Pathfinder 1E Pathfinder sales

[Echohawk]

There is no way to tell from here whether PF is REALLY outselling D&D. I am not too concerned if they are or are not. If it is, it is just more of "an I Told you so.." type of remark to WOTC for their poor marketing choice of cutting all 3rd edition support.

I'm a bit wary of that conclusion. It appears to me that WotC has made a strategic decision to transition from a print-only sales model for D&D to a broader sales model including DDI subscriptions and ancillary products like the Castle Ravenloft and Wrath of Ashardalon board games.

Sure, we could choose to be uncharitable and say that Pathfinder's comparatively strong sales indicates only that WotC has made poor marketing decisions. (As well as indicating that Paizo is doing well, of course.)

But I think we could also choose take a more charitable view and say that the apparent decrease in print D&D sales indicates that WotC's strategic shift is working well for them. For all we know, the combined income from DDI + print + board games is greater than their income was when they had a narrow focus on print products in the 3e era. As a long-term strategy, selling fewer print products isn't a problem, as long as the lost revenues are more than made up from other sources.

We also have no idea if Pathfinder sales are eating into 4e print sales any more or less than DDI subscriptions are eating into 4e print sales. Some combination of the two seems the most plausible to me.

It's loads of fun to speculate about our favourite hobby, but frankly, the only sure thing is that none of us has enough information to reach any solid conclusions. We're all just speculating.

 

[DaveMage]

Amazon Gaming Ranks are not good indicators at all. I see the 3.5 Player's Handbook (and other out of print titles) pop into the top 10 every now and again, so it likely means that a sale of just a few books can propel a product up the ranks quickly.

The only thing to really look at is the overall amazon sales rank, and anything under, say, 500 (and I may be being very charitable here - it's likely a much lower number), is likely going to be impacted significantly in rankings by just a few sales.

 

[Mercurius]

I kind of get how people get miffed when others bash their favorite game (or edition) of choice. Kind of. What I don't get is when advocates of one game/edition get upset when advocates of another game/edition claim that their game/edition is selling more. I mean, why does the popularity matter in the so-called Edition War? Why do folks care? In some circles (the Forge, RPG.Net to some extent), the more obscure your gaming choices, the cooler you are. Play Scribes of Z'zilizir? You're the shizzle.

In a fringe hobby we should be supporting diversity and the health and popularity of all games/editions, even those that don't cater to our nerdtastes. If someone out and out slams your game/edition of choice, feel free to engage, or at least share why you disagree with their perspective, but really don't waste any time warring over claims of popularity and sales figures. Discussion of sales is interesting; fighting about is not.

 

[MrMyth]

No but statistics show that ICv2 is usually within in 1% of actual sales - not everytime, but they're numbers are usually very accurate, even though their selection data is not. So despite where the numbers come from they tend to be right...

What statistics, if you don't mind sharing?

I'd be inclined to believe that it might be an accurate reflection of the book market as a whole, but it seems very unlikely to me for it to even remotely reflect the impact of DDI, for example.

 

[Zil]

Amazon Gaming Ranks are not good indicators at all. I see the 3.5 Player's Handbook (and other out of print titles) pop into the top 10 every now and again, so it likely means that a sale of just a few books can propel a product up the ranks quickly.

The only thing to really look at is the overall amazon sales rank, and anything under, say, 500 (and I may be being very charitable here - it's likely a much lower number), is likely going to be impacted significantly in rankings by just a few sales.

Speaking of overall sales rank, I was impressed seeing that Paizo's Ultimate Combat was sitting at #97 overall sales rank at amazon.ca last week. Just checked and it's now up to #85. I'm not sure how high RPG titles usually peak, but top 100 in all books seems kind of impressive. It's #461 overall on amazon.com, so within the top 500 books at amazon U.S.

 

[Pentius]

The thing that just occurred to me is that, you know, we're all fans of a niche hobby here, to say the least. Most of us are probably fans of other niche hobbies/interests as well(I'm still the only person I know, in meatspace, with a love for cheesy old wuxia films). So, why are so many of us concerned with the relative popularity of our game/edition of choice? You'd think we'd be used to knowing mainstream opinion doesn't dictate quality by now.

 

[Spatula]

Discussion of sales is interesting; fighting about is not.

In what way is the discussion of data that no one possesses interesting?

 

[thecasualoblivion]

In what way is the discussion of data that no one possesses interesting?

If no one possesses the data, you can make up your own and present it as truth and nobody can prove you wrong.

 

[IronWolf]

In what way is the discussion of data that no one possesses interesting?

The ICv2 report has been around for quite some time. While not an entirely accurate picture it is something that has existed long enough to show trends and such over time within its own reported statistics.

Are they actually the sales numbers of Paizo and WotC and others? Nope. But are they a barometer of one segment of the industry? Yep!

And then from there we can discuss - what is DDIs impact on these numbers? Or what impact does the release cycle of WotC versus Paizo versus other RPG publishers have on these results? Does Paizo's subscription numbers have any effect?

These are discussion boards - people discuss things. Heck, we discuss elves and dragons and wizards and they don't exist!

 

[Zil]

In what way is the discussion of data that no one possesses interesting?

But there is data. We can debate how reliable the various data points are, but you really can't deny that ICV2 rankings or Amazon rankings or even anecdotal stories are data. Sure, they all have different degrees of accuracy and none represent perfect information, but they are all still data.