D&D 5E Alphastream - Why No RPG Company Truly Competes with Wizards of the Coast

[Thomas Shey]

See I don't see it that way. I see it as WotC is recruiting my future customers. Sure, I only get a tiny percentage of them, but I only need a tiny percentage to do very well. So I don't compete with D&D -- I rely on it.

Also not an unreasonable view, if you take the long and high view.

Though it is based on an assumption that non-trivial numbers of people come in through D&D and don't remain, for one reason or another, effectively "trapped" there these days. One thing I've noticed in the last decade is there's many more people playing D&D who are only aware of other RPGs vaguely if that compared to what I saw in the 70's and 80's, which seems strangely counter-intuitive.

 

[darjr]

And the rising ship of D&D does lift other boats.

CR and D&Ds success are intermingled. When they played CoC it got a huge bump that seems to have persisted outside of Japan’s support. When they played Mothership it helped get the news out and we see a million dollar Kickstarter, not to mention MCDM a dnd company showed Motherships beta as one of the games they liked.

There are a lot of other factors at play but the help and lift are clearly evident.

 

[GreyLord]

The statement in the May press release/slideshow was that "over 50 million people have played Dungeons & Dragons to date", right? Are we sure they're just counting 5E?

Edit: Right now I'm wishing that I'd read my copy of Game Wizards already and had it handy to check old sales numbers.

Well, if we add up the numbers (and are generous) and say that is 25 million AD&D players over it's lifetime (1e and 2e), 5 million 3e players (that's with several million books sold, and at least close to a million PHB's over 3e and 3.5's lifetime to put that into perspective, with the 5 million commonly tossed around seemingly extracted from a million PHB's sold and multiplying that number by 5..not sure if that was 3e ONLY or if that is inclusive of 3e and 3.5...taking the liberal approach I'd say that is 3e only), 3 million active 4e players, that is 33 million players.

That put's it at 7 million 5e players (a LOT LOWER than many 5e hardcore fans claim) and 7 players per PHB sold on the old number...and when talking about essentials kits and starter kits we could be at a 5 to one sales ratio.

I recall though that there was a claim that there were at least 15 million 5e players at one point, which would put it at 48 million. AT the time I questioned how they were getting their numbers. One of the easiest ways is normally taking the number of PHB's sold and multiply that number by 5. (It doesn't need to just be PHBs, it could also be box sets that have rules for play like D&D's red set, or the Essentials kit...etc...though that makes it a more murky number as there is absolutely overlap in that).

If we look at it as 15 million on the more traditional route that would mean 3 million PHB's sold several years ago. That is still 15 to every PHB sold. That doesn't add up either. We could go with the FAR more murky number of it including Starter Boxes and Essential Boxes (And let's face it, just like the Red Box for D&D, there is a MASSIVE amount of overlap between players buying those and the PHB...but...hey...numbers are numbers). My guess is that they, combine sold at least a million copies (solely a guess on my part), bringing us up to the 7 to one ratio.

At 50 million players that puts it at 17 million 5e players. Plausible...and FAR MORE REALISTIC than saying 25 million 5e players, 40 million 5e players, and especially 50 million 5e players.

It relys on a heavily allowed liberal approach for no overlap between those who bought PHB's, Starter boxes and Essential Kits, and digital...but Plausible.

With that 1 million PHB's sold (probably over that now, but no where close to where they'd need for higher numbers) I could accept somewhere between 15 million to 17 million, but also seeing that it could actually be much lower at the 7-10 million player mark (still, no mean feat, meaning that it is the most played in our modern era since the time of the 80s and double the numbers of almost every other edition). Going by old metrics (if we say 5e sold 1.5 million PHBs by this point and multiply that by 5) it would fall into that range of 7-10 millon players of 5e which makes a LOT more sense.

I'd say 7-10 million is acceptable numbers, 15-17 million are plausible numbers, and anything over that starts getting ridiculous for people to claim regarding how many are actually playing 5e today.

Now, if they are claiming 40-50 million players EVER, or total...I think that could hold. It's only 50 million if we give it a lot of slack and go with the best numbers given for every edition ever. I'd put it more realistically probably at 25 to 40 million players ever, but that probably doesn't roll over well for those who love the PR and Hype machine.

 

[Thomas Shey]

And the rising ship of D&D does lift other boats.

CR and D&Ds success are intermingled. When they played CoC it got a huge bump that seems to have persisted outside of Japan’s support. When they played Mothership it helped get the news out and we see a million dollar Kickstarter, not to mention MCDM a dnd company showed it’s beta as one of the games they liked.

There are a lot of other factors at play but the help and lift are clearly evident.

Well, you can say Critical Role (and probably a few of the other more high-profile) streamers lift all boats. Does D&D per se? Probably. But that's just an assumption.

 

[darjr]

Well, you can say Critical Role (and probably a few of the other more high-profile) streamers lift all boats. Does D&D per se? Probably. But that's just an assumption.

Hmm, good point.

How about D&Ds success has led directly to the Power Rangers RPG becoming a reality?

 

[GreyLord]

I agree that GMs can feel that way. And companies too. But there are a lot of gamers and potential gamers out there. Trying to take on the ones that love D&D is skating up a steep hill when you have level ground right next to you. Find the audience that wants to be found. A lot of RPG creators have promoted their game by disparaging D&D - even writing disparaging remarks in the RPG itself. That's a waste of effort and even hurts the creator by making them look like bad people.

I think that happened a LOT early on and throughout the 80s and 90s. I don't think I've seen a TON of that these days.

Even Paizo with Pathfinder did not disparage D&D from what I saw (some of their players did during 4e's time, but I don't recall Paizo doing that). If anything, they fed off the connection they had with D&D and promoted the idea that they were somehow connected (and they were, but they were Pathfinder as their own thing rather than D&D, but saying it was a descendant of the oldest RPG didn't hurt them and probably helped a LOT).

I think more try to connect into D&D in some way to validate the game in gamer's eyes and get them to buy their RPGs.

Part of this is because it is Xerox, or Kleenex, or any number of other name brands that seem synonomous with the product these days. D&D is THE name for roleplaying. Many people don't call roleplaying or consider them as RPGs when they think of them, they think...D&D.

It's the name recognition. That would go why it is hard to compete with D&D as well...that name is worth a LOT with RPG credits because RPG equals D&D in the minds of many people. It's also why D&D is either the name you want to be associated with if you sell your products...OR occasionally at times, the name to say you do better than if you want to disparage it. Either way, D&D is the name that is the Kleenex (or Clariton, or Coke) of RPGs.

Edit: and going off the item above...because it is the kleenex of RPGs, when someone takes an interest in D&D, or the idea of roleplaying, D&D is probably the first item they seek out. Depending on how easy it is or complex for them to grasp the game, probably determines if they stick with it or not. Those who do eventually learn about other RPGS besides D&D and that D&D is not what you call RPGs. The easier for people to learn D&D, the easier it is for them to transition to the larger RPG audience as a whole. 5e is very easy to learn in how it is presented. This makes it a very good recruiting tool for RPG players, probably the best one we've had in over a generation (generation being 20 years), if not longer.

 

[Morrus]

Also not an unreasonable view, if you take the long and high view.

Though it is based on an assumption that non-trivial numbers of people come in through D&D and don't remain, for one reason or another, effectively "trapped" there these days. One thing I've noticed in the last decade is there's many more people playing D&D who are only aware of other RPGs vaguely if that compared to what I saw in the 70's and 80's, which seems strangely counter-intuitive.

I mean, it works. I make a living, and I employ other people.

 

[Thomas Shey]

Hmm, good point.

How about D&Ds success has led directly to the Power Rangers RPG becoming a reality?

The visibility of D&D almost certainly contributes to the perception that licensed RPGs are a good idea to license holders. I suspect in many cases (this has chronically been an issue with big ticket ones) the perception of how well such products will sell is unrealistic, but there's no help for that (I'd be interested to be a fly on the wall when Modiphus does their sales pitches to see if they make that clear to the licensors).

 

[cowpie]

If they've only sold 1 million PHB's...that number does not compute.

That is saying 50 players use ONE PHB. I might give leniency if it was 5 per PHB...but 50 per PHB is rather...absurd.

5 Players per PHB is actually pretty lenient to a degree...as even in what I've seen most groups either has every other person (if not every person) having a PHB, or at least one or two in a 4 - 6 person group.

With the numbers being claimed it HAS to be around 1 million PHB's per year or their numbers of how many are playing are WAAAY off no matter how you look at it. Even if we account for 1 million PHB's a year since 2013, that's 8 million PHB's, times 5 would be a MAXIMUM of 40 million...so even there it is not at 50 million. If we say they didn't sell a million PHB's per year until this past year, and it's more around the average of zero to a million each year, averaging around 500,000 per year, that's still around 4 million which would put it at a little over 12 players per PHB (still, what I think is a VERY rather absurd number) if we are claiming 50 million players.

There are websites that pirate the books, and poor college students will sometimes just download a pirated version for free.

 

[Thomas Shey]

I mean, it works. I make a living, and I employ other people.

Yeah, but are you fishing in the D&D populace (well, outside of Level Up which of course is) or are you fishing in the extent non-D&D RPG populace, who's growth may or may not directly tie into that (as I'd expect is the case with WOIN)? Do you have any way to know?