Cost of D&D Editions, then and now

[Klaus]

In each case I've only included the minimum required to play the game. Otherwise, you inevitably get bogged down in comparisons over what is "like for like" - the 1st Ed PHB, for example, has fewer classes than the 3e version, is black and white vs full colour, etc. (Conversely, the 1st Ed DMG is more essential for play than the equivalent volume in any edition since.)

In the case of the MC volumes, MC1 was comparable to the 1st Ed MM in terms of page count, although having one monster per page probably meant fewer monsters in total. But adding MC2 means it very definitely has more than the 1st Ed equivalent.

So, it's a tricky one. I don't think any perfect like-for-like comparison can ever really be made.

I'd go with the "three initial books" for each edition, in whatever form they'd take. For 2e, that'd be PHB, DMG and MC 1 + 2. For Essentials, It'd be the HoFR, HoFK, DMK and MV.

 

[adamc]

No, but telling the "Here's the starter set for you - and it's only 20$" might.

That depends what's in the box. The 4e starter box was pretty skimpy as far as content or usefulness goes.

 

[adamc]

In the long run, it doesn't matter. All that matters is whether a given book is attractive enough to a given buyer to persuade them to buy it for the price shown. Stats like this are interesting, but they're not going to make any difference when someone's in the store looking at the book.

I think economics suggests otherwise. Sure, some people aren't very price sensitive, but others (likely including newcomers) are more so.

My guess is that Wizards' has considered all this and believes that an expensive ($50) book with nice graphics will sell better than a cheaper book with less artwork. I don't care much for their artwork, so I'd favor the latter, but I'm willing to believe they know their market.

I think they need to provide a good online option that passes some of the cost-savings to the customer. I'd go for that.

 

[Morrus]

I think economics suggests otherwise. Sure, some people aren't very price sensitive, but others (likely including newcomers) are more so.

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That's not what I said. I was referring to graphs about historical prices.

 

[adamc]

That's not what I said. I was referring to graphs about historical prices.

Sorry to have misunderstood. I agree that historical prices, while interesting, won't have any real effect.

 

[Umbran]

In the long run, it doesn't matter. All that matters is whether a given book is attractive enough to a given buyer to persuade them to buy it for the price shown. Stats like this are interesting, but they're not going to make any difference when someone's in the store looking at the book.

The stats don't matter, in the sense that very few buyers will look at the stats and have them influence their buying decisions.

But, the stats can give us perspective on whether buyers will find it attractive enough. Forget the stated price of the book, how much does it cost, relative to other things we buy? How hard was it for us to scrape together the cost of a book in the past, as opposed to how hard it'd be today?

 

[Mercurius]

What would be interesting - a bit of unfounded optimism here - is if the 5e PHB is like the BD&D Rules Cyclopedia, the 5e DMG is like a meaty modern version of Gary Gygax's 1e DMG, and the 5e MM#1 was like the best of all the monster manuals combined (with interesting stats, ecology, monster harvesting, lairs for the most iconic monsters). That would be very nice

This is such a great idea--and I share your hope (if not optimism)--that it deserves re-mentioning.

You could buy a 4e boxed set (PHB/DMG/MM) from amazon for 67$ for something like 2-3 years after launch. I do note that you have used the retail price, but how relevant is that price? For any buyers, the lowest price you can regularily get an item for, is what's relevant in my opinion. I am assuming that people shop around a little, but I might be mistaken?

You can buy 1E rulebooks for a couple of dollars on eBay, 40 years after launch. Here's a 3E PHB for £11. I think the only sensible way to approach it is to use MSRP on the launch date. Otherwise the discussion just becomes very silly very quickly.

Not really. At the risk of belaboring Blackbrrd's point, its an important one. IIRC, until the ubiquity of the internet in the mid-90s there were no, or very few, discount options for books, so a cover price was what you actually payed most of the time, unless it was a bestseller or on sale for some other reason. D&D books were bought in game stores and big book stores and were rarely discounted. But for the last 15-20 years, we've had Amazon etc, and "MSRPs" only exist for in-store purchases. I'm guessing that the large majority of 5E PHBs will be purchased on Amazon or some other discounted option, so in a sense the net prices have gone down with 3E and 4E.

 

[delericho]

Not really. At the risk of belaboring Blackbrrd's point, its an important one. IIRC, until the ubiquity of the internet in the mid-90s there were no, or very few, discount options for books, so a cover price was what you actually payed most of the time, unless it was a bestseller or on sale for some other reason. D&D books were bought in game stores and big book stores and were rarely discounted. But for the last 15-20 years, we've had Amazon etc, and "MSRPs" only exist for in-store purchases.

While that's true, you can never be certain of getting a discount nor can you be certain how much of a discount you will receive. As such, any attempt to do a comparison based on a discounted price is a fool's game - you're trying to do a comparison with a moving target.

The MSRP is really the only fixed value that allows a comparison to even be made. Using the MSRP instead of the "real price" may reduce the value of the comparison, but without it there's no comparison to be made.

 

[delericho]

I've updated the OP with the figures for Essentials, and have added caveats about the selection of monsters in 2nd Ed's MC1 and about the selection of classes in Essentials - in both cases, a strong argument can be made that you should add an additional product to get a set for comparison.

(I haven't added those additional products to the calculated totals, though, because the games are playable without.)

 

[Alphastream]

I've updated the OP with the figures for Essentials, and have added caveats about the selection of monsters in 2nd Ed's MC1 and about the selection of classes in Essentials - in both cases, a strong argument can be made that you should add an additional product to get a set for comparison.

Very cool. Could you add in a DMG type book for Pathfinder, for comparison of "three books"? I would argue that the 3E DMG wasn't really needed either, but a 3-core set seems like the right method of comparison across editions.