D&D General Did 5e 2024 Not meet the economic goals set, and if not, why not?

[haakon1]

I think if 2024 had been promoted as 6th edition rather than an upgrade to 5th (2014), I doubt it would appear to be less interesting and I figure more people might have picked it up.

There’d more conflict and the 2015-2024 generation would experience the pain of all their stuff being made obsolete or having to switch.

Compatibility makes sense to me, especially with WotC wanting to essentially keep the same popular game but ditch “problematic” pre-2024 wording if things. Bit like 2e getting rid of AD&D’s controversial terms.

 

[UngainlyTitan]

We did not get a new edition, because calling it a new edition would kill sales in the back catalogue. The differences between the two version are not enough to make the older books useless. Most are still useful, particularly the adventures, setting and lore books.
Tasha's and Xanathar's are probably not worth for someone starting out in 2025.
So when WoTC market a new edition? When sales in the back catalogue. Do not look at sales of the PHB to measure the health of 5e. Look at sales of Tyranny of Dragons, Curse of Strahd and the like.

Edit: for clarity

 

[abazaba]

33:02 Unserious design process without a playtest
41:23 Mid-playtest retreat

So, which is it ? Is it 'without a playtest', or 'Mid-playtest retreat' ? You cannot have both.
Seriously ? Sounds like lame clickbait to me.

 

[CommodoreKong]

I suspect 5.5/2024 did decently, especially when you compare it to 2014 since I wouldn't be surprised if more sales were on D&D Beyond, where Hasbro is going to have much, much higher margins than a physical book.

Did it meet expectations. I suspect probably not because Wizards/Hasbro likely had some pretty sky high expectations. D&D in the early 2020s was probably doing the best it had ever done with the combination of Covid, Stranger Things, Baldur's Gate 3 and Critical Roll. They clearly were spending big on D&D, with a ton of money likely being spent on the salaries of 30+ software engineers for the 3D VTT and financing half of the budget of Honor Among Thieves. Hasbro likely expected big things from both brand becoming bigger

Unfortunately Honor Among Thieves didn't light the box office on fire and it seems unlikely we'll see a direct sequel. Larian is moving on from D&D and it will likely take Wizards half a decade, if not not more to develop something on the scale of Baldur's Gate 3. Project Sigil was a bust, and all of the extra revenue that Wizards was likely expecting from selling cosmetics from it is never going to materialize.

Probably the one big plus is that D&D Beyond is likely doing well, getting more and more traffic for Wizards produced books plus making lots of extra revenue on third party products that they sell on it, much like how Valve make a ton of money off of Steam from games sold on the service.

Overall while I suspect 5.5/2024 did well when you look at it from the perspective of any other TTRPG launch, but when you look at where Wizards likely was hoping the brand would be at and the amount of money spent on it/revenue they expected it to bring in I would imagine it's a disappointment for them.

 

[haakon1]

Overall while I suspect 5.5/2024 did well when you look at it from the perspective of any other TTRPG launch, but when you look at where Wizards likely was hoping the brand would be at and the amount of money spent on it/revenue they expected it to bring in I would imagine it's a disappointment for them.

Could be. Sounds reasonable. But only Hasbro knows for sure.

I saw on the TV news that Hasbro complained about tariffs hitting the toy industry hard. Lots of business headwinds.

 

[Clint_L]

I’ll wait to see some actual evidence one way or another before venturing an opinion.

 

[Lanefan]

I keep wondering why people seem to think the three core 5E24 books were supposed to be this huge thing in the first place? As though the game begins and ends with these three books and that if someone chooses not to buy them that somehow that's a major failing and that everything is falling apart?

For any edition or sub-edition, good sales for the core three books are essential. If they don't sell, nothing else in that edition is likely to sell either.

So yes, 5.24's core three not selling well would, if true, be a very major faiing indeed.

It's the "if true" bit there at which we can only guess, for the time being.

 

[cranberry]

I looked to try to see if this content creator was conservative or a little more to the right than I would normally ascribe to, but couldn't find much on that. They did make one point I may think contributed greatly, but isn't highlighted in their summary.

Ronald is left leaning.

 

[Remathilis]

We did not get a new edition, because calling it a new edition would kill sales in the back catalogue. The differences between the two version are not enough to make the older books useless. Most are still useful, particularly the adventures, setting and lore books.
Tasha's and Xanathar's are probably not worth for someone starting out in 2025.
So when WoTC market a new edition? When sales in the back catalogue. Do not look at sales of the PHB to measure the health of 5e. Look at sales of Tyranny of Dragons, Curse of Strahd and the like.

Edit: for clarity

I think it was an issue where the Core Rules were getting a little long in the tooth, but 5e itself was not. Minor mechanical adjustments aside, most of the 5e library works fine. The big differences are in the PC rule updates (species and backgrounds and rejiggered classes), the bulk of the modules and supplements work fine (again, "of Everythings" aside). Basically, they wanted to keep selling books like Planescape, Glory of the Giants, or Wild Beyond the Witchlight and weren't ready to hit the "breakaway new edition" button yet.

 

[UngeheuerLich]

For any edition or sub-edition, good sales for the core three books are essential. If they don't sell, nothing else in that edition is likely to sell either.

So yes, 5.24's core three not selling well would, if true, be a very major faiing indeed.

It's the "if true" bit there at which we can only guess, for the time being.

I think a forgotten realm campaign set will sell no matter which version you play. And it might actually boost sales of the core books.

Not that I like all changes, but so far the 5.24 overall give a very good experience.