Part 1: What is a Grognard?
First, a new definition of grognard: It starts with anyone older than the target audience age of D&D. Now of course that is rather nebulous, but I would think the target audience is the big part of the bell-curve of current D&D players, which is probably something like age 15-25 right now (could be wrong, but that's my guess...I'm guessing someone comes in here and says, "I disagree, it is actually probably more like 14-24"). Furthermore, under my definition, a grognard must have cut their teeth on an older edition of D&D, meaning 4E or older (2014 doesn't count).
Now I would put for that grognardism is a spectrum. We could posit the above definition equating with "quasi-grognards" or perhaps "apprentice tier" grognards, while journeyman grognards are two editions removed, and so forth. Something like this:
Novices (non-grognards): Started playing during the 5E era, 2014 or later. Generally under age 25 - younger Zennials and Alpha.
Apprentice grognards (aka "quasi-grognards"): Started playing during 4E, age 25-35ish, or older Zennials.
Journeyman grognards: Started playing during 3.x, probably age 35-45ish. Younger millenials.
Expert grognards: Started playing AD&D 2nd or BECMI, 1990s. Age 40-50ish. Millenials, mostly.
Master grognards: Started playing AD&D 1st edition, or B/X D&D. Age 50-60ish. Gen-X or older.
Grandmaster grognards: Playing with Gygax in the 70s, OD&D, baby. Age 60+. Boomers or older. Of course a true grognard had to have played wargames before D&D even started, but we'll waive this criteria for grandmastery.
Or something like that - all of the above is general, so there are probably exceptions. Back in the day, only "grandmasters" were considered grognards, but we're in 2025...meaning, the dawn of 3E is basically the mid-point in D&D history (crazy thought). But really, none of it really matters and is just a bit of fun.
Part 2: Why Grognards Still Matter
OK, that aside, here's why grognards still matter. I had this this thought while reading the thread about the new Magic book (whatever form it takes). Someone mentioned that Theros and Ravnica did well, Strixhaven not so much. I thought, "Interesting...I bought Theros and Ravnica, but not Strixhaven."
Now I'm a Gen-Xer who started playing AD&D during the early 80s, so would be a "master grognard." Aside from the boom of the 1980s, for most of my playing time D&D was thought to have several million players at a time and was mostly a bit niche in the larger scheme of things. Now there are allegedly tens of millions of players, maybe 5-10 times as many as there were 20 years ago. No one knows, except for perhaps a few folks at WotC, but certainly they talk big. At the very least, we can say that there are more active players than there have been since at least the 1980s.
Anyhow, who are those new players? Young folks, mostly. Zennials and even some Gen Alpha. Meaning, grognards might still be a few million, but are probably no more than 10-20% of the current player base.
But...
We still buy a higher percentage of books than kidz these daze.
We matter, economically speaking.
I say this as someone who has loved RPGs for over 40 years, but maybe actively played for half of that time. But, I've probably never gone more than a year without buying an RPG book - even during several hiatuses of several years. Currently I haven't actively played since 2019, but I've bought a handful of RPG books, including a few from WotC. My purchasing has diminished over the years, and where I bought almost every 5E book for the first few years, I started skipping more and more books about five years ago. The last new book I bought was Ravenloft in 2021...and then I skipped the next 15 or so, until the core 2024 books came out.
Why did my spending dry up? Well, when I'm not playing, I still tend to buy setting books, or new RPGs that I like for reading enjoyment (e.g. Free League stuff). Strixhaven didn't grab me, and I found the reviews of Spelljammer and Planescape tepid at best (thought might end up getting PS). Other than that, WotC hasn't really done any other setting books in the last few years.
Of upcoming books, I'll buy at least the FR setting book; not sure about the player's book, the dragon anthology, and will check out the Magic book.
Now here's the implication: I haven't played in five+ years, and while I didn't buy much from 2021 into mid-2024, I still plan on buying most of the books in late 2024-25. Meaning, if an inactive grognard is still buying books, I can only assume that the many active grognards are buying at least as many, on average.
Now let's cut to the kids at the small high school I work at. There's a bunch of kids that play D&D, but I've never seen anything other than 5E core books. They're mostly casual players, but I still found that noteworthy. One of the kids I talked to didn't even know about the 2024 books (As an aside, one of the reasons I don't buy the 50 million number that WotC cited a couple years ago, is that while a large number of the kids I've interacted with have played D&D, most don't actively play it....meaning the new boom involved a lot of kids playing a bit of D&D, but as with the 80s boom, it didn't stick for all of them...I think we're kind of in the early stages of "post-boom").
Which brings me (back) to my point: We grognards of different degrees still, as a group, follow D&D more closely than most of the younger active players. Having stuck with the game over the decades, it is mostly a life-long hobby even if, like myself, not all of us actively play. Some of those "new boomers" will become diehards, but most won't.
Part 3: Summing up (sorta)
OK, thanks for reading if you made it this far. My apologies for being long-winded. I just wanted to share something that I've changed my mind about. Previously, I knew I was no longer WotC's target audience - and haven't really been so for a decade or two - but I guess I extended that to not only the tone and themes of the game, but the economic aspect. In that sense, I
am still the target audience, because I probably spend as much on WotC books as a dozen casual younger players.
WotC is probably cognizant of this. Not only are many of the people that make the games grognards of different degrees, but they must know that grognards tend to have a larger share of purchasing power than the typical "novice." In fact, I'm guessing that a large majority of books are purchased by people age 25 and older, and still a significant percentage age 40 and older. And I know a lot of my fellow "old-timers" still play--and purchase--a lot more than I do. And yes, WotC is looking to the future - at the current players who will age and (assuming no huge economic collapse, ahem) will increase their discretionary spending. But most of us grognards will still be around for the next decade or three, which is a lot of time to buy books.
In other words, WotC's target audience may actually be
potential grognards in that they want to convert people to lifelong fans, but they still must (or should!) have current lifelong fans in mind, because we still pay the bills.
So fellow grognards, we stiil matter. We're still at the table.
