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Are D&D sales declining? Teos Abadia takes a look.
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<blockquote data-quote="Alphastream" data-source="post: 9157421" data-attributes="member: 11365"><p>The normal expectation would be for each successive release to do worse than the prior ones and for sure to do worse than core books and similar products. A starter set (typically sold at a loss) should sell better than an accessory, for example. There are always some surprises (if we look at 2E data from Ben Riggs, some products do really well for a while, but most do worse than previous releases).</p><p></p><p>5E has given us many surprises. First, that books were increasing in sales over time. That on month x in year 2 you might have y sales, and then the same month in year 5 you could have MORE sales? That's wild. And it's what many 5E books have done, both core and other books.</p><p></p><p>5E also shows some more recent books having huge initial releases, way beyond what you would expect. Tasha's just explodes with initial sales, even if it may not quite catch up to Xanathar's with its growth over time. Spelljammer with huge initial sales... even if folks decide it isn't a great product and sales slow, those initial sales were amazing.</p><p></p><p>What we also see is that this incredible growth is slowing. So, this isn't a situation where at year 10 5E is ever stronger, the way it was at year 5. That is important for our whole hobby to note. Because, look, maybe the same is true of 3rd party products. For sure, the DMs Guild sales are slower. And we have seen many 5E 3rd party publishers see some decline on Kickstarter (10% is a number thrown around, for what it is worth; varies by publisher). So, maybe it is all going out of overdrive and into simply a strong good place. Or maybe it will slow further. We don't know. But 5E new products are selling fewer copies in the BookScan data. All of which would encourage WotC to try new approaches and revenue streams, because corporations are more than a bit addicted to growth.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Alphastream, post: 9157421, member: 11365"] The normal expectation would be for each successive release to do worse than the prior ones and for sure to do worse than core books and similar products. A starter set (typically sold at a loss) should sell better than an accessory, for example. There are always some surprises (if we look at 2E data from Ben Riggs, some products do really well for a while, but most do worse than previous releases). 5E has given us many surprises. First, that books were increasing in sales over time. That on month x in year 2 you might have y sales, and then the same month in year 5 you could have MORE sales? That's wild. And it's what many 5E books have done, both core and other books. 5E also shows some more recent books having huge initial releases, way beyond what you would expect. Tasha's just explodes with initial sales, even if it may not quite catch up to Xanathar's with its growth over time. Spelljammer with huge initial sales... even if folks decide it isn't a great product and sales slow, those initial sales were amazing. What we also see is that this incredible growth is slowing. So, this isn't a situation where at year 10 5E is ever stronger, the way it was at year 5. That is important for our whole hobby to note. Because, look, maybe the same is true of 3rd party products. For sure, the DMs Guild sales are slower. And we have seen many 5E 3rd party publishers see some decline on Kickstarter (10% is a number thrown around, for what it is worth; varies by publisher). So, maybe it is all going out of overdrive and into simply a strong good place. Or maybe it will slow further. We don't know. But 5E new products are selling fewer copies in the BookScan data. All of which would encourage WotC to try new approaches and revenue streams, because corporations are more than a bit addicted to growth. [/QUOTE]
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