7 Years of D&D Stories? And a "Big Reveal" Coming?

When asked what he was working on, WotC's Chris Perkins revealed a couple of juicy tidbits. They're not much, but they're certainly tantalizing. Initially, he said that "Our marketing team has a big reveal in the works", and followed that up separately with "Right now I'm working on the next seven years of D&D stories". What all that might mean is anybody's guess, but it sounds like there are plans for D&D stretching into the foreseeable future! Thanks to Barantor for the scoop!

 

[Shasarak]

http://www.google.co.jp/url?sa=t&so...l4DoAQ&usg=AFQjCNE2JKE11O2Q7oZW2pcnpqsWPPLfYw

Hope that link works. Pegs RPGs at 15 million. Sorry misremembered.

So theoretically Pathfinder Adventures could be outselling the RPG.

That is....kinda cool actually. I really like that game.

 

[Hussar]

So theoretically Pathfinder Adventures could be outselling the RPG.

That is....kinda cool actually. I really like that game.

Well, no, actually. Since Pathfinder Adventures would be included in that number. That's the total size of the RPG market which does include all sales channels. Why wouldn't Pathfinder Adventures be included in there.

My personal take on it is that the market shrank pretty much by the size of WOTC's involvement. IOW, the market with WOTC (and D&D) is about 30 million). When WOTC stopped publishing, the market shrank to 15 million, because the biggest single player wasn't in the market anymore.

 

[Shasarak]

Well, no, actually. Since Pathfinder Adventures would be included in that number. That's the total size of the RPG market which does include all sales channels. Why wouldn't Pathfinder Adventures be included in there.

Well going off the link that you provided, Pathfinder Adventures was listed as the second ranking item in the Card-Dice game section which is estimated at having $35 million in sales per year as compared to the RPG section at $15 million per year.

So why would you lump them together when the article that you provided does not?

 

[Carlsen Chris]

They've signed a novel distribution deal with Tor?

"Have no fears, we've got stories for years!"

 

[Hussar]

Well going off the link that you provided, Pathfinder Adventures was listed as the second ranking item in the Card-Dice game section which is estimated at having $35 million in sales per year as compared to the RPG section at $15 million per year.

So why would you lump them together when the article that you provided does not?

Oops, sorry, my bad. I got PF Adventures mixed up with the RPG line. My total bad.

 

[Kramodlog]

Sorry [MENTION=55961]goldomark[/MENTION], but yes it does.

Um, no.

Me not buying an AP will not cancel out someone else's purchase. That purchase will appear on the distributor's ledger and on Hasbro's.

It's better to produce fewer better selling products that more products. It's better to sell 25,000 copies of a single book than 15,000 copies of two different books even though they have 30,000 total sales in the latter.

It is also more profitable to seel two books that sell will 25,000 copies than one book that sells 25,000.

If they release two products, to reach you and [MENTION=261]Doc_Klueless[/MENTION], then they've doubled their production costs and have to double their sales. If they halve their products, so long as they do not halve their sales, then they've made more money. So if they sell an AP with some crunch content in it (like how Princes of the Apocalypse is expected to come with the content from the free PDF), and even a single extra person buys that book, then they've made more profit.

Which one do you think will sell more copies? PotA or a Forgotten Realms campaign setting book?

 

[Kramodlog]

Well, we know how many PHBs sold during 3.0 and 3.5e. And we know that 4e somehow outsold 3e on its launch. And we know how many Pathfinder Core Rulebooks have sold and that every year Paizo sold more Pathfinder CRBs than the year before.
The number of CRB was around half the number of 3.0 PHBs. So the number Paizo sold several years earlier - when they started beating 4e - would be much lower. So the number of people who stopped buying 4e was greater than the number of people who bought Pathfinder.
So the total number of people buying RPG books either shrank or became much, much more spread out. Likely a bit of both.

At launch, 4e out sold the number of PHB 3.x sold during its entire 8 years of existence? According to a post [MENTION=22424]delericho[/MENTION], 3e or 3.x sold 700k copies, if I remember correctly.

Now if I remember correctly, someone paraphrasing WotC said that 5e's launch out sold 4e's. According to the novelrank numbers you commented on, about 90k PHB might have been sold during 5e's first six months of existence. Even if we say that the numbers are higher, that those, say double or triple, we are not above 700,000. Are you sure it is not "4e's launch sells out sold 3e's launch sells"?

What are Paizo numbers for their corebook? Does it count their PDFs? Seems to me all we have is a lot of conjecture.

 

[DMZ2112]

Which one do you think will sell more copies? PotA or a Forgotten Realms campaign setting book?

If Wizards marketed it right, the AP could easily outsell. It has legs far beyond die-hard FR fans. But historically Wizards' marketing has been sub par. The FRCS5 is the safer bet, due to the sheer number of those die-hard FR fans who will buy it regardless of how anemically Wizards pitches it.

 

[Kramodlog]

Umm... no. Math fail.

A 60-page softcover product would probably cost around $25. (Paizo charges $19.99 for their 64-page books, but hasn't raised prices in some time.) So buying the 5 needed to make-up the 320-page accessory would cost $125. Opposed to the $50-60 of the single 320-page book. It would be twice the price, not less.

Up front the cost is less. That is a fact. And who is to say WotC will make 5 60 pages books? Remember, your argument making too making too many books is bad. We should forget that WotC doesn't sell PDFs and they probably sell more physical unites than Paizo. So they print more and that means economy of scale, so cheaper products for customers.

Given the choice of smaller monthly softcovers or a large hardcovers twice a year, I think I'll go for the hardcovers. It's cheaper, more durable, requires less searching for content (all in one place), easier to finance around, makes store shelves less intimidating.

It also means a lot of people won't buy them cause they cost too much. It is just fact. Not everyone can shell out 50$ or save that sum up.

Also, that whole intimidating shelve is a argument from forums. It is just as valid as an argument saying that empty shelves will mean games won't buy books cause they feel the edition is not supported. They might be even more numerous than the "intimidated ones".

 

[jgsugden]

All the numbers that people discuss about how much of this book sold at that point are pretty meaningless - because we're living in a rapidly evolving world where people are changing how they play this game every year - and how they obtain gaming materials.

If you ask me, WotC's best approach is to make the gaming materials cheap and high quality - basically selling at minimal profits - so that they can try to rebuild the brand and gain more marketshare back. Why? Because their best bet to make money is to Marvel D&D.

They should be using the game to draw together fans and then spinning that off into TV and major movies. It is ridiculous that such a well known character as Drizz't has not made it to the big screen, yet. Dragonlance, if done right, could be a pretty darn good TV series on cable or a good movie series (animated version is NOT a good example of this...)

To that end, they want to make the game as pervasive as possible. D&D, the game, should be their marketing, not their product.