D&D (2024) More People Test One D&D Origins Playtest Than D&D Next

WotC has announced that more people have playtested the first One D&D playtest than the number of people who playtested the entirety of the D&D Next playtest 10 years ago, which led to the release of D&D 5E. The number of people who playtested D&D Next, according to the credits in the 5E Player's Handbook, was over 175,000 people.

In the first week alone, more of you have playtested One D&D than in the entirety of 5e playtesting!

Thank you to everyone who has helped shape the future of Dungeons & Dragons!

 

[Maxperson]

I’m not sure how they’d know. Maybe download and some measure of play reports? It’s a bold claim and if it’s based on downloads it’s still very impressive.

In the first week alone, more of you have playtested One D&D than in the entirety of 5e playtesting!

Thank you to everyone who has helped shape the future of Dungeons & Dragons!

Yeah. The downloads is probably how they are tracking it. They're probably guessing at a margin of error, though, because there's no way they can know how many are like me and just reading and digesting the rules, but not actually playtesting them.

I'm not surprised at the numbers of downloads, though. D&D took off after 5e was released, so the huge numbers of D&D players that we have now weren't around for the 5e playtest.

 

[Nikosandros]

PS Isn't the survey supposed to be available today?

Yes, but it is still early morning in the Pacific Time Zone.

 

[dave2008]

Yes, but it is still early morning in the Pacific Time Zone.

I always forget that, even though both my children are going to school on the west coast!

 

[Veltharis ap Rylix]

Didn't they had some kind of registration for downloading the Next material? I seem to recall one, but I'm not sure.

Have to "claim" it on D&D Beyond to get access to the page with the download link.

 

[Maxperson]

Yes, but it is still early morning in the Pacific Time Zone.

I live in California. I'm not sure almost 9am qualifies as early morning. My 6:45 wake-up, though...

 

[Ruin Explorer]

Are they interpreting "downloaded the UA" as equal to "playtested"?

Because, I mean, I downloaded and read it. I haven't used any of it at the table, and probably won't. I'm sure I'm not alone in that.

Yes, but I think that's equivalent measure - download for download.

No-one will ever know how many people actually playtested anything. I mean, we actually playtested the heck out of one of D&D Next playtests - the one with the cool Sorcerer - but we didn't playtest any of the others, even though we downloaded them.

Have to "claim" it on D&D Beyond to get access to the page with the download link.

Yeah it's quite a lot of clicks, which I think is intentional, you have to be logged in, and relatively determined to download it. No-one in my main D&D circle even knew about it but me, on Friday when we played Spire, which I found kind of interesting.

Also yay Eric and Diana, my favourite D&D cartoon characters! Illegitimi non carborundum Eric!

 

[Parmandur]

Are they interpreting "downloaded the UA" as equal to "playtested"?

Because, I mean, I downloaded and read it. I haven't used any of it at the table, and probably won't. I'm sure I'm not alone in that.

You have to formally aign up for the playtest, ao year they are counting that, not spying on what people do after sighing up.

 

[Parmandur]

I live in California. I'm not sure almost 9am qualifies as early morning. My 6:45 wake-up, though...

Pretty sure WotC doesn't open their office till 9. Literally every time they do something like this, it's after 9 AM, which I doubt is a coincidence.

 

[Parmandur]

Pretty sure WotC doesn't open their office till 9. Literally every time they do something like this, it's after 9 AM, which I doubt is a coincidence.

Speak of the Devil, the Survey is open now, y'all.

@darjr @Morrus

 

[overgeeked]

As the PHB says: Playtesting provided by over 175,000 fans of D&D. Thank you!

So they’ve had more UA downloads than that since release. It’s likely also why they’re more willing to dump tradition as they know there are orders of magnitude more new fans than long-haulers.