D&D General 50 Years of D&D On a Single Chart

[CleverNickName]

Also 3.0 came out in 2000 not 1999.

I have AD&D 2E product on my shelf from 2000. It was still in print.

I'm not counting reprints either. 1E was 77 to 1990 in print no break but won't nitpick if you call it 89.

Like I said above, my numbers come from Wikipedia (and should be taken with a grain of salt). I didn't actually research anything here; I was mostly just playing around with Excel.



And remember kids: despite what YouTube and Reddit told you, regurgitating stuff you found on Wikipedia is not research.

 

[Zardnaar]

Like I said above, my numbers come from Wikipedia (and should be taken with a grain of salt). I didn't actually research anything here; I was mostly just playing around with Excel.

I thought the release dates were reasonably well known. Years at least months no so much for me. OD&D January 1974, 3.0 mid 2000 beyond that I'm a bit vague month wise.

 

[ichabod]

Instead of complaining about dates, I'm going to complain about it being a pie chart. Bar charts are much better for reading information from a graphic. Human perceptual systems are much better at comparing lines than comparing areas or angles.

 

[KYRON45]

But....I love pie!!!!

 

[CleverNickName]

Instead of complaining about dates, I'm going to complain about it being a pie chart. Bar charts are much better for reading information from a graphic. Human perceptual systems are much better at comparing lines than comparing areas or angles.

Well, I was trying to show each edition as a fraction of the last 50 years. I agree that bar charts are great for comparing individual slices of the pie with each other, but unfortunately they're not very useful for showing the fraction of a whole.

But I am your humble servant, and I need practice with graphing in Excel. So:

Or if you would prefer:

 

[J.Quondam]

Instead of complaining about dates, I'm going to complain about it being a pie chart. Bar charts are much better for reading information from a graphic. Human perceptual systems are much better at comparing lines than comparing areas or angles.

I believe it's a throwback to the classic "Orc and Pie Chart" scenario.

 

[delericho]

I love your graph, but these numbers seem a little off to me. 5E debuted in the summer of 2014, so it's not quite ten years old yet. AD&D 1E is a bit hard to pin down, because its Core Rulebooks came out in different years (1977 for the MM, 1978 for the PHB, and 1979 for the DMG); I'd say if we start when all three were out (the DMG releasing in August of 1979), then it lasted 9.5 years, as the AD&D 2E PHB came out in February of 1989. Likewise, the last of the AD&D 2E Core Rulebooks to come out was the MC1, in June of 1989. Given that the final 2E product came out almost exactly eleven years later (Die Vecna Die!, in June of 2000), it currently holds the record for the longest edition of D&D...albeit with an asterisk, due to the gap in publishing between 1996 and 1997.

If we're counting first to last product, the technically the last official 1st Ed product was "L3 Deep Dwarven Delve", published in 1999. But I'm far from convinced that's really a good metric.

I'm amused, though not surprised, at the amount of debate that a simple, light-hearted pie chart has spawned.

 

[Alzrius]

If we're counting first to last product, the technically the last official 1st Ed product was "L3 Deep Dwarven Delve", published in 1999.

What, the premium reprints don't count? A0-A4 Against the Slave Lords was published in June of 2013, and even included a brand new 1E adventure, A0 Danger at Darkshelf Quarry.

 

[Zardnaar]

What, the premium reprints don't count? A0-A4 Against the Slave Lords was published in June of 2013, and even included a brand new 1E adventure, A0 Danger at Darkshelf Quarry.

That's why I'm not counting reprints.

1990 arguably an exception because it's continual.

I suspect we haven't seen the last 1E products.

 

[CleverNickName]

I'm amused, though not surprised, at the amount of debate that a simple, light-hearted pie chart has spawned.

I know right?

Can you imagine what would have happened if I had graphed the number of books published by TS&R/WotC instead?

Guy 1: "OD&D only had three books?! Ugh, what a total failure. 4E was clearly superior, it had ten times that number, easily."
Guy 2: "In that case, 3rd Edition had--"
Guy 1: "SHUT UP KEVIN. SHUT ALL THE WAY UP."