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.

 

[EthanSental]

I just checked and MP:MotM has finally gone live on my D&D Beyond account. Below is a screen shot of my Sourcebooks and links to the discontinued titles are available for me to read.

I haven't checked if I can share them with my players in my campaigns.
EDIT: I checked and the discontinued books are available to share to my players in a campaign in D&D Beyond.

One annoying thing is, I have no filter to remove those books from being visible in character creation if I so desire. Sometimes it is nice to have less stuff visible to cut down on confusion for my players for a particular campaign.

View attachment 157181

You can “check” books to allow the players access to them, just not potions of a book. I think the button is shared or blocked to players under content management tab of a created campaign,

 

[JEB]

Looks like you can still buy access to the legacy versions in books other than VGTM or MTOF, interestingly. (Unless buying them there now results in getting the MOTM version; not inclined to spend $1.99 to check.) EEPC material is also still available, though you have to specifically search for it item by item.

 

[smiteworks]

I am 100% sure the 2024 books are just going to be added to D&D Beyond like the others. As all the recent books are being made with the new core in mind.


Cause it's more profitable for them to have their own. With Fantasy Grounds it sounds like they are getting ready to end their license. Maybe with Roll20 as well.

That's an interesting theory, but I've been told the exact opposite by Wizards of the Coast. Our royalties go right to the bottom line for each of our partners and don't cost them anything. Any of our partners could devote money and resources to replace us if they really wanted to, but it wouldn't necessarily be a profitable change for them.

In the case of Roll20 and Fantasy Grounds, we each present a distinct view of what virtual tabletop play should look like and these each cater to a separate audience. If there was only a single view of a VTT, this would risk alienating a substantial audience. Our partners see value in what we bring to their brand -- not just in financial terms, but in fan service.

 

[DataDwarf]

It appears that if you play in Adventurers League you have to use the new races in MotM. I'll let everyone read into that what they will.

Monsters of the Multiverse Update

Hi folks!

yawningportal.dnd.wizards.com

 

[Parmandur]

It appears that if you play in Adventurers League you have to use the new races in MotM. I'll let everyone read into that what they will.

Monsters of the Multiverse Update

Hi folks!

yawningportal.dnd.wizards.com

I mean, nothing much to read, AL rules are AL rules.

 

[DataDwarf]

I mean, nothing much to read, AL rules are AL rules.

I mean, some might read that as; In WotC official games the old printings of the races are no longer compatible.
And since Adventurers Leagues is run by WotC it could be construed that WotC no longer views the old printings as compatible.

 

[Parmandur]

I mean, some might read that as; In WotC official games the old printings of the races are no longer compatible.
And since Adventurers Leagues is run by WotC it could be construed that WotC no longer views the old printings as compatible.

It means AL wants all players on the same page. For context, AL is a teeny tiny fraction of games, like 100,000 players out of 50 million by the last numbers I saw.

AL is, essentially, one DMs random game. AL rules are not what WotC expects people to play by and large, which can be seen from a number of the adjustments made for the peculiarity of OP.

 

[HammerMan]

And since Adventurers Leagues is run by WotC it could be construed that WotC no longer views the old printings as compatible.

It could be but it would just be a guess like the rest of us

 

[Nikosandros]

I think that the AL decision has little to do with compatibility and much to do with uniformity. They don't want multiple versions of the same race and they consider the most recent iteration the best one.

I mean, in my current Greyhwak campaign, there are no dragonborns. But it's not like dragonborns are incompatible (rulewise) with my game...

 

[Jer]

I mean, some might read that as; In WotC official games the old printings of the races are no longer compatible.
And since Adventurers Leagues is run by WotC it could be construed that WotC no longer views the old printings as compatible.

Adventurer's League has a LOT of rules that don't apply to the game as a whole and are there to provide a uniform experience to players and DMs across tables. Many of which would not be adopted by most non-AL tables, in fact. For example, in AL you gain a level after completing an adventure if you want to gain a level - XP aren't tracked and you can choose to not gain a level if you want to stay at your current level. They also used to have a PHB+1 book rule for creating characters - that didn't mean that characters created with multiple books weren't compatible, it means that they were restricting things to make the games easier to DM.

It makes complete sense that since Wizards has provided what they consider updated versions of these rules they would have their official organized play use the updated version of the rules for consistency.