Quote from: Bloody Stupid Johnson;397058I'm not going to say anything bad about WOTC on this thread btw - since I appreciate ggroy probably split off the thread to avoid derailment by flamewar.
Slightly off topic but how do the print run figures line up with the quoted figures of "1.5 million active players"? Its generally assumed that's 4E players, which would have to mean that many 4E PHBs were sold, at a minimum? Possibly more, given people that bought the PHB may still not be playing.

Hasn't that number pretty much always been how many active D&D players they have bandied about since late 2e or so?

The previous "naive" analysis assumes that gaming groups actually own and used the real actual hardcover PHB1 books at one point.  The analysis will be off if there are a significant number of groups which only use 4E pdfs, whether legit or pirated.

For example, if as high as half of the gaming groups are actually using pirated pdfs without buying any real hardcover 4E books, then the case of selling only 100k or 250k PHB1 books may actually have some meaning.  For the B=125k case (ie. 125,000 core books) the P/B ratio is 12, which means two average gaming groups (ie. 12 people) only have one copy of the real hardcover 4E PHB1 core book.  In such a case, one of the two groups could be playing 4E perfectly fine with legit or pirated pdfs of the 4E PHB1 (with nobody buying a real hardcover 4E PHB1).

EDIT:  If this analysis has any substance, perhaps it may partially explain WotC's yanking of the pdfs back in early/mid-2009.

Quote from: Captain Rufus;397064Hasn't that number pretty much always been how many active D&D players they have bandied about since late 2e or so?

There was a 2.25 million active monthly players figure, which dates back to WotC's marketing research study from 1999.

http://www.seankreynolds.com/rpgfiles/gaming/WotCMarketResearchSummary.html

Let's take a closer look at the ICv2 article,

http://www.icv2.com/articles/news/12654.html

in regards to the statement:

Quote from: Published: 05/30/2008 12:00amA WotC spokesperson has informed ICv2 that Dungeons & Dragons 4th Edition has already gone back to press more than a week before its scheduled street date next Friday, June 6th.  Sell-in of 4th Edition has “far exceeded expectations” and even though the initial print run for 4th Edition was 50% higher than the order for the previous D&D 3.5 Edition, WotC has now realized that it is necessary to go back to press to meet anticipated reorder demand.

Notice that they mentioned 3.5E and not 3E.  If they had indeed printed up at least 300,000 copies of the 4E PHB1, most likely they would have mentioned 3E and not 3.5E.  (They probably would have also done a "we beat Ryan Dancey's ass" party dance).  

Recall that Ryan Dancey likes to brag about selling 300,000 copies of the 3E PHB1 in 30 days back in August 2000.

http://rpgpundit.xanga.com/698172157/item/?page=1&jump=1482254924#1482254924

So if we take 300,000 as the upper limit of the possible number of 4E PHB1 books printed in April/May 2008, then the statement "50% higher than the order for the previous D&D 3.5 Edition" could mean that the upper limit of the "order of 3.5E books" is 200,000.

One could ask what exactly is this "order of 3.5E books" and when did it happen.  The nature of the ICv2 article suggests most likely it is the first printing of the 3.5E PHB1 back in mid-2003 (ie. July 2003).

In another post, Ryan Dancey asserts that the 3.5E PHB1 sold 100,000 copies (or more) in 2003.  (Scroll to the bottom of the page in the link).

http://indie-rpgs.com/archive/index.php?topic=11075.msg%msg_id%

With these two pieces of information, the 3.5E PHB1 probably had 100,000 to 200,000 copies printed as its first printing in mid-2003.


Let's reverse things and start off with Ryan Dancey's lower limit of 100,000 copies of the 3.5E PHB1 being printed in mid-2003 as the first printing.  The ICv2 article statement of "50% higher than the order for the previous D&D 3.5 Edition" now means that the first printing of the 4E PHB1 (before the "necessary to go back to press" phase), consisted of 150,000 copies.

The number of copies of the 4E PHB1 printed in the "necessary to go back to press" phase, is unknown at this point.

With the numbers calculated so far, one could infer that the number of 4E PHB1 printed in the first printing (April/May 2008), is probably between 150,000 and 300,000.  The 300,000 copies figure would correspond to the case where the "necessary to go back to press" phase produced exactly zero additional copies of the 4E PHB1 (ie. 200,000 copies with an additional 50% added in gives 300,000 copies).


Within these constraints, the sets of "print numbers" which follows the logic of the ICv2 article are:

- "the initial print run for 4th Edition was 50% higher than the order for the previous D&D 3.5 Edition"

3.5E PHB1 first print run = 100,000
initial 4E PHB1 print run = 100,000 + 0.50*(100,000) = 150,000

3.5E PHB1 first print run = 110,000
initial 4E PHB1 print run = 110,000 + 0.50*(110,000) = 165,000

3.5E PHB1 first print run = 120,000
initial 4E PHB1 print run = 180,000

3.5E PHB1 first print run = 130,000
initial 4E PHB1 print run = 195,000

3.5E PHB1 first print run = 140,000
initial 4E PHB1 print run = 210,000

3.5E PHB1 first print run = 150,000
initial 4E PHB1 print run = 225,000

3.5E PHB1 first print run = 160,000
initial 4E PHB1 print run = 240,000

3.5E PHB1 first print run = 170,000
initial 4E PHB1 print run = 255,000

3.5E PHB1 first print run = 180,000
initial 4E PHB1 print run = 270,000

3.5E PHB1 first print run = 190,000
initial 4E PHB1 print run = 285,000

3.5E PHB1 first print run = 200,000
initial 4E PHB1 print run = 300,000

QuoteNotice that they mentioned 3.5E and not 3E. If they had indeed printed up at least 300,000 copies of the 4E PHB1, most likely they would have mentioned 3E and not 3.5E. (They probably would have also done a "we beat Ryan Dancey's ass" party dance).

Ummm...Mearls essentially did the "we beat Ryan Dancey's ass" party on his blog.  3.5 did in fact print more than 3.0.

QuotePrint run size:

3.0 < 3.5 < 4e

.

Also, you are ignoring the Amazon data.  There are fairly good (and long) descriptions of how to count estimated print runs based on Amazon data for ranking over a period of time.  I think some folks did the calculation, and also came out with higher numbers than either 3.5 or 3.0.

Finally, we have this:

QuoteBill Slavicsek wrote:From a business perspective, the core rulebooks are already well into their third printing, the H1 and H2 adventures are both in reprint. The new Dungeon Tiles product, DU1 Halls of the Giant Kings, is almost gone from our inventory less than one month after going on sale. This means that, using the current trends, we’re going to crush our original projections for 4th Edition in 2008!

My recollection from others that did this estimate is that the 4.0 PHB sold over 500,000 copies after the second print run.

Quote from: Mistwell;397073I could have sworn someone from WOTC said the first print of PHB 1 of 3.5 was larger than the first print of PHB 1 of 3.0.

Link?

Quote from: Mistwell;397073Also, you are ignoring the Amazon data.  There are fairly good (and long) descriptions of how to count estimated print runs based on Amazon data for ranking over a period of time.

Link?

Quote from: Mistwell;397073Finally, we have this:

It would be nice to see actual real copies of the third printings of 4E PHB1 and 4E DMG1.  So far I have not been able to verify either one's existence.

Quote from: Mistwell;397073Ummm...Mearls essentially did the "we beat Ryan Dancey's ass" party on his blog.  3.5 did in fact print more than 3.0.

QuotePrint run size:

3.0 < 3.5 < 4e

Mike Mearls' numbers for the 3E printings, from 2004:

http://indie-rpgs.com/archive/index.php?topic=11075.msg%msg_id%

Quote from: Mike Mearls in 2004- 3e PHB at between 700,000 and 800,000
- 300,000 to 400,000 DMGs
- 200,000 to 300,000 MMs

If we take Mearls at his word, he is asserting that on 2008-05-30, more than 700,000 to 800,000 copies of the 4E core books were published.

EDIT:  If what Mearls meant was the 4E "core books" as the PHB1/DMG1/MM1, then his assertion of "3 < 3.5 < 4e" implies that more than 1.2 million to 1.5 million copies of the 4E core books were publish by 2008-05-30.  This is in contradiction with the early/mid-2009 WotC lawsuit documents which allegedly asserts that the 4E core books sold in the hundreds of thousands.  (I haven't been able to find the lawsuit links to verify for sure.  I'll try to do it later).

Quote from: Mistwell;397073My recollection from others that did this estimate is that the 4.0 PHB sold over 500,000 copies after the second print run.

Link?

I do not have a link to the full Amazon information, or the 500K speculation.  But, it was just someone doing what you are doing, not someone from WOTC.  I believe it was at EnWorld, but I am not certain.  I know it involved a large compilation of Amazon data and it was not perfect.  It was just a means to give some best and worst case scenarios, not a firm average.

As far as what Mearls meant by that print run statement, I thought at the time he meant just PHB1 for each edition but I could be wrong.  Maybe he did mean core? Or maybe he is comparing first prints to first prints? The statement is a bit vague.

I would not be shocked to find the 4e core sold 850K, but printed 1.2M, though my instincts tell me those numbers are high.

Quote from: Mistwell;397079I do not have a link to the full Amazon information, or the 500K speculation.  But, it was just someone doing what you are doing, not someone from WOTC.

The 500k speculation I don't recall offhand.

I vaguely remember something about doing counts on amazon.  I'll have to do some searching to find it again.

Quote from: ggroy;397065The previous "naive" analysis assumes that gaming groups actually own and used the real actual hardcover PHB1 books at one point.  The analysis will be off if there are a significant number of groups which only use 4E pdfs, whether legit or pirated.

For example, if as high as half of the gaming groups are actually using pirated pdfs without buying any real hardcover 4E books, then the case of selling only 100k or 250k PHB1 books may actually have some meaning.  For the B=125k case (ie. 125,000 core books) the P/B ratio is 12, which means two average gaming groups (ie. 12 people) only have one copy of the real hardcover 4E PHB1 core book.  In such a case, one of the two groups could be playing 4E perfectly fine with legit or pirated pdfs of the 4E PHB1 (with nobody buying a real hardcover 4E PHB1).

EDIT:  If this analysis has any substance, perhaps it may partially explain WotC's yanking of the pdfs back in early/mid-2009.

Probably to determine # active players they would have used PHB sales, adding in a multiplier for book-sharers and pdf moochers. Its probably only useful as an "upper limit" figure for sales - though they could also have applied a reduction for purchasers who don't play, so there's a fair bit of latitude either way.

Quote from: Mistwell;397079As far as what Mearls meant by that print run statement, I thought at the time he meant just PHB1 for each edition but I could be wrong.  Maybe he did mean core? Or maybe he is comparing first prints to first prints? The statement is a bit vague.

Noticed Mearls didn't answer your question on the "3 < 3.5 < 4e" comment, about print run details specifics.

Quote from: Bloody Stupid Johnson;397081Probably to determine # active players they would have used PHB sales, adding in a multiplier for book-sharers and pdf moochers. Its probably only useful as an "upper limit" figure for sales - though they could also have applied a reduction for purchasers who don't play, so there's a fair bit of latitude either way.

That "fudge factor" multiplier, is probably quite difficult to determine in general.

Found this link for calculating weekly sales from ranking - there probably are better sites out there though, and it wouldn't surprise me if someone on EnWorld or RPGnet might already have done the full calculations.

http://www.fonerbooks.com/surfing.htm