From Forgotten Realms to Red Steel: Here's That Full D&D Setting Sales Chart

Whether this will end a thousand internet arguments or fuel another thousand, Ben Riggs, author of Slaying the Dragon: A Secret History of Dungeons and Dragons, has finally published the combined chart of cumulative sales for every AD&D setting from 1979 to 1999.

Forgotten Realms, Greyhawk, Oriental Adventures, and Dragonlance lead the pack. The least selling setting was Red Steel in 1994. There was a clear decline in sales of all settings from 1989 onwards, so that's not necessary a comment on quality. Planescape, certainly a cult favourite, sold surprisingly few copies.

Slaying the Dragon - Macmillan

The secret and untold story of how TSR, the company that created Dungeons & Dragons, was driven into ruin by disastrous management decisions, then ...

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In order, the best-selling settings were:

1. Forgotten Realms
2. Greyhawk
3. Oriental Adventures
4. Dragonlance
5. Ravenloft
6. Dark Sun
7. Spelljammer
8. Lankhmar
9. Al-Qadim
10. Planescape
11. Birthright
12. Maztica
13. Karameikos
14. Red Steel

These stats were compiled as part of his research into his book, Slaying the Dragon: A Secret History of Dungeons and Dragons, which you should totally buy.

Slaying the Dragon - Macmillan

The secret and untold story of how TSR, the company that created Dungeons & Dragons, was driven into ruin by disastrous management decisions, then ...

read.macmillan.com

Let's dive into some individual sales charts! Note, these are for the primary setting product, not for additional adventures, supplements, etc.

 

[teitan]

I don't know about that. Saltmarsh is an adventure anthology, not an AP, and it's connections to Greyhawk are tenuous and easily ignored. Ovbiously that is not the case with CoS.

It’s still Greyhawk and a Greyhawk location. CoS is similarly a location within a larger setting named for that one location within that larger setting. It doesn’t matter if it’s an anthology, they’re Greyhawk adventures and WOTC considers them as such. They don’t have that FR flavor they go for, they’re very GH, darker Fantasy kinda vibe going on. Plus 300+k sales for the core historically? That’s gonna factor in somewhere with the right product.

Doing the math the difference between GH and FR is about 57k with GH having a head start and then a dead period. So only coming up 57k less than FR is essentially meaningless in the core set sales category because it could have been a very different case had Lorraine not ground an axe when Gary left.

 

[Jer]

I would think that the primary reason that spelljammer is getting the nod is because unlike other settings, there doesn’t seem to be this group of gate keeping super fans who will scream from the mountaintops about how every little change is ruining the setting, DnD is dead and anyone who disagrees isn’t really a fan

In other words SJmmer doesn’t have this mass of toxic fans.

I think even that is overvaluing the impact of the loud minority of fans on the internet for settings.

Honestly I think the reason why Spelljammer is getting an update is because a) Chris Perkins likes it and he has a lot of pull on what direction to take, b) multiverses are in right now and since D&D has always had one it's time to bring it back, c) the current broad D&D community seems love Star Wars Cantina style D&D, and Spelljammer is a perfect setting for that approach and d) Spelljammer can be made to look distinctive from Magic the Gathering's multiverse ideas in a way that is probably harder to do with Planescape/Manual of the Planes.

 

[Reynard]

It’s still Greyhawk and a Greyhawk location. CoS is similarly a location within a larger setting named for that one location within that larger setting. It doesn’t matter if it’s an anthology, they’re Greyhawk adventures and WOTC considers them as such. They don’t have that FR flavor they go for, they’re very GH, darker Fantasy kinda vibe going on. Plus 300+k sales for the core historically? That’s gonna factor in somewhere with the right product.

I'm not arguing about how whether it "feels" like Greyhawk rather than FR, I'm just saying it is not comparable to CoS as a setting segue. One would think that an AP set in Castle Greyhawk or against the Eight(?) or whateverwould be the only think comparable, from an iconic perspective.

 

[Mannahnin]

It’s still Greyhawk and a Greyhawk location. CoS is similarly a location within a larger setting named for that one location within that larger setting. It doesn’t matter if it’s an anthology, they’re Greyhawk adventures and WOTC considers them as such. They don’t have that FR flavor they go for, they’re very GH, darker Fantasy kinda vibe going on. Plus 300+k sales for the core historically? That’s gonna factor in somewhere with the right product.

Doing the math the difference between GH and FR is about 57k with GH having a head start and then a dead period. So only coming up 57k less than FR is essentially meaningless in the core set sales category because it could have been a very different case had Lorraine not ground an axe when Gary left.

A reminder that Ben's numbers are entirely missing the 1980 Greyhawk Folio, which Jon Peterson has confirmed sold quite well for a few years. Which only makes sense, given that it was the first real campaign setting TSR released, it had those famously wonderful Darlene maps, and it was released during the first full year of D&D's fad period. If Ben had those numbers, it might even pass FR on these charts. It'd at least be close.

That being said, I think sales in the 80s are not necessarily a good indicator of what settings will sell today.

But I would certainly like to see some sort of Greyhawk product/project for the 50th anniversary, and if historical sales do weigh in at all for WotC's decision making, they would seem to add some to those chances.

 

[wicked cool]

OA isn't that surprising. It was the 80s and Japanese (and related) stuff was HOT.

i remember playing Shogun in 86 when it came out. i never made the connection until now. 80's were also big with people buying throwing stars and other weapons of that market

 

[Blue Orange]

We who are about to game salute you.

 

[Bedrockgames]

Ben Riggs here!
These numbers are taken from internal company documents I've been given. As such, they are apparently what the company considered settings. Your points are well taken. But I'm a historian at the mercy of what data has trickled down to us from the past. There's tons of data I don't have. Everything in your post for example. Also, I have no data on the vast majority of novels, and the vast majority of adventures.

Thanks for the info! It’s good to have some actual numbers for these kinds of conversations. Do you have any guess in the margin for error with the data, and are there any red flags that trigger your historian antennae in the data? (In terms of spots you feel numbers aee more likely to be missing, inaccurate, etc)

 

[wicked cool]

A reminder that Ben's numbers are entirely missing the 1980 Greyhawk Folio, which Jon Peterson has confirmed sold quite well for a few years. Which only makes sense, given that it was the first real campaign setting TSR released, it had those famously wonderful Darlene maps, and it was released during the first full year of D&D's fad period. If Ben had those numbers, it might even pass FR on these charts. It'd at least be close.

That being said, I think sales in the 80s are not necessarily a good indicator of what settings will sell today.

But I would certainly like to see some sort of anniversary Greyhawk product/project for the 50th anniversary, and if historical sales do weigh in at all for WotC's decision making, they would seem to add some to those chances.

Ravenloft seems to be doing better now than it did then . Its the quality of the product. OA was a good product for its time . i had a lot of fun with that setting. i would argue that the adventures of then for the most part are better than the adventures now

Take the delorean back to the 80's. you cant strongly argue that todays adventures/settings are better than those. In fact 4 of the top 10 adventures of today are just remakes of those adventures

Now obviously the OA would be highly offensive now however it felt like a more complete setting than new settings including say the critical role setting and i love critical role .

People all over this board alone are begging for a return to darksun and spell jammer etc

Whats really sad is that theres no "new " box setting like forgotten realms or hardcover OA type thing thats taken over. I think Mercer could be that person however its more like a loose guide and no setting world with established stuff . Everything now is less is more where the majority want a take us from point a -z but give us this world full of npcs etc (strahd)

 

[Blue Orange]

In all seriousness (IMHO of course):

1. Greyhawk's #2, eh? I wonder why there's so little interest in bringing it out now--the fans just aged out?

2. OA is #3. I know there are all the concerns about cultural appropriation, but seems like Hasbro (unlike indie developers) has enough money to hire enough people with cultural competence in Japan (or at least enough to satisfy American activists?) to pull off a pseudo-Japanese setting at least. I do wonder if concerns about the portrayal of fantasy-China (Shou Lung in the old setting?) might slip into a Sino-American kerfluffle with someone taking something out of context and the Chinese government actually getting offended and starting an international incident. (Same problem with al-Qadim, only more so. And Maztica, plus it was never that popular.)

3. I guess Lankhmar doesn't have the modern fanbase, but I'm curious to see if there are real attempts at urban fantasy. I guess they have the rights to Waterdeep.

4. I'm surprised nobody tried to bring back Planescape--I'm guessing the actual 17th-century slang and piercings and spiky hair look too 90s? Maybe that's exactly what will sell it in a few years when 90s nostalgia gets going.

5. Birthright--no way they're bringing that back. Genetically determined powers and kingdoms are going to sound way too white nationalist (yes, I know this is perfectly normal premodern thinking around the world historically, I'm talking about the way it's going to come off).

6. Spelljammer probably had (as other people said) enough of an obscure fanbase to not start flame wars and little enough material they could give it their own stamp.

7. Why don't they bring back Dark Sun? The Brom pics (Brom did as much for our view of Dark Sun as DiTerlizzi did for Planescape, and they both played a huge role in creating my view at least of the setting and giving it a unified artistic vision) look too Frazetta-y and toxically masculine? You could easily make muscular nonbinary and female warriors too. I'm guessing psionics were so divisive they figured it wasn't a good bet.

 

[Reynard]

In all seriousness (IMHO of course):

1. Greyhawk's #2, eh? I wonder why there's so little interest in bringing it out now--the fans just aged out?

I think that is largely it. Greyhawk had its heyday early in the 80s and appealed to older players given its darker tone, i think. There are just fewer of those folks around.