4 years of 5E on Amazon: same old same old

[Zardnaar]

But that threatens the Narrative of Decline from the Golden Age!!!


NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

Peak golden age D&D adjusted for inflation is around 50% bigger than the estimated 2018 market. Some of those old adventures though were selling 200k+ though so it was not just the red box and PHB doing gang busters (and peak D&D lasted 1 maybe 2 years).

We don't know how they made their estimates lol, I would expect WotC to have abetter idea due to more resources and focused research groups vs Gary's opinion. As I said releasing the PHBs sold would be a good clue and even that is not that great due to things like VTTS and D&D Beyond, nor do we know 100% how much of an overlap between VTTS, D&D Beyond, and real books their are. THey might be going with something like 5 players per PHB sold for estimates, I have seen players with 2 or 3 PHB though and most players seem to have them locally here and I doubt NXZ matters in the grand scheme of things (all bought on Amazon or other online dealers as well- no FLGS).

Anecdotally what I have noticed is most players now have a PHB, we had 7 people and 6 of them had PHBs, and some of my other players their groups also have one each. In the past usually had 2 maybe 3 for the group. Mates sisters group uses D&D Beyond along with some amount of dead tree format PHB's. A lot more women playing as well although the game is still overwhelmingly pale. The other thing somewhat unique to 5E is how it is doing consistent sales with peaks on Amazons with sales, 3.0 for example apparently had 60% of sales in the 1st month, 1/3rd of 2E was the 1st year. They only have to sell a couple of hundred books a day + early sales spikes to beat peak D&D as even a million+ sales over 10 years breaks down to 300 a day and Amazon probably has 30-50% of total sales so

 

[Zardnaar]

Its hard to get good quantitative or qualitative data. Hence these threads..

So here is something on 3e>2e

http://www.escapistmagazine.com/articles/view/features/9292-The-Ghosts-of-D-D-Past.2

I have seen similar statements elsewhere, but they could always be taken with a grain of salt.

We do know from the amazon data we could get that 5e was way ahead of 3.5 and they had to launch 3.5 due to 3e lagging.

Again that just leaves 1e. As noted above, there are statements that 5e has done better by some metrics.

Does that take into account 1 million+ B and X sets sold, or a dozen other things, we can't really be sure.

3.5 did not do that well, its either the 2nd or 3rd worst selling D&D of all time (it beat OD&D maybe 4E).

 

[Zardnaar]

WotC doesn't even care about selling PHB, compared to getting people to play. Hence why the rules are so liberally available for free. The books are premium items, once they get someone into the game and the brand.

Up to a point, if they used the metric most estimated numbers of people playing they could be 100% right. They never defined what they really meant and as I said TSR revenue at times was higher than the entire RPG market now and they had 2 editions of D&D on sale at the same time both break the 1 million mark (well red box alone broke 1 million, apparently the black box also sold a well).

Is peak D&D the most units sold, the most players, did 5E beat B/X and 1E combined? They were both on sale at the same time splitting the market IDK. Are they counting free downloads as active players, things like that.

 

[Parmandur]

Up to a point, if they used the metric most estimated numbers of people playing they could be 100% right. They never defined what they really meant and as I said TSR revenue at times was higher than the entire RPG market now and they had 2 editions of D&D on sale at the same time both break the 1 million mark (well red box alone broke 1 million, apparently the black box also sold a well).

Is peak D&D the most units sold, the most players, did 5E beat B/X and 1E combined? They were both on sale at the same time splitting the market IDK. Are they counting free downloads as active players, things like that.

You are, again, conflating TSR revenue exclusively with D&D during peak D&D, they were selling other successful games. If anything, I would reckon Gygax gave a high estimate from his educated knowledge. The early WotC numbers were for "had ever played," and based on more recent information, after several generations of high school and college groups.

It is highly doubtful that they are extrapolating numbers of players off of book sales at all, as they have access to much more sophisticated and accurate market metrics (see also the general survey up on the site). The 15 million player estimate was just for North America, anybody outide the US and Canada is beyond the 15 million, another indication that we are at peak D&D now.

 

[Zardnaar]

You are, again, conflating TSR revenue exclusively with D&D during peak D&D, they were selling other successful games. If anything, I would reckon Gygax gave a high estimate from his educated knowledge. The early WotC numbers were for "had ever played," and based on more recent information, after several generations of high school and college groups.

It is highly doubtful that they are extrapolating numbers of players off of book sales at all, as they have access to much more sophisticated and accurate market metrics (see also the general survey up on the site). The 15 million player estimate was just for North America, anybody outide the US and Canada is beyond the 15 million, another indication that we are at peak D&D now.

As I said revealing PHB sold (or equivalents such as D&D Beyond), otherwise its mostly corporate PR and there are differences between paying customers and people who play.

Most of the other games did not do very well and 1983 was the peak of the red box and 1E along with explosive D&D growth. This was before novels, most of their other lines, and before things like Dragonlance along with adventurers we know sold 100k+. And as I said peak D&D TSR was making more money than the entire RPG market now and somehow I don't think much of that was coming from Boot Hill.

Inflation adjusted 2E D&D TSR revenue was more than the entire RPG market now (although novels could account for a huge chunk of that, and they were releasing 4 or 5 products a month at one point).

They are giving rules away for free, sure peak D&D in terms of players is believable. I don't think they are grasping at straws or spinning moon beams but until they pill the beans or someone who used to work their does its hard to know. Its like these MMORPG companies that boast they have XYZ million players when they count every account created and played once for free as a player. It doesn't really mean much its pure PR.

 

[bedir than]

And we know Gary would never have said anything for PR

 

[Zardnaar]

And we know Gary would never have said anything for PR

Gary was also not there for most of peak D&D (they shipped him off to California). Basically even he would not know a lot of things. Hell they used his name to sell books he barely wrote (OA, ToEE).

 

[Parmandur]

As I said revealing PHB sold (or equivalents such as D&D Beyond), otherwise its mostly corporate PR and there are differences between paying customers and people who play.

Most of the other games did not do very well and 1983 was the peak of the red box and 1E along with explosive D&D growth. This was before novels, most of their other lines, and before things like Dragonlance along with adventurers we know sold 100k+. And as I said peak D&D TSR was making more money than the entire RPG market now and somehow I don't think much of that was coming from Boot Hill.

Inflation adjusted 2E D&D TSR revenue was more than the entire RPG market now (although novels could account for a huge chunk of that, and they were releasing 4 or 5 products a month at one point).

They are giving rules away for free, sure peak D&D in terms of players is believable. I don't think they are grasping at straws or spinning moon beams but until they pill the beans or someone who used to work their does its hard to know. Its like these MMORPG companies that boast they have XYZ million players when they count every account created and played once for free as a player. It doesn't really mean much its pure PR.

Not pire PR, but sure, it is part of their push to show that the game is appealing. TSR made other games, and would give them multiple printings. They weren't nothing to the bottom line. TSR ≠ D&D at any point.

People playing is the most important metric for the hobby as hobby (which is what I care about), and for WotC business model. They are more interested in selling licenses for products, such as comics to IDW Publiahing or novels to HarperCollins. That the books are selling well is great, but they probably make more money from Idle Heroes of the Forgotten Realms and Neverwinter annually.

That their business model is then hobby friendly is nice Kismet, as they can manage the game at sustainable, low levels without putting massive revenue expectations on it

 

[Jester David]

Inflation adjusted 2E D&D TSR revenue was more than the entire RPG market now (although novels could account for a huge chunk of that, and they were releasing 4 or 5 products a month at one point).

I'd love to see where you're getting 2e revenue numbers.


I discussed this earlier in another post in this thread:
http://www.enworld.org/forum/showth...same-old-same-old/page6&p=7472666#post7472666

Right now, comparing 1982 TSR sales to 2017 D&D sales, TSR was at $57 million while according to ICv2's numbers, D&D is probably around $40 million.
But, of course, that's all of TSR. Which wasn't just Boot Hill but that game and Gangbusters and Star Frontiers and Top Secret. Plus the first Endless Quest books. And their various board games.

However, as someone quickly pointed out after I made my post... the $40 million D&D likely made in 2017 is for retail stores and doesn't include Amazon. Nor would it include sales from D&D Beyond, Roll20, Fantasy Grounds, or the DMsGuild.
So if Amazon accounts for an additional 35% sales, it matches ' 82 TSR. And given this thread is about the continued and ever increasing sales of D&D on Amazon, it's probably pretty likely that Amazon might be moving that many books and that D&D 5e has crushed TSR as a whole.
And that's still NOT including all the side D&D products like board games or collectable mini games (not included in RPGs) or Neverwinter and related video games. All of which would funnel money into WotC's pockets.

But... even if it hasn't actually passed the TSR of 1982, as I extrapolate in that thread, provided D&D doesn't crash like it did in 1983, 5e will make more money than early 1980s TSR, and that 5e will sell more than 1e and Basic combined. Even if sales plateau, that's not enough for '80s TSR to maintain its lead. It's pretty much inevitable, if it hasn't already happened.

 

[GreyLord]

Never going to happen. WotC is owned by a publicly traded company. They will never share sales.

What we do have is this:
https://twitter.com/mikemearls/status/764241988128419840?lang=en

And that was two years ago. Two years of continued and steady sales. 5e long ago passed 2e and very likely has passed 1e. (But it probably hasn't passed 1e + Basic.)

I get sales numbers on other things in the quarterly meetings...and have gotten sales numbers ON D&D previously. I'm not with Hasbro or WotC today, and I'm in the same boat as all of you in this, but there is no reason they should NOT release actual numbers.

Prior to now, such as 2015, D&D was such a small splash that I can understand why there was hardly any implications of it, though MtG was pointed out with some hard numbers. It would be like trying to talk about how much Betrayal at House on the Hill or a smaller enterprise sold that year in relation to everything else.

Now, with how much they are bragging...I WANT to see the hard numbers and find it curious that they don't. It's far easier to make claims like they have without any substance to back it up, than it is when they release hard numbers to show exactly WHERE 5e is and how it's sold comparatively to other parts of WotC. If it is as big as they are claiming then they are pretty close to MtG numbers in some areas. I can see MtG in Walmart (and up until recently at least, and maybe still, Walmart STILL outsold Amazon in the US from what I understand, even if Amazon is pretty big), MtG has far more presence and more players (and it's still not a game as widespread presence in the US as say...Madden Football 2018). If it's as big as MtG in numbers, why am I not seeing that?

I can see better market penetration than ever before, and I even can believe their 9-10 million players (even without their evidence to back it up, after all we have the 25 million AD&D/D&D players from prior to WotC and that has very little evidence too), but what are the hard sales numbers thus far for 2018? Why are they saying they have this many players and then why isn't their market penetration as high as MtG from what I can see?

PS: In the US MtG is still pretty high, not quite as high as AD&D numbers in the past, but it's still doing gangbusters. Worldwide there are more than 20 MILLION MtG players. In the US, if we assume at least 12-15 Million, and over 60K participate in premium events. We should see something similar with D&D players if they are starting to approach those numbers in market penetration and representation in events and local scenes, meaning I should be able to go to nowhere North Dakota and pick up a D&D game set or something similar. I CAN with MtG, even in very rural areas where there are no game stores and almost nothing around but maybe a Walmart.

One other thing to add, with 15 million, if we go by that, we are talking almost 4-5% of all Americans are playing MtG, which is something even the most devout sometimes doubt or wonder. If it's 10 million MtG player that composes around 3% of Americans playing. That means in nowhere South Dakota we'd have a representation out of their 2000 citizens in the city, we'd have 60 players. That's more players than show up at some game shops on a regular basis. We can account for it by large department store sales and otherwise.

So, when WotC claims that you have 10 million D&D players, that means in a high school of 2000, you should have 60 D&D gamers in that school. That's MORE than what you have show up at some hobby stores in cities with 40K or 50K people living in them. A city of 40 or 50K means that you would have 1,200 - 1,500 people playing. ANY game with that many playing it is going to have a pretty good representation in events and other wise in a city that size. This is what I mean by we should see this market penetration everywhere if they are actually this many people playing D&D. WE DID see it in the US during the early 80s fad. WE did NOT see it during the late 80s and 90s. This is why, because I'm not seeing this regularly, I'd like to see hard numbers on the actual sales for 5e.