D&D 5E Revisited Setting News: Its not the 2023 Classic setting, but rather for 2024

[tetrasodium]

@Paul Farquhar Oh i was meaning more about the popularity among all the D&D campaign settings that were published

@Urriak Uruk If it's the last data WoTC had it's already old and probably unreliable

They have asked about settings a couple times in surveys over the last year or so. One of them I recall even including an option along the lines of "because I dislike the forgotten realms" when asking why I gave my previous rating on the prior question.

 

[Urriak Uruk]

@Paul Farquhar Oh i was meaning more about the popularity among all the D&D campaign settings that were published

@Urriak Uruk If it's the last data WoTC had it's already old and probably unreliable

Yeah I don't think there is any publicly available data on this, beyond looking at the current sales of 5E books on Amazon.

Which would point to these rankings (in current sales of 5E settings);

1. Ravenloft
2. Wildemount
3. Eberron
4. Theros
5. Forgotten Realms
6. Ravnica

 

[Urriak Uruk]

@Urriak Uruk If it's the last data WoTC had it's already old and probably unreliable

Agreed, folks who point to that "Tier List," should probably know that I'm sure WotC has their own internal survey data they use that is more up-to-date.

 

[Plaguescarred]

folks who point to that "Tier List,"

What are the Tier List?

 

[overgeeked]

What are the Tier List?

From here:

D&D Monthly Survey | Dungeons & Dragons

dnd.wizards.com

"The popularity of settings in the survey fell into three distinct clusters. Not surprisingly, our most popular settings from prior editions landed at the top of the rankings, with Eberron, Ravenloft, Dark Sun, Planescape, and the Forgotten Realms all proving equally popular. Greyhawk, Dragonlance, and Spelljammer all shared a similar level of second-tier popularity, followed by a fairly steep drop-off to the rest of the settings. My sense is that Spelljammer has often lagged behind the broad popularity of other settings, falling into love-it-or-hate-it status depending on personal tastes. Greyhawk and Dragonlance hew fairly close to the assumptions we used in creating the fifth edition rulebooks, making them much easier to run with material from past editions. Of the top five settings, four require significant new material to function and the fifth is by far our most popular world."

It's important to note that's from 2015. So before the massive wave of new D&D fans. So that's a fairly good gauge of the older fans' taste in settings. What the wave of new fans prefer, we don't know...

Yeah I don't think there is any publicly available data on this, beyond looking at the current sales of 5E books on Amazon.

Which would point to these rankings (in current sales of 5E settings);

1. Ravenloft
2. Wildemount
3. Eberron
4. Theros
5. Forgotten Realms
6. Ravnica

I'm not sure what you're using for the FR numbers there. But those aren't great numbers. Ravenloft has two books out (three if you count the revise coffin set) and it's October, "scary" stuff sees a sales bump pre-Halloween. The rest have one book each except FR, which has...nearly every D&D book and adventure.

 

[Urriak Uruk]

What are the Tier List?

D&D Monthly Survey | Dungeons & Dragons

dnd.wizards.com

The popularity of settings in the survey fell into three distinct clusters. Not surprisingly, our most popular settings from prior editions landed at the top of the rankings, with Eberron, Ravenloft, Dark Sun, Planescape, and the Forgotten Realms all proving equally popular. Greyhawk, Dragonlance, and Spelljammer all shared a similar level of second-tier popularity, followed by a fairly steep drop-off to the rest of the settings. My sense is that Spelljammer has often lagged behind the broad popularity of other settings, falling into love-it-or-hate-it status depending on personal tastes. Greyhawk and Dragonlance hew fairly close to the assumptions we used in creating the fifth edition rulebooks, making them much easier to run with material from past editions. Of the top five settings, four require significant new material to function and the fifth is by far our most popular world.

1. Eberron, Ravenloft, Dark Sun, Planescape, Forgotten Realms
2. Greyhawk, Dragonlance, Spelljammer
3. Everything else

Fans of FR feel that it hasn't gotten its justice, despite it getting the SCAG and a new adventure book on an annual basis. I dunno if they'll eventually get a new setting book, but it's certainly possible.

 

[Parmandur]

@Paul Farquhar Oh i was meaning more about the popularity among all the D&D campaign settings that were published

@Urriak Uruk If it's the last data WoTC had it's already old and probably unreliable

WotC has much more recent data, they just haven't shared results since 2015. They ask about favorite AND played Settings once or twice a year in big blast surveys.

 

[Parmandur]

From here:

D&D Monthly Survey | Dungeons & Dragons

dnd.wizards.com

"The popularity of settings in the survey fell into three distinct clusters. Not surprisingly, our most popular settings from prior editions landed at the top of the rankings, with Eberron, Ravenloft, Dark Sun, Planescape, and the Forgotten Realms all proving equally popular. Greyhawk, Dragonlance, and Spelljammer all shared a similar level of second-tier popularity, followed by a fairly steep drop-off to the rest of the settings. My sense is that Spelljammer has often lagged behind the broad popularity of other settings, falling into love-it-or-hate-it status depending on personal tastes. Greyhawk and Dragonlance hew fairly close to the assumptions we used in creating the fifth edition rulebooks, making them much easier to run with material from past editions. Of the top five settings, four require significant new material to function and the fifth is by far our most popular world."

It's important to note that's from 2015. So before the massive wave of new D&D fans. So that's a fairly good gauge of the older fans' taste in settings. What the wave of new fans prefer, we don't know...

I mean, since then we've gotten those Tier 1 Settings, tons of Forgotten Realms, Exandria, and Magic Settings. So, some combination thereof. I would expect that Homebrew + FR is still the most common, and in particular homebrew that lifts from FR books liberally being the biggest slice of customers.

 

[GuyBoy]

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[Parmandur]

Yeah I don't think there is any publicly available data on this, beyond looking at the current sales of 5E books on Amazon.

Which would point to these rankings (in current sales of 5E settings);

1. Ravenloft
2. Wildemount
3. Eberron
4. Theros
5. Forgotten Realms
6. Ravnica

That doesn't tell us too much, since that's an hourly list not a historical list.