The 5 'Tiers' of TTRPG Publishing

Cannibal Halfling Gaming published an interesting article recently in which they divided tabletop roleplaying game publishers into five tiers, based on annual revenue. Here were their categories, but you should check out the article for a deeper dive.

~$500 million annual: D&D
~$50 million annual: Paizo
~$5 million annual: Steve Jackson Games
~$500K annual: Evil Hat Productions
~Everyone else (up to $100K)

They chose one example publisher per tier; they didn't list every TTRPG publisher. That's why your favourite publisher is not on that list of 4 companies. But feel free to add to the list!

Also, we talked about it in last week's episode of Morrus' Unofficial Tabletop RPG Talk, for those who prefer to absorb their news in video format!

 

[Morrus]

Scipios comment was about a number in the text

I was talking about Cannibal Halfling.

 

[Morrus]

GW outsources its Warhammer RPGs to Cubicle 7. I don’t know what C7’s revenue looks like.

Just to follow up -- RocketReach reports, for comparison:

• Cubicle 7's annual revenue is $7.2M
• Modiphius at $12.7 million
• Free League at $4 million
• Mongoose at $14M
• Kobold Press at $2M
• Monte Cook Games at $12M
• Green Ronin at $7M
• Chaosium at $26.2 million
• WoTC at $1.5 billion
  

 

[Morrus]

Just to say, don't rely on AI info for this. I just tested it with my own company and it was embarrassingly wrong. Utter nonsense, as usual. So those above figures? Big old pinch of salt.

 

[MGibster]

It's a little sobering to see the numbers and a good reminder of how fortunate we are to have a the number of excellent games we do have.

 

[darjr]

Just to follow up -- RocketReach reports, for comparison:

• Cubicle 7's annual revenue is $7.2M
• Modiphius at $12.7 million
• Free League at $4 million
• Mongoose at $14M
• Kobold Press at $2M
• Monte Cook Games at $12M
• Green Ronin at $7M
• Chaosium at $26.2 million
• WoTC at $1.5 billion
  

Do I understand this that Mongoose makes $14 million?

 

[Morrus]

Do I understand this that Mongoose makes $14 million?

Based on RocketReach, which said EN Publishing makes $5M annual. Which it does not.

 

[M.T. Black]

My guess for the tier 2 category ($5M - $50M):

• Paizo Inc.
• Chaosium Inc.
• Free League Publishing (Fria Ligan)
• Modiphius Entertainment
• Monte Cook Games?
• Goodman Games?

 

[Morrus]

My guess for the tier 2 category ($5M - $50M):

• Paizo Inc.
• Chaosium Inc.
• Free League Publishing (Fria Ligan)
• Modiphius Entertainment
• Monte Cook Games?
• Goodman Games?

Paizo is in a league that the others are not. The others? Sure, same broad band. With the emphasis on 'broad'.

 

[dead]

It would be interesting to know what figures mean your company is in a healthy position.

For example, the “impression” I get from various posts and comments about Steve Jackson Games is that they can only afford to pay the bills and therefore don’t innovate much on some of their product lines - like GURPS, for example.

But maybe they have a lot of staff to pay and the $5mil gets soaked up.

What level of innovation is there and what amount of new titles released is there of a company like Evil Hat Productions ($500K annual) as compared to the output of a company like Steve Jackson Games ($5 million annual), for example?

 

[Morrus]

It would be interesting to know what figures mean your company is in a healthy position.

For example, the “impression” I get from various posts and comments about Steve Jackson Games is that they can only afford to pay the bills and therefore don’t innovate much on some of their product lines - like GURPS, for example.

But maybe they have a lot of staff to pay and the $5mil gets soaked up.

What level of innovation is there and what amount of new titles released is there of a company like Evil Hat Productions ($500K annual) as compared to the output of a company like Steve Jackson Games ($5 million annual), for example?

Revenue is not a good guide to health. You can have a revenue of millions and be losing money. You can have a revenue of thousands and be making money. Profit is much harder to know if a company does not share that information.