over 100, with a mix of MAA, Campaigns and Air Campaigns. The new Campaign release On the battle of Hue will soon have a place on my shelf.

The books are a usually quick overview of my broader interest. They are relatively inexpensive and hence easy to pass along to others that need them or sell at flea markets. I usually part with them when I'm done with a project or period.

Gave a couple of hundred to the local charity shop.

I've bought about this a little and at the end of the day Ospreys are fun to buy.

Not much in there you couldn't get from google and wikipedia, but they are fun. I like to buy them, I like to read them. I didn't mean to collect a hundred of them, but that's probably what I have. If you need an in depth look at something, you need a thicker, less picture-filled book (which might cost less than the Osprey). If you don't need an in depth look you can just read a few articles on the web, and you can find pictures pretty easily, too. But Ospreys are good looking, bite-sized, and just neat. I'll probably have two hundred for my kids to sell off in thirty years or so.

It's not printing "too many" unless your returns are excessive, Deucey. Go look at a thrift shop or used bookstore and see how many of the books are by best-selling authors--and how few by people with a single short print run.

I like collecting them as a primer to time periods I might want to collect figures for. Plus, I can get a used copy for cheaper than a cheeseburger, so I'm watching my weight at the same time!