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 ...

read.macmillan.com

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.

 

[wellis]

I have to admit unfortunately, perhaps due to Forgotten Realms borrowing quite a bit from Greyhawk, that Greyhawk & Forgotten Realms feel somewhat interchangeable in some ways.

 

[Hussar]

Tone, culture, and tech level. From what I've read of Ravenloft, the Domains are far more humanocentric, the tech level feels more distinctly Renaissance (guns are bigger thing), and it leans more on gothic horror tropes and such.

Ahh, are we talking about 5e Ravenloft, or earlier, because that will change the answer a bit.

But most of the changes in Darksun are largely cosmetic. Sure, no metal weapons, but, your mechanics for a sword are still the same - d8 damage and whatnot. Yes, there's defiling, so, that's a thing. But, big desert? That's just tone. There are certainly honking big deserts in FR where you could have the same monsters, same cities, and races and whatnot. So, yeah, it's tone that sets the difference, not mechanics.

I dunno, I seem to feel that most of what you, @DorkForge are pointing to is mostly just flavor stuff. It's not mechanical differences. Yup, you can play a warforged in Eberron. But, then, there's no problem playing warforged in Forgotten Realms too. I know because I have one right now. And certainly not the first one either.

Note, I said that there was very little mechanically distinctive about these different settings. They're all D&D. The classes are (more or less) exactly the same. The spells are the same. A magic missile is still a magic missile no matter what setting you are in. What really distinguishes these different settings are the tones. Darksun is all about survival, Man Vs Nature stuff, lots of post-apocalyptic tropes. Ravenloft is Gothic horror. Spelljammer is more or less steampunk. Mechanically? Not really a whole lot of differences and far more similarities. But thematically? Oh, totally different settings.

Could you do post apocalyptic survival stuff in Forgotten Realms? Sure. yeah, you absolutely could. But, we generally don't. Same as we generally don't do Gothic Horror or Steampunk. Because FR is high fantasy. It's very much good heroes fighting the good fight against the baddies. Great stuff. Greyhawk, OTOH, leans far more in the direction of, say, Moorcock to use an older example, or Glen Cook's Black Company series for a newer approach.

To put it another way, if you were going to set, say, Game of Thrones in a setting - neither of us would use Ravenloft or Darksun, I don't think. Just totally bad fit. But, Game of Thrones thematically fits Greyhawk far, far better than Forgotten Realms. Simply because that's the stories that are typically told in the different settings. It's not a value judgement at all, in case anyone thinks I think one is superior to the other. Very much not. Witcher is another good example of a Greyhawk style setting. Very morally ambiguous. Whereas what I know of Wheel of Time or Shanarra (sp?), or Tad William's Dragonbone Chair are far better fits for Forgotten Realms.

 

[Micah Sweet]

I'm not really sure I agree with that actually. Tone matters. Like, a lot.

After all, what sets Ravenloft apart from Forgotten Realms? The only real difference is tone. You certainly could do horror stories in FR. Heck, my players joked that the first half of Candlekeep Mysteries feels much more like Ravenloft than Forgotten Realms - they are predominantly horror stories for the first four or five modules.

There's nothing particularly mechanically distinct about, say, Darksun. More psionics? Maybe? But, it's still very distinctly D&D. Even Spelljammer is actually set (currently anyway) right in Forgotten Realms.

So, no, I'm going to disagree that play options play much of a role in what people want in settings. There's extremely little different in the play options between most settings. Play options aren't what set Eberron apart from Forgotten Realms. It's almost entirely about tone.

The story of those settings is what makes them matter. That's why I was so irritated with VRGtR. They changed the story.

 

[Hussar]

The story of those settings is what makes them matter. That's why I was so irritated with VRGtR. They changed the story.

For all the things we disagree about, this I am totally with you on. And, a perfect way to phrase it. It's the "story of the setting" that matters.

((to be honest, on the specifics of Van Richten's Guide, I have no opinion. Haven't read it and haven't even looked at it. But, I totally agree with the basic sentiment.))

 

[Micah Sweet]

For all the things we disagree about, this I am totally with you on. And, a perfect way to phrase it. It's the "story of the setting" that matters.

((to be honest, on the specifics of Van Richten's Guide, I have no opinion. Haven't read it and haven't even looked at it. But, I totally agree with the basic sentiment.))

Nice to find some common ground. Worth calling out when it happens.

 

[wellis]

Ahh, are we talking about 5e Ravenloft, or earlier, because that will change the answer a bit.

Earlier I guess. What are the big changes for 5e Ravenloft? I've heard itbwasn't considered a great conversion?

But most of the changes in Darksun are largely cosmetic. Sure, no metal weapons, but, your mechanics for a sword are still the same - d8 damage and whatnot. Yes, there's defiling, so, that's a thing. But, big desert? That's just tone. There are certainly honking big deserts in FR where you could have the same monsters, same cities, and races and whatnot. So, yeah, it's tone that sets the difference, not mechanics.

Dark Sun has breakage issues for weapons (and armor I think) and extreme heat. Hence why metal weapons are especially prized for their ability to go through the armors of the setting much better.

Also, all the nasty city-state rulers (though as I recall Hamanu was pretty nuanced for an evil bastard).

Also, Dark Sun feels a little limited as well. It's a really cool setting but adventure reasons might revolve around certain themes far more than others.

 

[Hussar]

Earlier I guess. What are the big changes for 5e Ravenloft? I've heard itbwasn't considered a great conversion?

Dark Sun has breakage issues for weapons (and armor I think) and extreme heat. Hence why metal weapons are especially prized for their ability to go through the armors of the setting much better.

Also, all the nasty city-state rulers (though as I recall Hamanu was pretty nuanced for an evil bastard).

Also, Dark Sun feels a little limited as well. It's a really cool setting but adventure reasons might revolve around certain themes far more than others.

Yeah there’s a danger here in giving too much credence to criticism. Raven loft is an unparalleled success in 5e. Massively popular. So popular that they actually went back to the well for a second book. Nothing in 5e has gotten two books.

So I’d say that despite some grumbling, 5e rave loft is a smashing success.

But again sure there are some setting specific mechanics in Dark Sun. Although, again stuff like weapon breakage and whatnot is part of the overall post apocalyptic theme.

Like was said, it’s the story of a setting that really sets a setting apart.

 

[Willie the Duck]

For now, but there are plans for Kobra Kai spin offs, fans are taking about a Mr. Miyagi origin spin off.

And Manga and Anime have become huge in the west, with Manga out selling DC and Marvel.

Right, but it is still one property. I mean, I don't want to dismiss the power of one IP (after all, 300 made hoplites and spear-soldiers cool again for TTRPGs almost solo), but in general it takes a lot more than that to make a fad or trend.

Manga and Anime are completely different things whose relevance to the discussion I don't understand. They happen to be Japanese initiated art forms/movements, but that's not the same thing as the (centered on the) 80s western martial artist/ninja fad. There are sometimes martial artists or ninjas in Manga and Anime, but not consistently or I'd say even most of the time.

I don't know.

Perhaps because they were, in fact, wargamers, and such a game was simply outside their wheelhouse?

I'm not clear on what you mean. It was their wheelhouse -- Gary played Braunstein and other domain-centered play. That's what he expected people to do with their characters* once they hit high level. Once he realized that it wasn't wargamers, but instead mostly high school and college kids new to the scene who were picking up D&D, he could have made similar rules (or even bought/licensed Braunstein).
*if anything, I think this notion that you were supposed to play them as leaders and rulers gets overblown, and oftentimes that was just the explanation of what they did when you retired them.

There are indeed a lot of ways to run a dungeon crawl, but we were talking explicitly about Old school, Greyhawk era dungeon crawling -- which, while not monolithic, definitely fits intoa tighter definition than it does in the modern era. Saying one doesn't need to alter 5E to make it work for that era of dungeon crawling is, IMO, entirely ignoring the procedures and playstyle of that kind of play.

Exactly what the old school sensibilities 5e has are really up to interpretation. IMO, 5e could be hammered into place to do this, but to really make it the same beast as bitd Greyhawk era dungeon crawling, a lot would have to be modified. Stuff like eliminate light cantrips, make treasure obtained the XP metric, makes sessions end when you left the dungeon to rest, and so forth.

 

[Henadic Theologian]

Right, but it is still one property. I mean, I don't want to dismiss the power of one IP (after all, 300 made hoplites and spear-soldiers cool again for TTRPGs almost solo), but in general it takes a lot more than that to make a fad or trend.

Manga and Anime are completely different things whose relevance to the discussion I don't understand. They happen to be Japanese initiated art forms/movements, but that's not the same thing as the (centered on the) 80s western martial artist/ninja fad. There are sometimes martial artists or ninjas in Manga and Anime, but not consistently or I'd say even most of the time.


I'm not clear on what you mean. It was their wheelhouse -- Gary played Braunstein and other domain-centered play. That's what he expected people to do with their characters* once they hit high level. Once he realized that it wasn't wargamers, but instead mostly high school and college kids new to the scene who were picking up D&D, he could have made similar rules (or even bought/licensed Braunstein).
*if anything, I think this notion that you were supposed to play them as leaders and rulers gets overblown, and oftentimes that was just the explanation of what they did when you retired them.

Exactly what the old school sensibilities 5e has are really up to interpretation. IMO, 5e could be hammered into place to do this, but to really make it the same beast as bitd Greyhawk era dungeon crawling, a lot would have to be modified. Stuff like eliminate light cantrips, make treasure obtained the XP metric, makes sessions end when you left the dungeon to rest, and so forth.

It's shows that there is still a very strong interest in Asian cultures, especially Japan.

There was also Shang Chi movie that is one of the few marvel movies in the last few years that didn't under preform for expectations. It's on my to watch list.

 

[Parmandur]

Nothing in 5e has gotten two books.

Ahcshually, Critical Role has two books. But I think that proves your point.