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Don't know how big, but I found this looking for answers on the internet.
Freeform chatroom gaming; harry potter/LOTR style.
Nope, I can't find any info on sales numbers for individual books but I did find an article that stated that the publishing industry a few years ago went private with this kind of stuff and considers print runs and numbers sold to be proprietary information. So you have to pay to know the numbers or be a part of the industry to find out more.
its bigger than a bread box
Don't know how big, but I found this looking for answers on the internet.
Freeform chatroom gaming; harry potter/LOTR style.
Good link, Heathy. It's been a while since I read Trollsmyth. I can't help but think that such activities can easily lead to rpging, pen and pencil style...at least, the way some of us play it.
DUNNO, take the numbers from GenCon Attendance and multiply them by the arbitrary number of say...200...
Seriously? I would say under a million...
Chief Technical Officer
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Nope, I can't find any info on sales numbers for individual books but I did find an article that stated that the publishing industry a few years ago went private with this kind of stuff and considers print runs and numbers sold to be proprietary information. So you have to pay to know the numbers or be a part of the industry to find out more.
Our industry does indeed generally keep print run sizes private, but you can't even pay to find out the answer, as there's not actually any one party that has the whole picture.
Part of that is because there are a number of different distribution outlets for products in our industry. The three big ones, at least for Paizo, are direct sales (for us, that means paizo.com), hobby (which means all of the game stores and other mostly small hobby retailers out there), and book trade (which means all of the big chain stores and many of the surviving mom-and-pop bookstores).
Now, there is a consolidated source for book trade sales; it's called Bookscan. Startlingly few people seem to have access to this data, but is very accurate for its market segment. It is not, however, even close to accurate as an overview of the industry as a whole.
For hobby distribution, there are a number of different distributors, and they do not generally share sales figures with the public, or with each other.
Finally, since nobody has to share any information on direct distribution with anyone outside of their company, it's the least documented. Each company knows what they sell directly, and nobody else really does.
Shortly after Wizards acquired TSR, they spent a lot of money on a massive market survey which gave them probably the best single overview of the market that this industry has ever had; however, that information wasn't released publicly, and it's now hopelessly out of date. I don't see anybody who's likely to bother undertaking that effort again anytime soon.
The upshot of this is that no one source has a complete picture of the industry, and I guarantee you that anybody who tells you any different is missing at least some part of the picture.
Seriously? I would say under a million...
While I'm in the dark as much as anyone I can be pretty certain that a million is way, way, to small. One number I did see was that WotCs advertising budget just for the run up to the release of 4E was 2.4 million. So if they are spending that much on advertising alone in one year (admittedly a big year) the market must be a heck of a lot larger then a million.
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It's probably a bit smaller then the actual number of people playing in the Pen and Paper market.
I'm sorry to say it but RPGers are getting quite the record of being rather stingy gamers. People not wanting to pay retail for books, for expansion books, for miniatures or other gaming supplies as a whole.
A lot of the newer players and a lot of the older players too seem rather content to head into a shop and play with one single player's handbook style book between 5 people and even then they bought it on Amazon. :(
Obviously that's not everyone, but the book collectors are probably outnumbered by the players who don't even bother to pick up a rulebook.
Also not saying that you should rush out and buy the complete book of pixie faeries or the like, but if your an RPGer you should at least own your own dice, pen and pencil set, paper and a copy of the rulebook needed to play the game. -.-
Well, I can say that I bought the new PRPG as did 5 of my friends and we bought bestiaries and 2 of us got the campaign setting for golarion and one of us has a subscription to the chronicles and AP... so now you've got a few numbers from Denmark, let's hear from everybody else and you can start adding up the numbers! :D
I know that at one point WotC said that they estimated that 20 million people had played D&D in its lifepsan, but if that's 20 million since the mid-1970s that's still rather a vague amount. And it's hard to tell if there's a substantially larger market now than there was then.
I know that at one point WotC said that they estimated that 20 million people had played D&D in its lifepsan, but if that's 20 million since the mid-1970s that's still rather a vague amount. And it's hard to tell if there's a substantially larger market now than there was then.
Recent court filings mentioned that WotC holds the number of current players of D&D at around 6 million. I'd say the tabletop RPG market probably stretches 1 or 2 million beyond that, accounting for those who player other RPGs but don't play D&D.
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Director of Brand Strategy
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I know that at one point WotC said that they estimated that 20 million people had played D&D in its lifepsan, but if that's 20 million since the mid-1970s that's still rather a vague amount. And it's hard to tell if there's a substantially larger market now than there was then.Recent court filings mentioned that WotC holds the number of current players of D&D at around 6 million. I'd say the tabletop RPG market probably stretches 1 or 2 million beyond that, accounting for those who player other RPGs but don't play D&D.
I wonder if that figure accounts for people playing the current edition of D&D, any edition or D&D, or any derivation thereof. Knowing corporate doublespeak (and this isn't unique to WotC or Hasbro), they would want to stretch whatever numbers they have as much as possible to increase their apparent damages in court. Hows that for irony if they only count players of previous editions as their customers when it conveniences them.
I know that at one point WotC said that they estimated that 20 million people had played D&D in its lifepsan, but if that's 20 million since the mid-1970s that's still rather a vague amount. And it's hard to tell if there's a substantially larger market now than there was then.Recent court filings mentioned that WotC holds the number of current players of D&D at around 6 million. I'd say the tabletop RPG market probably stretches 1 or 2 million beyond that, accounting for those who player other RPGs but don't play D&D.
I'd say more than that. A lot of people play WoD and I imagine they're picking up more players now with the vampire craze that's going on at the moment. WoD by itself surely has to be at the 1 million + market, and that's not even counting everyone else (including Paizo)?
I'd say more than that. A lot of people play WoD and I imagine they're picking up more players now with the vampire craze that's going on at the moment. WoD by itself surely has to be at the 1 million + market, and that's not even counting everyone else (including Paizo)?I know that at one point WotC said that they estimated that 20 million people had played D&D in its lifepsan, but if that's 20 million since the mid-1970s that's still rather a vague amount. And it's hard to tell if there's a substantially larger market now than there was then.Recent court filings mentioned that WotC holds the number of current players of D&D at around 6 million. I'd say the tabletop RPG market probably stretches 1 or 2 million beyond that, accounting for those who player other RPGs but don't play D&D.
Still its not a matter of just picking up some players - the players have to not play D&D and, I suspect, that most players of other RPG games also play D&D. Certainly they may not play it regularly and it may well not be their choice game but they usually at least know how to play.
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I have occasionally run across players who have not played Dungeons and Dragons, but are pen and paper role players. In each case they were women, and they were playing some sort of Vampire game. at the time i think it was called Vampire the Masquerade.
I still wonder how many pen and paper role player gamers are out there. I also wonder if our numbers are shrinking or growing.
From my anecdotal experience, it would seem the numbers are relatively stable. When i lived in New York city, i was involved in three gaming groups two groups of five people, and one group of 8 people. The two smaller groups have broken up. Out of those two groups of five people, I can say two including myself are still gaming. Two left D&D for WoW because they didn't like 4.0 D&D and the other six left because of life work etc. The larger group is still active. they play a variety of games from Vampire the Masquerade, Starwars D6, some wild west games, and 3.5 D&D. they are thinking of switching to pathfinder.
Up here in Vermont, i am involved in two gaming groups. One has about 6 people in it. we are playing 3.5 D&D. i am hoping to nudge people to play Pathfinder. The other fluxuates between 4 and 12. Its in a game store, and you never know how many people will show up. In the game store game, the majority of players are between 14 and 20 years old. We are playiing Pathfinder, after giving 4.0 a go when it came out. There are also two other groups who meet in the game store, with similar numbers around 8 players on average. One plays 3.5 D&D and the other warhammer.
I have seen some people leave the hobby, but at this game store, new kids are coming into the hobby.
So I'm not sure if the number of people involved with pen and paper role playing games is growing or shrinking, Nor how many people there are playing Role playing games.