24 Million Lapsed D&D Players - Define "Lapsed"

[mudbunny]

I believe (and this is only based on my extrapolations on posts by WotC staffers from the old WotC forums) that sometime in the past several years (2 or 3, tops) WotC paid for a nationwide survey to get an idea of how many people

a - Know of D&D*
b - Are playing RPGs
c - Are playing D&D
d - Are playing OD&D
...
X - Are playing 4E

* I recall a remarkably high number, on the order of 95%, of people, when asked, knew what D&D was, generally. A high enough number that increases the value of D&D (as an IP, not as a game) by a significant amount.

 

[ggroy]

Here are relevant numbers from that 1999 WotC survey, for comparison:

Adventure Game Industry Market Research Summary (RPGs) V1.0 -- Wizards of the Coast

play or have played TRPGs ~ 5.5 million

play monthly ~ 2.25 million

A two phase approach was used to determine information about trading card games (TCGs), role playing games (RPGs) and miniatures wargames (MWG) in the general US population between the ages of 12 and 35.

This age bracket was arbitrarily chosen on the basis of internal analysis regarding the probable target customers for the company's products. We know for certain that there are lots of gamers older than 35, especially for games like Dungeons & Dragons; however, we wanted to keep the study to a manageable size and profile. Perhaps in a few years a more detailed study will be done of the entire population.

 

[ggroy]

These figures of 24 million lapsed players and 1.5 million active players, appear to be possibly from a subsequent survey than the 1999 one. Though what year this subsequent survey was done, is unknown. They also did not state whether this subsequent survey only covered America or included other countries.

If we add the 24 million lapsed players + 1.5 million active players, we get a figure of "25.5 million players who play or have played D&D".

If the 1999 WotC survey figure of "5.5 million people who play or have played tabletop rpgs", only covers an age range of 12 to 35 (as mentioned in the 1999 survey), one could deduce from the above "25.5 million people who play or have played D&D" figure that the subsequent survey may possibly cover a greater age range than 12 to 35. Though what exact age ranged was used in this subsequent survey, is unknown.

As a percentage of the US population (using a 309 million population figure from US & World Population Clock), people who play or have played D&D make up approximately 25.5/309 = 8.25% of the population. (This is assuming the WotC subsequent survey only covered American households and not overseas).

 

[ggroy]

The 6 million players figure from the WotC lawsuit documents, may possibly be from the WotC 1999 survey. From the 1999 WotC survey document, we have the figure:

"play or have played TRPGs ~ 5.5 million"

which rounds up to 6 million.

If the lawsuit documents are dated April 2009, then most likely these new figures of "24 million lapsed players" and "1.5 million active players" come from a WotC survey which was done within the last year or so (ie. April 2009 -> present).

If these new survey numbers were available back in April 2009, most likely they would have been used in the lawsuit documents.

 

[Theo R Cwithin]

To say nothing (good or bad) of the content of the game they're trying to sell to former players, in light of the initial marketing of 4e, it's got to be an uphill struggle in a serious way to reclaim folks rather than see them drift off to other games or to different older or current editions.

I get the impression that WotC aren't really targeting people who noticed the 4e roll out (ie, current gamers).

My feeling is that they're aiming more for long lapsed players who haven't even thought about gaming in years, much less paid any attention to the coming and going of the last couple editions. Those people won't have any memory of 4e's release and the hooplah that embroiled the active gaming community at the time.

 

[ggroy]

I get the impression that WotC aren't really targeting people who noticed the 4e roll out (ie, current gamers).

My feeling is that they're aiming more for long lapsed players who haven't even thought about gaming in years, much less paid any attention to the coming and going of the last couple editions. Those people won't have any memory of 4e's release and the hooplah that embroiled the active gaming community at the time.

If this newer WotC survey was done within the last year (ie. April 2009->present), perhaps these new figures of "24 million lapsed players" and "1.5 million active players" may have been partial motivation for them to change course and do the 4E Essentials line and the new 4E "red box" later this year.

24 million lapsed players is certainly a huge untapped potential market. Even if they able to tap into as low as 10% of that lapsed player market, it could bring in 2.4 million lapsed players back into the game.

 

[mhensley]

Very interesting. I ran a poll on my site last month about what version of D&D you played last and it came up with only 24% playing 4e which is very close to that 1.5 out of 6 million number given here.

 

[delericho]

If this newer WotC survey was done within the last year (ie. April 2009->present), perhaps these new figures of "24 million lapsed players" and "1.5 million active players" may have been partial motivation for them to change course and do the 4E Essentials line and the new 4E "red box" later this year.

24 million lapsed players is certainly a huge untapped potential market. Even if they able to tap into as low as 10% of that lapsed player market, it could bring in 2.4 million lapsed players back into the game.

That would make sense, unless that 1.5m represent 4e players, and there are 6m D&D players. In which case, some 4.5m of the 24m lapsed players are actually current "old D&D"/retroclone/Pathfinder players, many of whom would be aware of the 4e changeover, but have decided against it for one reason or another. Another big chunk are probably "current gamers" who just don't play D&D any more (for whatever reason).

Remove those two groups, and that 24m people in the target market for the new Red Box suddenly looks a lot smaller. I do hope that this strategy works for them - the game could certainly use an influx of new players. I'm just not seeing this massive untapped market that WotC are banking on.

Certainly, the Red Box has no chance whatsoever of bringing me back to 4e - I tried it and decided against.

(Of course, I'm not actually a "lapsed player" any more, as I'm now playing in a 4e campaign. However, I most certainly am a "lapsed customer", and that won't be changing. Indeed, with the cancellation of SWSE, WotC are about to lose my custom entirely.)

 

[ggroy]

That would make sense, unless that 1.5m represent 4e players, and there are 6m D&D players. In which case, some 4.5m of the 24m lapsed players are actually current "old D&D"/retroclone/Pathfinder players, many of whom would be aware of the 4e changeover, but have decided against it for one reason or another. Another big chunk are probably "current gamers" who just don't play D&D any more (for whatever reason).

Remove those two groups, and that 24m people in the target market for the new Red Box suddenly looks a lot smaller. I do hope that this strategy works for them - the game could certainly use an influx of new players. I'm just not seeing this massive untapped market that WotC are banking on.

Wonder if WotC measured an itemized breakdown of that 24 million lapsed players into various groups, such as the two you mentioned and other ones such as older AD&D players who have not played any rpg games in over 10 or 20 years.

For example, out of the 20+ people I played D&D with back in the day, I'm only aware of 2 or 3 who still play any tabletop rpg games today. Many of these people stopped playing tabletop rpgs altogether after high school or college.

Certainly, the Red Box has no chance whatsoever of bringing me back to 4e - I tried it and decided against.

I imagine this would probably be the case for many, in that 24 million lapsed players figure.

The upcoming 4E "red box" being made in the style of the old Mentzer basic D&D box set, suggests WotC may possibly be targeting lapsed gamers who played D&D back in the 1980's but whom today do not play any tabletop rpgs at all. These may be people who have not played any tabletop rpgs at all over the last 20+ years.

I don't think that 4E "red box" is targeting people who are current or recent players of 4E and/or 3.5E/Pathfinder. Targeting people who currently or recently played the retroclones and older editions of D&D/AD&D, is probably not their main aim either.

If they are indeed targeting people who have not played any tabletop rpgs in over 20+ years, they are most likely looking at a demographic of people over age 30 to age 50+. A 40-something former gamer today, would have been in high school or college when the Mentzer red box was first released.

It will be interesting to see how WotC will advertise this 4E "red box". I suppose they could put up television ads on a cable channel like Spike and/or during prime time shows like CSI, if they are targeting the over age 30 to age 50+ crowd.

 

[darjr]

Thanks for that survey, but I'll bet it's driven more by your reader base than anything else.

It is also possible that those numbers in the OP were a bit of a typo or some such. It was a live blog of the event. Granted the site that did it is generally very good about their facts, but it is still possible that they misheard or mistyped and it's just been overlooked. We should probably look for confirmation from either them or WotC before a really detailed analysis of what it could all mean makes any sense.