D&D 5E D&D 5E’s Top-Selling Adventures and What It Means for the Hobby from Teos Abadia aka Alphastream.

[Parmandur]

Sure but they also very likely bought it based on its potential as much or more than whatever its revenue at the time was. Remember -- "undermonetized."

The CEO of Hasbro said they already made good on the purchase in the Q1 shareholders meeting, IIRC. In

 

[Reynard]

Nope, not a bit! This is our moat complete data, but all it gives is some relatice comparisons and minimum floors for what these books sell.

I would think that we can at least assume similar ratios. That is, there's probably no reason to believe that people that buy books at FLGS or on Beyond do so in dramatically different relative numbers.

 

[Parmandur]

I would think that we can at least assume similar ratios. That is, there's probably no reason to believe that people that buy books at FLGS or on Beyond do so in dramatically different relative numbers.

Well, for one example from the article, Teos was surprised at the sales for the official Criticsl Role Setting and Adventure products. However, it would not surprise me at all if Critical Role having commercials for D&D Beyond all the time meant that a higher proportion bought Explorer's Guide to Wildemount and Call of the Netherdeep on Beyond in highet relative numbers compared to Hoard of the Dragon Queen...which was in print years before being available on Beyond.

I don't think we have enough data to be sure the relative sales are the same between Bookscan, FLGS and Beyond. I mean, I would assume in aggregate that Curse of Strah has probably outsold Princes of the Apocalypse, but I don't think we have the data to make certain extrapolations.

 

[darjr]

Oh please note that Amazon is known for not always reporting numbers to bookscan or being haphazard about it. No idea how or in what way. But it’s possible that if Amazon numbers are in these it’s some fraction.

 

[Parmandur]

Oh please note that Amazon is known for not always reporting numbers to bookscan or being haphazard about it. No idea how or in what way. But it’s possible that if Amazon numbers are in these it’s some fraction.

Lots of unknowns. Still, fascinating.

 

[Marc Radle]

An interesting observation ... two of the top 5 best-selling WotC adventure books were collaborations with Kobold Press or Kobold Press's designers (Hoard of the Dragon Queen and Saltmarsh).

If you're a fan of either of these adventures, be sure to check out some of Kobold Press's other adventures!

If you like Saltmarsh, check out Scarlet Citadel (written by one of the Saltmarsh designers), or check out City of Cats or Tales of the Old Margreve, both are similar, self-contained books with a city/small setting, accompanying adventures, and everything you need to run those adventures all in one book. If you like Hoard of the Dragon Queen or want a longer campaign, check out Empire of the Ghouls, a level 1-13 adventure that takes the heroes across the world, chasing ghoulish enemies who want to bring darkness and death to the living.

If you're intrigued by Kobold Press's adventures but don't want to dive in completely, check out the Kobold Press adventure search tool (Search Kobold Adventures) to find the perfect short-form (one to three sessions) adventure for your game, many of which can be purchased as $3.99 PDFs or in short adventure anthology books similar to the Yawning Portal.

 

[Parmandur]

Teos dropped his next blog post, about Setting and supplements. Basically, it's all selling pretty good?

 

[michaeljpastor]

The freaking cookbook outsold the 3.5 PHB. That's bonkers to me, and I own both!

I can personally attest, having worked at a gaming/comics stores at Xmastime, that you cannot keep cookbooks and artbooks in stock enough. We sold Firefly, Tomb Raider, Disney and other licensed books of the sort (including the Cthulhu bartending guide) like hotcakes as gifts from both clueless family members who didn't know what to get their geeky family member for the holidays, and from clued-in nerds who wanted to buy a group gift for their GM (with get the added benefit of someone cooking some of it for the next gaming session). It's the ultimate Xover gift and they all look great on an endcap by the register. If you're a retailer, it's gold.

 

[Starmaster]

I'm not at all surprised that "Dragon Heist" is near the top of the list. The article says that Amazon sales are included (except when Amazon refuses to disclose their figures) and "Dragon Heist" has been one of the cheapest D&D books (if not the cheapest) available on Amazon for long stretches of time since it is often more heavily discounted than the other books the sell. For example, Camel shows that Amazon was selling new copies for $14.97 throughout almost all of 2023.

 

[Parmandur]

I'm not at all surprised that "Dragon Heist" is near the top of the list. The article says that Amazon sales are included (except when Amazon refuses to disclose their figures) and "Dragon Heist" has been one of the cheapest D&D books (if not the cheapest) available on Amazon for long stretches of time since it is often more heavily discounted than the other books the sell. For example, Camel shows that Amazon was selling new copies for $14.97 throughout almost all of 2023.

It also has "Dragon" in the title. WotC figured out ages ago that putting "Dragon" or "Magic" in the book title boosts sales (whichbis why they mandated "Dragon Magic" for 3.5).