Orr Group's Quarterly Report: D&D Up 3%, Pathfinder Down 2%, Cthulhu Is Rising!

The Orr Group - the company behind the popular Roll20 virtual tabletop - has just released its Quarter 1 2018 user stats. D&D has increased its share yet again, with a 3% increase, with Pathfinder dropping by about 2%. Starfinder holds steady in 11th places and there's a big bump for Call of Cthulhu. The Q1 report was a bit late, so the Q2 report will be coming very soon, too.

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Here's what the Orr Group has to say:

"Q1 is reliably a great month for games on Roll20. Whether that’s because of extra time, holiday cheer, or winter slowly forcing us to huddle around the glowing friendship box – we’re not entirely certain.

Dungeons & Dragons 5E’s growth trend has been increasing about 3% each quarter, and this trend has maintained for Q1 2018. The phrase “the rising tide raises all ships” is quite true in our corner of the tabletop industry, and despite the continued growth of D&D, other publishers on our platform continue to see increased player numbers overall.

Pathfinder continues to be in a reliable second place, with the official Pathfinder character sheet and adventures helping to cement it further. We believe Pathfinder will continue to rise, especially as our support for the system continues with more product and upcoming Charactermancersupport. Starfinder is growing steadily, from #16 to #11 over the course of two quarters, and we anticipate that the release of the official Starfinder sheet, as well as some excellent Starfinder products, will break it into the top 10 in no time.

Call of Cthulhu is one of the biggest disruptors on the list. It’s been rising in ranks bit by bit each quarter, but has shot up from the 8th most played game on Roll20 to the 4th. This is likely due to their successful new edition picking up steam, but every function I try to run to examine this trend simply returns the value #Error.TheDarkLordWillsIt"


Here's the previous quarter for those who want to compare.

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[Pokelefi]

with Pathfinder dropping by about 2%

and

Pathfinder continues to be in a reliable second place, with the official Pathfinder character sheet and adventures helping to cement it further. We believe Pathfinder will continue to rise, especially as our support for the system continues with more product and upcoming Charactermancersupport

Sorry is this just more is anyone else confused by these statements they drop 2% but "will continue to rise"?

 

[Echohawk]

Not confusing for me, because of this sentence: "The phrase “the rising tide raises all ships” is quite true in our corner of the tabletop industry, and despite the continued growth of D&D, other publishers on our platform continue to see increased player numbers overall."

So I took "continue to rise" as meaning "overall player numbers will continue to rise for Pathfinder despite the fact than even faster 5E growth gives Pathfinder a shrinking percentage of the total number of games played".

 

[Pokelefi]

ok thanks for clearing that up

this honestly didn't make senes to me befor glad that more peopel get into it I a realtivly new player too oly in it for 1,5 years (and already it cased me to meet the guy again I had the only other RPG experiance iwht before that desit moving )

 

[Jester David]

and

Sorry is this just more is anyone else confused by these statements they drop 2% but "will continue to rise"?

You need to look at all the numbers.

When you look at just the percentages, D&D increased (again) and Pathfinder dropped:

View attachment 98397

Along with pretty much every other RPG really.

But, when you look at the numbers of games played:

View attachment 98398

You see that there *was* a spike in Pathfinder's numbers. It's just buried under the staggering spike of D&D players that came in at the same time.
In fact, if you strip out the D&D numbers:

View attachment 98399

Pathfinder has mostly been trending upward, but the last quarter is a decent jump. It's be an impressive spike... if not for D&D's staggering growth.

 

[Banesfinger]

Looking at your charts Jester David, would it be correct to say that since 2015, 5e had *doubled* its Total Number of Games *each* year?

 

[Jester David]

Looking at your charts Jester David, would it be correct to say that since 2015, 5e had *doubled* its Total Number of Games *each* year?

Checking the numbers, yes, that has happened.
(And after just one quarter, it's already halfway to doubling its 2017 number...)

 

[Nylanfs]

Yea, #numberporn #graphporn

 

[Mercule]

Looking at your charts Jester David, would it be correct to say that since 2015, 5e had *doubled* its Total Number of Games *each* year?

Looks pretty close, to me. A bit more than that, most years. Keep in mind, though, that this is about VTT games, which is, itself, growing. Don't project the Roll 20 growth onto the hobby, as a whole. Which is not to imply that the hobby isn't doing well, just that the physical tabletops probably aren't doubling every year.

What I find interesting is that Fate is outperforming Savage Worlds. These are the two "smaller" systems that I've started paying some attention to. I was under the impression that Roll 20 was something of a major outpost of SW players.

 

[Xavian Starsider]

Props to Morrus for the Cthulhu is rising joke. Funny, I am just prepping to start my first Call of Cthulhu (7e) campaign. But I didn't realize I am part of a trend. It seems the stars are right!