Mercurius
Legend
No, it isn't the Player's Handbook. Nor is it Heroes of the Fallen Lands or even the Rules Compendium. What is it then, you ask?
D&D Insider.
There has been a lot of talk about Essentials and whether or not it is "4.5" or "4.25" or just another series of splat books with new options akin to the Power books. I'd like to take a slightly different route.
D&D Insider is the one and only core rulebook. It includes all the rules in Compendium, all the options of character creation and advancement in Character Builder, and all the monsters in Monster Builder. Eventually we may see Adventure Tools such as Encounter Builder, Adventure Builder, World Builder, NPC Builder, Class Builder, Powers Builder, etc.
What about the dead-tree rulebooks? Well, they are supplements and updates to D&D Insider; the flavor-focused books like the Dark Sun Campaign Guide or Manual of the Planes will not enter DDI, and thus are true supplements. But the crunch-focused books like Psionic Power and Heroes of the Fallen Lands act are more akin to rules updates and add-ons to the core D&D rules as represented by DDI.
DDI is 4E; 4E is DDI. 4E isn't only DDI, but DDI is the core rulebook for 4E. Everything else is subject to being revised, updated, superceded, and even negated by newer material. In some sense DDI is the river of 4E, while the books themselves--the crunch-focused books, at least--are snapshots of the river (the flavor-focused books are more akin to islands in the river, specific configurations and applications of the rules of the river).
Because of this, there is a quite simple (and cheap) starting point or basic package for 4E: You start with a one-month subscription to DDI and buy the Rules Compendium and you're off and running; you have all the monsters and character options and treasure that you need in DDI, and a handy desk reference in the RC. From that point you can specialize in whatever area suits your campaign. If you need DM advice, get the DM's Kit or the two Dungeon Master's Guides. If you want a campaign focused on undead, get Open Grave. If dragons are your thing, the two Draconomicons.
To put it another way, DDI is core - it is the primary rules set, and everything else is secondary (or tertiary).
For better or worse, this is how things are. One positive benefit of this model is that it makes micro-updates to the rules relatively painless; that is, if you have DDI and use it as the primary source for the rules. It even makes larger changes, if not seamless, then at least do-able. It also makes it likely that if and when 5E comes out, for it truly to be "5E" it would have to be significantly different from 4E, at least as different from 4E as 4E was from 3.5E. Why? Because DDI can handle all but the largest of changes and unless there is a drastic change to the core structure of the D&D game, there is no real reason to change the edition. So DDI may extend 4E much longer than we initially thought.
(with the caveat emptor that if WotC does not find a way to continue to make 4E profitable, they might have to reboot in order to keep the D&D line viable; for whatever reason, Dungeons & Dragons as a brand name has not garnered the kind of invincibility that, say, Coca Cola has; all Coca Cola has to do to remain on top is a steady stream of advertisement. They don't really have to make new products; they do, afaik, but they don't have to. Coca Cola simply has to keep the name in the public awareness and the ship will keep sailing. The same is true of D&D to some extent, but what happens is that it booms and then dwindles to a relatively stable core of diehards; what doesn't happen is that it booms and then stays at that level of boom but shrinks back down to a much smaller size; again, afaik).
This also means that we could easily see revised Player's Handbooks and even revisions of other books over the years because they wouldn't be invalidating the core, because the core would shortly reflect any changes that these revised books would offer, and these revised books would be snapshots of the same stream a bit further down, with everything that has happened since--not just errata, but rules modifications, add-ons, etc--integrated into the text. And it would work because the revised book itself would not be the new core, but simply a new expression of the core that has already been revised.
In other words, we're in very different waters than we were with any previous edition. Uncharted waters, really!
D&D Insider.
There has been a lot of talk about Essentials and whether or not it is "4.5" or "4.25" or just another series of splat books with new options akin to the Power books. I'd like to take a slightly different route.
D&D Insider is the one and only core rulebook. It includes all the rules in Compendium, all the options of character creation and advancement in Character Builder, and all the monsters in Monster Builder. Eventually we may see Adventure Tools such as Encounter Builder, Adventure Builder, World Builder, NPC Builder, Class Builder, Powers Builder, etc.
What about the dead-tree rulebooks? Well, they are supplements and updates to D&D Insider; the flavor-focused books like the Dark Sun Campaign Guide or Manual of the Planes will not enter DDI, and thus are true supplements. But the crunch-focused books like Psionic Power and Heroes of the Fallen Lands act are more akin to rules updates and add-ons to the core D&D rules as represented by DDI.
DDI is 4E; 4E is DDI. 4E isn't only DDI, but DDI is the core rulebook for 4E. Everything else is subject to being revised, updated, superceded, and even negated by newer material. In some sense DDI is the river of 4E, while the books themselves--the crunch-focused books, at least--are snapshots of the river (the flavor-focused books are more akin to islands in the river, specific configurations and applications of the rules of the river).
Because of this, there is a quite simple (and cheap) starting point or basic package for 4E: You start with a one-month subscription to DDI and buy the Rules Compendium and you're off and running; you have all the monsters and character options and treasure that you need in DDI, and a handy desk reference in the RC. From that point you can specialize in whatever area suits your campaign. If you need DM advice, get the DM's Kit or the two Dungeon Master's Guides. If you want a campaign focused on undead, get Open Grave. If dragons are your thing, the two Draconomicons.
To put it another way, DDI is core - it is the primary rules set, and everything else is secondary (or tertiary).
For better or worse, this is how things are. One positive benefit of this model is that it makes micro-updates to the rules relatively painless; that is, if you have DDI and use it as the primary source for the rules. It even makes larger changes, if not seamless, then at least do-able. It also makes it likely that if and when 5E comes out, for it truly to be "5E" it would have to be significantly different from 4E, at least as different from 4E as 4E was from 3.5E. Why? Because DDI can handle all but the largest of changes and unless there is a drastic change to the core structure of the D&D game, there is no real reason to change the edition. So DDI may extend 4E much longer than we initially thought.
(with the caveat emptor that if WotC does not find a way to continue to make 4E profitable, they might have to reboot in order to keep the D&D line viable; for whatever reason, Dungeons & Dragons as a brand name has not garnered the kind of invincibility that, say, Coca Cola has; all Coca Cola has to do to remain on top is a steady stream of advertisement. They don't really have to make new products; they do, afaik, but they don't have to. Coca Cola simply has to keep the name in the public awareness and the ship will keep sailing. The same is true of D&D to some extent, but what happens is that it booms and then dwindles to a relatively stable core of diehards; what doesn't happen is that it booms and then stays at that level of boom but shrinks back down to a much smaller size; again, afaik).
This also means that we could easily see revised Player's Handbooks and even revisions of other books over the years because they wouldn't be invalidating the core, because the core would shortly reflect any changes that these revised books would offer, and these revised books would be snapshots of the same stream a bit further down, with everything that has happened since--not just errata, but rules modifications, add-ons, etc--integrated into the text. And it would work because the revised book itself would not be the new core, but simply a new expression of the core that has already been revised.
In other words, we're in very different waters than we were with any previous edition. Uncharted waters, really!
