D&D 5E D&D Beyond Will Delist Two Books On May 17th

D&D Beyond will be permanently removing Volo’s Guide to Monsters and Mordenkainen’s Tome of Foes on May 17th in favor of the upcoming Monsters of the Multiverse book, which largely compiles and updates that material.

As per the D&D Beyond FAQ for Mordenkainen Presents: Monsters of the Multiverse:

Can I still buy Volo’s Guide to Monsters or Mordenkainen’s Tome of Foes on D&D Beyond?
Starting on May 16, you can acquire the streamlined and up-to-date creatures and character race options, as well as a plethora of exciting new content, by purchasing Mordenkainen Presents: Monsters of the Multiverse. On May 17, Volo's Guide to Monsters and Mordenkainen’s Tome of Foes will be discontinued from our digital marketplace.

If you already own these two books you will still have access to your purchases and any characters or encounters you built with them. They won’t be removed from your purchased sourcebooks. Therefore, if you want the "fluff" and tables in those two tomes in D&D Beyond, you need to purchase them soon.

This is the first time books have been wholesale delisted from the D&D Beyond Platform rather than updated (much like physical book reprints are with errata and changes).

There’s no word from WotC on whether physical books will be discontinued and be allowed to sell out.

 

[Stormonu]

nope... if in 1996 you went to 100 tables with DMs running 2e D&D with a 1e half orc monk I doubt you would get 10 DMs willing to let you play it... and at least 2 of those 10 would tell you to make changes...

now some number (pull number out of butt) lets say 15-20 of the 90 that wont let you play that 1e half orc monk might MAKE a whole new 2e race/class that is based on it... but it would not be the 1e one.

either way MOST tables in 1996 are telling you NO...not compatible (and again that was the closest we ever got)

Things were a little different where I was back then. In my own games, I had started a group with 1E (w/ UA) and we flipped to 2E shortly after the new edition came out. We had a monk in the group, so we grandfathered that class in (among other things, like Half-orcs). I still used 1E modules where I could, but just used 2E stats for any of the monsters they came across - or their 1E stats if they hadn’t been released in 2E format. Other DMs in my area did much the same, and it stayed pretty much the same until the death of the edition. Those who came into D&D later might not have grandfathered in 1E material, but that would be because they didn’t have or know of the material in the first place. If you sat down and educated them on it, I imagine most would be fine with including it.

IF things change in the 2024 books, I suspect it with be more like the 1E -> 1E UA days. Classes and races will get some bumps and ribbons (and a sort of Method V stat generation change with the floating ASIs & 1st/4th level feats) with the new books, but existing characters won’t need to be changed to continue playing. Prior modules should still work fine as-is, though newer ones would certainly take any changes into account - but I don’t think they’d be significant enough to really be noticeable.

 

[GMforPowergamers]

Sure, they will have some more stuff coming, but we already have the Race and Monster changes in hand, which are....completely compatible.

except when they took the spell casting trait and changed it and half this board exploded becuse you may or may not be able to counterspell a firey burst like you could the fireball that it replaced... or when the issue of spells PCs can't learn came up

Other than the actual changes which have been introduced, which remain compatible. As people reported doing for the OD&D/Basic/AD&D complex of Editions.

again... if in 1996 you went to 100 tables running 2e with a Basic or O or 1e character more often then not (by a wide margin) you would be told to make a 2e character.... I mean the 1e half orc monk was bad enough I can't imagine someone showing up and there class was dwarf

 

[Marandahir]

Well, my question would be, is the 4E digital apps still available? E-tools for 3E is gone, so at some point the original 5E books on D&D Beyond will vanish into the aether too. My guess will be at the +5 year mark (as an IT guy, this is usually as long as we hold onto abandoned hardware or legacy software).

I'll be sad when it goes, but it's not going to stop me from using it until it does. Worrying about it is just hand-wringing to no good effect.

Maybe it's been said already in the 10 pages since - want to put in my word now before I finish backlog reading - but the 4E digital tools and D&D Beyond are fundamentally different animals.

5e's D&D Beyond is free on a baseline, with optional purchases of books or other ancillary material, and an optional, tiered subscription model that mainly serves to share your purchased and homebrew content with other players as well as allow you to expand your number of built player characters saved in the system.

4e's Digital Tools Suite was entirely subscription based. Everything included from all books and magazine articles, with no additional prices save the subscription price (which went up as they added additional tools like the character builder and the encounter builder and EVENTUALLY a digital tabletop after everyone else had done it better).

4e's Digital Tool Suite was retired but they also retired their billing of your wallet. If you ever unsubscribed, you didn't have access to the content in the digital tools. Simple as that.

5e's D&D Beyond doesn't require a subscription, and in order to have content available for use on it, you need to purchase it as you would a physical book or an e-book (such as on DM's Guild). Therefore, it is HIGHLY unlikely that they'd "take your books away from you." It's not remotely the same situation, since a subscription model is essentially "renting" the material while D&D Beyond is a digital purchase of the books in a streamlined form that's hard to turn into an easily-distributed PDF.

It's WotC's way around people "distributing the tapes" - a fundamental flaw they discovered with early 4e PDF sales (and why they stopped selling PDFs of their current edition books). They legally mind if you "distribute the tapes" but if it's an old edition, they don't mind nearly as much because it's not their current bestselling hot items. So those books go to DM's Guild as old edition content.

When we get to a true 6e, if they for some reason retire the 5e D&D Beyond books entirely, I'm 99% certain there will be a way to legally download your 5e purchased content from D&D Beyond for archival purposes.

 

[Parmandur]

except when they took the spell casting trait and changed it and half this board exploded becuse you may or may not be able to counterspell a firey burst like you could the fireball that it replaced... or when the issue of spells PCs can't learn came up

I'm sorry, but a few people on a message board having a panic attack is not the same thing as not being "compatible." You can make an Encounter right now, mixing the old and new Monster stat blocks: WotC expects people to be doing just that, per the books! That is compatibility.

You also still seem a little confused about yhe "rule change" involved. They didn't change a general rule of the game, they provided Monster stat blocks with different powers: but all Monster stat blocks are already variant rules, in the exceptions based system they are the exceptions. WotC can change all the exceptions without touching the core rules.

again... if in 1996 you went to 100 tables running 2e with a Basic or O or 1e character more often then not (by a wide margin) you would be told to make a 2e character.... I mean the 1e half orc monk was bad enough I can't imagine someone showing up and there class was dwarf

Random assertion of what you assume to be the case isn't as compelling to me as the manifold testimony of people who mixed 1E, Basic and 2E. Especially since my casual as heck College group did thst with 3E and 3.5 which in retrospect was a bit gnarly.

 

[Micah Sweet]

I'm sorry, but a few people on a message board having a panic attack is not the same thing as not being "compatible." You can make an Encounter right now, mixing the old and new Monster stat blocks: WotC expects people to be doing just that, per the books! That is compatibility.

You also still seem a little confused about yhe "rule change" involved. They didn't change a general rule of the game, they provided Monster stat blocks with different powers: but all Monster stat blocks are already variant rules, in the exceptions based system they are the exceptions. WotC can change all the exceptions without touching the core rules.

Random assertion of what you assume to be the case isn't as compelling to me as the manifold testimony of people who mixed 1E, Basic and 2E. Especially since my casual as heck College group did thst with 3E and 3.5 which in retrospect was a bit gnarly.

I mixed 1e and 2e material at the table all the time too. I still considered them two separate editions, and looked forward to 2e versions of un-updated 1e material.

 

[GMforPowergamers]

I'm sorry, but a few people on a message board having a panic attack is not the same thing as not being "compatible."

then a guess a few people claiming compatibly can be ignored too since we just ignore things on enworld now

You can make an Encounter right now, mixing the old and new Monster stat blocks: WotC expects people to be doing just that, per the books! That is compatibility.

really? when did you speak to WotC?

You also still seem a little confused about yhe "rule change" involved.

sigh... no but you seem to be unclear on what most of us mean by rule.

even if I excepted that the rules on how to make an elf did not count as a rule (I don't except this definition) the fact that they didn't just change elf, dwarf ect, but HOW RACES OVERALL are made/work does.

They didn't change a general rule of the game, they provided Monster stat blocks with different powers: but all Monster stat blocks are already variant rules, in the exceptions based system they are the exceptions. WotC can change all the exceptions without touching the core rules.

the rules that MAKE those monsters changed. In a fundamentally way, and as this thread shows in the places WotC has the power to enforce the change (new digital customers) they are retroactively changing the old to the new... not puting them side by side. this is a NEW way.

Random assertion of what you assume to be the case isn't as compelling to me as the manifold testimony of people who mixed 1E, Basic and 2E

people did. in small scale mix some (more 1e people taking what they liked from 2e then the other way around but they did) but it was not the norm. the two were sepreate and not togather... and I have seen very little to none of basic mixing in.

again trying to bring a half orc monk from 1e into a 2e game would be hard to find a game... I am pretty sure the class dwarf from basic would be orders of magnitude harder.

. Especially since my casual as heck College group did thst with 3E and 3.5 which in retrospect was a bit gnarly.

your college group did that cool cool... still different editions, still not remotely proof of anything

 

[Parmandur]

I mixed 1e and 2e material at the table all the time too. I still considered them two separate editions, and looked forward to 2e versions of un-updated 1e material.

Yes, and this is a new edition in the works. But one that is completely compatible, that is, you can mix and match. Unlike 3.5 to 4E, for example.

Distinctions are important.

 

[GMforPowergamers]

Yes, and this is a new edition in the works. But one that is completely compatible, that is, you can mix and match. Unlike 3.5 to 4E, for example.

Distinctions are important.

what makes you so sure... heck I am willing to bet we will find people if we look that took Bo9S maneuvers and used them on4e characters (where we did not we did discus mountain hammer)

just like I took a 2e wizard complet and made him an npc in a 5e game... it's all D&D and with SOME work you can kitbash them... that doesn't men that are compatible or fully compatible or completely compatible.

I also have over the last 5 editions used Vampire the Masquerade mechanics at least 1/edition (a lot in 5e) and in 3e and 2e I mix and matched epic level rules with mage the ascension to make a new class, and I have used were wolf the apocolypes powers in 3.5 4e and 5e... that doesn't make WoD completely compatible, after all Distinctions are important.

 

[Parmandur]

then a guess a few people claiming compatibly can be ignored too since we just ignore things on enworld now

I mean, I see no reason to believe they are statistically relevant.

really? when did you speak to WotC?

I mean, it's right there in the book. Unless you think that Monsters of the Multiverse options can't be paired with the Monster Manual in an Encounter? Do you have textual evidence establishing that they can't mix?

sigh... no but you seem to be unclear on what most of us mean by rule.

No, I get what you mean entirely, but there is a distinction between the core rules and the rules that are exceptions. This is central to the design of modern D&D, as Crawford has gone at length to explain several times in the past.

WotC has been working on changing the exception, not the core. They haven't been putting out any surveys about the core rules.

even if I excepted that the rules on how to make an elf did not count as a rule (I don't except this definition) the fact that they didn't just change elf, dwarf ect, but HOW RACES OVERALL are made/work does.

You are missing the forest for the trees here. Tasha's didn't actually introduce a new system for designing Races, it just gave players the tools WotC was using to design Races already. People had reverse engineered it years ago based on what WotC was putting out, and got it pretty close to Tasha's to begin with.

the rules that MAKE those monsters changed. In a fundamentally way, and as this thread shows in the places WotC has the power to enforce the change (new digital customers) they are retroactively changing the old to the new... not puting them side by side. this is a NEW way.

The fundamentals of Monster design in D&D are mathematical constructs. The math has not changed. Ergo, this does not represent a fundamental change.

They have made some Monaters with tweaked powers, but they haven't changed the actual engine in place, the math.

people did. in small scale mix some (more 1e people taking what they liked from 2e then the other way around but they did) but it was not the norm. the two were sepreate and not togather... and I have seen very little to none of basic mixing in.

again trying to bring a half orc monk from 1e into a 2e game would be hard to find a game... I am pretty sure the class dwarf from basic would be orders of magnitude harder.

To some given 2E game, maybe or maybe not (though as @Remathilis has pointed out, that's an illegal Race/Class combo), but thst doesn't mean they were not completely compatible. The base math was compatible, and it would work.

your college group did that cool cool... still different editions, still not remotely proof of anything

Not denying thst this is a new Edition, just that is, in fact, completely compatible.

 

[Parmandur]

what makes you so sure...

We alrwsfy have the Race and Monster changes in hand, and they are completely compatible. They could replace all the Classes, Feats and Equipment, but if nothing from Part 2 of the PHB is changed...then the 2014 material is completely compatible.

Notably, they are releasing a Starter Set in August, for 5E, and have said that it will work with the new rules in 2024.