Critical Role Explorer's Guide to Wildemount Rockets to #1 In 'All Books' on Amazon

When the Amazon page for Explorer's Guide to Wildemount leaked, the book went straight to #15 in all books (not just games, or even just fantasy - all books!) on Amazon before WotC had even said a word about it. It quickly jumped to #3 on Monday, and as of today... it is currently sitting at #1. In ALL books.

Screenshot for posterity!
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It sits there, just above Where the Crawdads Sing by Delia Owens, Profiles in Corruption: Abuse of Power by America's Progressive Elite by Peter Schweizer (note -- that is not an invitation to start discussing American politics on EN World), and Just Mercy: A Story of Justice and Redemption by Bryan Stevenson.

Last year, Critical Role's Kickstarter for an animated show based on their livestream smashed records and raised over $11,000,000. It then went on to get picked up by Amazon for a full series. While there are people on the web confidently declaring that this book will never sell, I think it's safe to say not only will it sell, it already has. Critical Role these days is a brand as strong as D&D itself. Indeed, a couple of years back when speaking to the Seattle Times, WotC indicated that more than 50% of new player watched live-streamed games.

 

[dave2008]

Very impressive
Though a slight caveat. Isn’t the ranking based not on actual sales (because there are none yet as the product isn’t out) but on pre orders which are in some part placed by customers to get the benefit of amazon deals, and which can be cancelled without cost anytime before the book comes out?

Just to clarify, pre-orders are not (generally) charged to your card until the product is available, but it is not just sitting in your chart. If you do not actually go in an cancel it, it will automatically charge your account when the product is available. Pre-order sales have a a high likelihood of converting to sales, especially with only a 2-month window until release.

 

[Umbran]

... especially with only a 20-month window until release.

Um... Two months. Not 20.

 

[dave2008]

Um... Two months. Not 20.

Thank you catching that, I've corrected my post.

 

[darjr]

The Tal’dorei setting book is at 813 sales rank

 

[Parmandur]

Awesome, though frankly not surprising. Good business move is good for business.

 

[Urriak Uruk]

Ugh book number 3 is just gross...

 

[amuller33]

Count me as one of the doubters on how big Critical Role is and whether the book was too specific an audience.. Yea... Ill be quiet now. Smart move By WoTC. Yes, I pre-ordered. The kids in my gaming group were anxious to use this

 

[dave2008]

The Tal’dorei setting book is at 813 sales rank

Interesting, it is jumping up too. It was about 1,200 yesterday.

 

[R_J_K75]

Its probably safe to say that if this book sells as good as it seems like its going to it may very well get more future support than anyone anticipated. Even if the book isn't for me, (I may still be convinced otherwise), I cant say I don't blame them. Never in a million years when this was leaked Sunday would I have thought there would be that much demand for it.

 

[Maestrino]

Its probably safe to say that if this book sells as good as it seems like its going to it may very well get more future support than anyone anticipated. Even if the book isn't for me, (I may still be convinced otherwise), I cant say I don't blame them. Never in a million years when this was leaked Sunday would I have thought there would be that much demand for it.

Consider that on Twitch, Critical Role has 425,000 followers. They average over 33,000 viewers per stream. And that's just the number of people that will subscribe and pay a monthly fee for the privilege of watching them play live on Thursday nights from 10pm - 2am Eastern.

Then they release episodes on YouTube for free after the fact. Their most recent episode (went up less than 24 hours ago) is already up to 193,000 views. The first episode of the Wildemount campaign has over 6 million views on YouTube. That's not counting the people that listen via podcast rather than actually watch the video...

The part of the D&D community that doesn't watch streams literally has no idea about the scale of the following Critical Role has. There's a big reason Amazon threw eight figures at them for a second season of an animated series that hasn't even come out yet.