Quote from: HappyDaze on May 21, 2021, 07:28:10 AM

Quote from: Jam The MF on May 20, 2021, 11:57:40 PM
I bet the people who buy 5 or more 5E books, are predominantly 40+ years old.

Are you specifically referring to the hard copies of the books? If so, then I'm more inclined to agree with you.

Yes, hardcovers.  Post edited, to reflect that now.

I suspect they are getting their "D&D Community" stats from online subscriptions and/or Adventurer's League, which would explain why it skews younger. I see a number of news articles that line up with the graphic, but nothing that gives any more detail about the source of the numbers.

They wouldn't have stats on the ages of people buying paper books, though they would have some idea about how paper books sales overlap with and/or compare to online subscriptions.

From in-person play at local conventions, my experience is that there are still plenty of older players - but then, I don't know that in-person convention play is any more representative of the overall market than online play. My son plays D&D in college with a bunch of his classmates, and based on the number of college games, I believe that it is experiencing a surge of popularity in younger players - but maybe not to the extent implied by the numbers there.

Younger players have more time to play.  I'm certain that some young players are very active in the hobby.  They want to belong to a social community, and D&D offers that.

Many people dance to the music, but someone must pay the band.  Who is shelling out the money to support the hobby?  They are the superfans, of D&D.

Quote from: Steven Mitchell on May 21, 2021, 08:53:56 AM
I know several young people that have gotten into D&D 5E.  Every last one of them got into the game initially by playing in a game with someone older.  Of course that is not a representative sample.

Sure. And as the new players become old players, they will be the one to pass on the game to new young players.

I mean, obvious the people you know will be biased to be closer to your age, as a generalization. There are 35 year olds teaching 20 year olds to play right now, like you probably did when you were 35, right?

Are these stats coming from the surveys they do over on dnd.wizards.com?  If so, the numbers are biased to folks who bother to follow that site.  From time to time I catch they are doing one in a redit thread and give them make stuff more like AD&D answers.

I do have 5e, but really don't follow the constant march to more firmly establishing it as a woke medieval super-heroes game.

Quote from: Palleon on May 21, 2021, 04:09:19 PM...a woke medieval super-heroes game.

And that's what I feel like I'm playing when I get involved with 5E for the most part.

Quote from: Dropbear on May 22, 2021, 05:52:49 AM

Quote from: Palleon on May 21, 2021, 04:09:19 PM...a woke medieval super-heroes game.

And that's what I feel like I'm playing when I get involved with 5E for the most part.

I hear ya, and I do not support their recent contributions to the industry. At least the core books, and especially the Basic Rules, leave the non-gaming shit at the door.

Quote from: Mistwell on May 19, 2021, 04:25:57 PM

I'm in the D&D UK Facebook group, where the majority of posts are new players looking for a game, and new GMs looking for advice. People often give their age, and/or age & gender can be deduced from their pics. I'd say WoTC's listed demographics above closely match the demographics of new, never-played-before gamers (and would be gamers), including a small but substantial number of newbies aged 40+; I have several of these in my own online and IRL game groups - people who started playing after 40. The Facebook posters probably skew more female than the WoTC numbers, but I think that's an artefact of social media. Female posters certainly get more and more positive responses to requests for help.

I can believe that a survey on D&D Beyond gets similar numbers. But they're not capturing gamers who don't engage with the surveys. The idea that only 13% of ALL D&D players are over 40 is just laughable IMO. Sure it's not the 60%+ you might get if you surveyed message boards like this one, ENW, rpgnet et al - these definitely skew vastly older (and vastly more male). Reality has to be in between.

Quote from: FingerRod on May 22, 2021, 10:07:41 AM
I hear ya, and I do not support their recent contributions to the industry. At least the core books, and especially the Basic Rules, leave the non-gaming shit at the door.

Just as with Paizo it's best to avoid material published 2012 or later (except the Runelords reprint hardback), I think there is a cutoff point where 5e D&D goes definitively Woke and should be avoided.
Looking at the lists here https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Dungeons_%26_Dragons_rulebooks I'd suggest mid 2018 as the cutoff. That puts Mordenkainen's Tome of Foes before the cutoff, Waterdeep: Dragon Heist after the cutoff. I think the latter was a clear indicator of WoTC going Full Woke ("Fully Converged") under Crawford.

It says "the brand" -- 5e is the first time we have seen a DnD brand that goes into mediums outside of traditional tabletop and forays into video games.

Also -- "We haven no idea about the numbers of the TSR era, but our are better!"

If 5e is truly the most played edition, I find it appalling the lack of support they're giving all of these new players. Where's the epic 1-20 campaign? What about DM aids, like tiles? Instead they get these theme splatbooks.

Quote from: Jam The MF on May 21, 2021, 01:23:51 PM
Younger players have more time to play.

Quite true ... for now. We've come to that point in history when grognards are hitting retirement age en masse.

Quote from: horsesoldier on July 19, 2021, 01:00:06 PM
It says "the brand" -- 5e is the first time we have seen a DnD brand that goes into mediums outside of traditional tabletop and forays into video games.

I still remember a video (since deleted) of a "Secrets of TSR" panel in a PaizoCon with guys like Jeff Grubb, Stan!, Dave Gross, Wolfgang Baur and others.

In one of the segments, they talk about how close D&D was to having a movie produced by James Cameron. The reason it didn't happen? Lorraine, yes the witch herself, antagonized James Cameron when he made it clear he wanted to produce instead of direct, and that he wanted his special effects pal to direct it. His special effects pal? 4-time Oscar winner Stan Winston (if you think the live action dinos in Jurassic Park were great, think about what his dragons might have looked like).

Cameron was so pissed off by how he was treated by Lorraine that he rage quit a meeting, pulled Winston out with him, and never again was D&D close to getting a mainstream director interested in a movie project.

Quote from: Samsquantch on February 23, 2021, 12:48:50 PM

Quote from: robh on February 23, 2021, 12:33:11 PM

Quote from: TJS on February 10, 2021, 07:22:15 PM
Edit: I've seen some of this spilling over into live games.  I've seen several GMs run 5e by printing out battlemap size maps of dungeons, cutting them up and progressively laying them out as the party move around with the miniatures never leaving the table.

You say that like it's a bad thing 
I am a huge fan of figures on the table for RPGs but prefer one of the modular 2.5D or 3D dungeon terrain sets to maps.

And that is how I came to own three 3d printers... I couldn't justify buying Dwarven Forge stuff anymore.

I got a big box of Dwarven Forge blocks at a garage sale for a hilariously low price and I quickly deduced that the girlfriend made her dude sell them and this was close to when the first kickstarter delivered so...I may go to hell for taking part in that brutal shit-test emasculation ritual. Poor dude. His face said it all.

Quote from: palaeomerus on July 19, 2021, 05:47:17 PM

Quote from: Samsquantch on February 23, 2021, 12:48:50 PM

Quote from: robh on February 23, 2021, 12:33:11 PM

Quote from: TJS on February 10, 2021, 07:22:15 PM
Edit: I've seen some of this spilling over into live games.  I've seen several GMs run 5e by printing out battlemap size maps of dungeons, cutting them up and progressively laying them out as the party move around with the miniatures never leaving the table.

You say that like it's a bad thing 
I am a huge fan of figures on the table for RPGs but prefer one of the modular 2.5D or 3D dungeon terrain sets to maps.

And that is how I came to own three 3d printers... I couldn't justify buying Dwarven Forge stuff anymore.

I got a big box of Dwarven Forge blocks at a garage sale for a hilariously low price and I quickly deduced that the girlfriend made her dude sell them and this was close to when the first kickstarter delivered so...I may go to hell for taking part in that brutal shit-test emasculation ritual. Poor dude. His face said it all.

He should have put his foot down, and said hell no!!!

Quote from: horsesoldier on July 19, 2021, 01:00:06 PM
It says "the brand" -- 5e is the first time we have seen a DnD brand that goes into mediums outside of traditional tabletop and forays into video games.

Also -- "We haven no idea about the numbers of the TSR era, but our are better!"

If 5e is truly the most played edition, I find it appalling the lack of support they're giving all of these new players. Where's the epic 1-20 campaign? What about DM aids, like tiles? Instead they get these theme splatbooks.

Uh, they revised the tiles way back in 2018 and can be found under the title, "D&D DUNGEON TILES REINCARNATED" . There are tons of other accessories too. Have you never been to a Barnes and Noble and looked at their RPG section? And there are tons of epic campaigns. Though a lot of additional support for them is through DMsGuild.