Why?
Why not Stewart instead of Mearls? Would it be more authoritative from Mearls? Does Mearls have access to information his boss does not?
Again… why?
Again, you sound incredulous. Doubtful. Your last two or three posts cite Stewart and imply that the number of players is somehow incredulous.
Which brings me back to what I asked earlier?
Are you implying Nathan Stewart is a liar? That he's purposely telling people inaccurate numbers? Or are you implying that he's incompetent, and doesn't know his job?
Should the D&D market be bigger than $55 million? Once again: IT IS!!!!! The ICv2 reports don't include Amazon.You know, the massive online retailer that is selling hundreds of copies of the PHB each day.
Repeating: the $55 million figure does not include online sales.
Once more for the people in the back: the $55,000,000 figure could be as much as twice as large.
Say it with me now…
Also, keep in mind that while D&D apparently has more players than Magic the Gathering, you NEED a deck to play Magic (and you need to update that deck, and making cards for Magic is super cheap). Plus, you need to update your deck on a regular basis.
Meanwhile, only one person in every 4-6 needs the rulebooks to play D&D. If even as high as that, given there are the Basic Rules are free. AND you only need to pay once, as the book you bought in 2014 or 2015 still works. So that 12 million player number might only translate to 2 1/2 million books sold.
In short, you're looking at the numbers for HALF the sales that are sold to a FIFTH of the audience for a SINGLE year and then complaining that they don't match the total numbers of the audience.
:/
There is a difference between it coming from Mearls and coming from Stewart...yes. However, I don't really care to explain why it matters to me.
Am I incredulous...I am...but now that I know why you guys were claiming what you were claiming, I'm willing to have a wait and see situation on it.
This stuff should be reflected in the Quarterlies, or at a minimum the Annuals. This type of money in flow should mean at least a bump to investors.
If you have 15 million players, and you have over ten books out, you should probably see $5 - $10 per player (many spend zero, but then you have those who make up for it and spend a TON) on average in my approximation. During 3e/3.5 you had around a 5 million player base, and WotC in some thoughts was making between 25 million and 30 million a year. At just $5 on average you'll see $75 million. At $10 you'll see 150 million if that is an ACTIVE player base (emphasis on Active). Everyone needs something like Dice, books, materials, something.
This could also be where some are looking in expanding the brand with coming up with new types of Brand merchandise. I'm not too keen on it, but I think some are pushing for it to go that way. More ways to milk the player base. If it really is 15 million, that should represent a LARGE amount of money.
PS: For those who are trying to figure out how this works, let's say at a MINIMUM it costs someone $75 to buy all three core rulebooks. ONLY the DM gets those. For it to be $5 a player that would mean that DM plus the players is equal to 15 total players (DM + 14 others).
$10 is actually a much more reasonable idea (DM + 6 players) and I think it is a 5 player base that is planned for (DM +4 players) which would actually be $15 a group with ONLY ONE individual spending money.
Obviously this is a VERY LOW BALL. I know to some this may seem outrageous amounts of an averaging, but honestly, many don't just buy the core rulebooks, and normally the books, even on amazon are going to be more than $75 all together, and there are going to be many groups that have MORE than 1 PHB in them. I gave a LOW BALL idea of what I SHOULD see therefore. In reality, if the numbers reported are active players and it is higher, I should see a much HIGHER amount.
Though the thing I expect people to toss back at this assumption is that the entirety of the hobby is made up of players playing off the free Basic D&D document. I don't think that's the case, but I expect people will assume that if the numbers do not add up).