D&D 5E Initial D&D Next Releases Showing Up on Barnes & Noble Website

[Ahnehnois]

As with any value proposition, there's price and then there's what you get for paying it. If $150 gets you a complete game, supported by an OGL and SRD, and a game that's actually good-well-researched, well-written, high production values, and so on-then it's more than worth it. Otherwise, it's really not worth anything at all, because there are extant games that do meet those criteria.

 

[delericho]

3e was, IIRC, released all at once...

3.0e was released one book per month. The first printing of the PHB included a small number of monsters (and, I think, magic items) to tide you over until the other books were out. 3.5e was released all at once.

if we call the three volumes "all" - 3e also began the Splatbook trend...

Well, provided we redefine 'began' - after all, 2nd Edition had splatbooks for each individual class and each individual race (except Gnomes and Halflings, who got half of one each).

 

[Dausuul]

I'd still like to know where all this "staggered launch" talk is coming from.

 

[delericho]

I'd still like to know where all this "staggered launch" talk is coming from.

It's an assumption based on there being a placeholder for the PHB but none for the DMG or MM. Which is, of course, a big assumption. (In fact, even the existence of the DMG and MM is an assumption at this point, although that does seem very likely - rather more likely, IMO, than a staggered release.)

 

[I'm A Banana]

O'course, just because the price is "reasonable" doesn't mean that it's worth it for everyone.

If you're having fun with 4e or a retro-clone or Pathfinder or indie games or whatever, it might not be something you'd be interested in up-front. D&D 5e has a significant amount of healthy competition out there.

The price isn't ridiculous, but y'know, you can't sell a steak dinner to a vegan at any price.

 

[Lord_Blacksteel]

BECMI was released one letter at a time, I believe.

It was, but it covered everything you needed for a set range of levels in each box - races/classes, monsters, magic items, DM advice, etc. Call it a "layered" approach where each release stacked on to the previous vs. AD&D's model (and the main one ever since then) of a "silo-ed" approach of separate books for players and DM's that covered all possible levels in each book.

It would be really interesting to try the BECMI approach today. Beyond just changing things up it would give the designers a chance to ensure that the basic mechanics were sound before moving to the next tier of play. I would love to see that.

3e was, IIRC, released all at once ... 3e also began the Splatbook trend,

3.0 was one book a month. 3.5 may have been different, but 3.0 was staggered. It's debatable whether it began in 1E AD&D (Unearther Arcana? Survival Guides?) but splat books were all over 2nd Edition - see the "Complete Book of X" series that was all over the place back then.

as was 4e (if we call the three volumes "all" - while 4e removed several elements from the core rules with the expectation of future PHB's and DMG's bringing many back and otherwise growing the game).

Yes 4E gave us multiple PHB's and DMG's AND splat books for classes (well, power sources), continuing the trend from 3E. I expect we will see more of that with the new edition too.

A staggered launch wasn't the most recent approach, but it's hardly historically unprecedented.

Very true. I don't think we can tell form this discovery alone which approach is being used this time.

 

[Cadence]

What about $130?

That's what the Pathfinder Core Rulebook, Gamemastery Guide, and Bestiary cost, in total -- and what they have cost since their release in 2009-2010. If you assume an equivalent value between the D&D5 PHB and Pathfinder Core Rulebook, thanks to inflation you're actually getting a $5 discount on the PHB.

The Bestiary is as critical to Pathfinder play as the Monster Manual is to D&D. You could argue that the Gamemastery Guide is not as important, but the D&D4 Dungeon Master Guide served a similar purpose -- the PHB contained all the rules needed for play.

This is the first time I've heard anyone describe the Gamemastery Guide as being even vaguely important for playing Pathfinder. I wasn't playing PF when it came out though and might have missed the adds. Was the Gamemastery Guide ever held up at the level of the 4e DMG (which was included in the PF+MM+DMG boxed set, and the 4e PhB says every DM _needs_ a copy of it.)

Did the combined 4E PhB + MM contain the basic mechanical rules for encounter balancing (CR and the like), constructing skill challenges (a major part of 4e GMing as far as I can tell), NPCs, magic items, and magic item construction? I don't remember. If the 4e PhB +MM did, then there are really only two 4e core books in the sense of having what you need to play. (And in that case I'm guessing a lot of the complainers here are remembering earlier editions where you really did need all three, and they would backpedal if 5e did the same thing). If the 4e PhB + MM didn't contain all of those, then, unlike PF, I think it is hard to argue that they contained everything needed for play.

In any case, using the 1st 4E PhB might not be the best way to drum up enthusiasm given that it did not contain several D&Disms - barbarian (3e), bard (2e, 3e), druid (1e, 2e, 3e), monk (1e, 3e), sorcerer (3e), gnome (1e, 2e, 3e), and half-orc (1e, 3e) and you needed to get a second players handbook to get the two of those that had been in every other edition of the game. The 2e, 3e, and PF groups I've played with seem just fine with no splat books. I wonder what percent of those groups thought the splat books/supplements were "necessary" versus the percent of 4e players that thought the 2nd PhB was.

Also, the comparison with PF falls a little flat in that all of the rules needed to play PF (along with all the Advanced and Ultimate books) are available free on-line.


Edit: I agree with your reorganization statement in the post right below this one, but again note the free on-line SRD difference.

 

[DMZ2112]

I am not freaking out

Again, Bedrock, it was not my intention to single you out in any way. I just didn't want to quote everyone who was saying the same thing.

This price just caught me off guard.

All I'm saying is I don't know why, because it's the same price the books have been since 2000, adjusted for inflation.

The reason people are freaking out about it is that we don't evaluate prices in a vacuum. We compare to other, similar things, and to what we have paid in the past.

Is that... not what I did? *checks* I'm pretty sure that's what I did.

The argument that "If you're willing to pay $130, you should be willing to pay $150" doesn't hold water at all.

Fair enough. For me, $130 and $150 fall into the same mental brackets, it's true. $160 would be another story.

The greater point of my post was not, however, that anyone willing to pay $130 for Pathfinder should be willing to pay $150 for D&D5. Rather, it was to note that it is entirely possible that, despite using the established PHB-DMG-MM naming conventions, Wizards could pursue a more modern organization of the information within that division, resulting in a $50 "core rulebook" and two $40 "supplements" that are as optional as any major supplement really is for any modern RPG. Which would lower the entry cost to $50 -- where it arguably is for Pathfinder and other recent titles.

I just didn't feel like anyone was addressing that possibility. People seem to be assuming that the existence of a PHB mandates a $150 "core set," and I think that's a stretch.

Which who the what now? Who says they're doing a staggered launch? You're reading a whole heck of a lot into a single placeholder on Barnes and Noble--and it's obviously a placeholder, they don't even have an author credit. Do you have a source for this?

Only the same source you do. Two products for D&D5 on BN.com, neither of which is a DMG. Staggered launch. It's an assumption, yes, but I find it more plausible than "PHB = $150 edition."

Ummm...

Sigh.

A staggered launch wasn't the most recent approach, but it's hardly historically unprecedented.

I didn't say it was. In fact, I directly alluded to an instance of it occurring in the past, with D&D3.0.

 

[Jester David]

I've been trying to express my... disappointment... for how we learned this information. And it occurred to me last night. It's a little like if someone leaked the Oscar winners in advance.
Obviously the scale of show and dance is different, but the intent is the same. And without the drama of waiting to see who wins what, the Oscars are just a really, really long and fairly slow variety hour show.

WotC wanted to reveal this information on their schedule and likely had something planned. Now the suspense and drama of the reveal has been ruined.

 

[Cadence]

All I'm saying is I don't know why, because it's the same price the books have been since 2000, adjusted for inflation.

I wonder if some combination of marriage, old age, house payments, children, and/or impending retirement is making some of us feel poorer as time goes by