D&D (2024) 2024 Player's Handbook Reveal #1: "Everything You Need To Know!"

Each day this week, Wizards of the Coast will be releasing a new live-streamed preview video based on the upcoming Player's Handbook. The first is entitled Everything You Need To Know and you can watch it live below (or, if you missed it, you should be able to watch it from the start afterwards). The video focuses on weapon mastery and character origins.

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There will be new videos on Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday this week, focusing on the Fighter, the Paladin, and the Barbarian, with (presumably) more in the coming weeks.

 

[Minigiant]

The play test deleted the Hexblade patron and put its key feature (use Cha for melee attacks) into the Blade Pact itself.

No one role prayed the Blade as a patron anyway.

 

[Greg K]

Everything listed in the UA 6&7 releases, except Psi Warrior replaced Brawler for the Fighter and Soulknife replaced Swashbuckler for the Rogue.

I don't know whether to be sad or glad about the Swashbuckler rogue. I like having a swashbuckler, but I think it should either be part of a Fighter variant class or subclass of an entirely new class

 

[Vaalingrade]

Fighter players are welcome to give up all the damage they do, in exchange for effects instead.

If only.

 

[UngainlyTitan]

Reading comprehension is a skill not everyone gets proficiency with, and the DCs seem surprisingly high. It's a little like those people who watch a movie and come away with the idea that the villain makes a good point, despite the hero finding the counter-argument that demolishes the villain's claims in the third act. People read a second hand bullet point summery of an announcement, and instead of going to the primary source to get the full story they just sort of fill in the details on their own with whatever their gut tells them feels right.

I saw this happen again and again when a new MMORPG expansion was coming, and I saw it happen throughout the entire last couple of years of them working on Revised 5e. People get their information through a game of Internet Telephone, and make up their own details to fill in the blanks, and then get very upset when the actual facts turn out to be different.

Depressing innit. It is also why I prefer to read this stuff than get it from videos and if possible read/ watch a couple of versions. One always misses stuff on the first pass.

 

[Mistwell]

I also feel like the compatability they promised is what they delivered.

Well what do you think they promised, and where did that belief come from?

To me, there are different types of compatibility, and they only promised one type:

Backwards Compatibility: You can use your old books with the new system. You can play an old class with the new system, and run an old adventure with the new system.
Forwards Compatibility: You can use the new books with the old system. You can play a new class with the old system, and run a new adventure with the old system, without referencing the new system, and with errata to the old system to include any references from a new class or other new element not found in the old system.

What WOTC Promised: Backwards Compatibility.

That's it. As far as I've seen for the past many videos and UAs and posts they've made, they've only ever said it would be Backwards Compatible. I've never once seen them say it would be Forwards Compatible or that you could run a new class in the old system without referencing the new system, or mix and match everything without referencing the new system. I've never once seen them say or imply they would errata the old system to accommodate you running a new class in the old system by adding new system rules to the old system like Weapon Mastery rules.

If you've seen different, I'd like to see what you're referring to.

 

[TwoSix]

No one role prayed the Blade as a patron anyway.

Can you pray the Blade away?

 

[Remathilis]

So now that we have the facts about the compatibility....now what?

I assume we wait until we have the final books (or at least have a very strong idea of the actual rules in the final books) to determine how much work is needed to make 2014 options work with 2024. My guess is that it will vary subclass to subclass. For example, I don't imagine it will be hard to retro-fit the remaining four wizard subclasses back by using the four we get as template, but retrofitting cleric domains will take more effort as domains having extra proficiencies and divine strike/potent cantrip were moved to the base class. Now, none of that is going to be exceptionally hard for any DM who is used to homebrewing or using 3pp material, but its a bit much to ask of a DM who is not adept under the hood. I suspect most of the people here will be able to make use of any '14 era option with a bit of elbow grease, so if your half-elf transmuter wants some 2024 love, it should be possible to convert them, but it won't be with the same love the revised options have.

And as stated, the DM's Guild will have 300 products day 1 converting everything missing to 2024, at least until WotC releases the next 24' compatible Everything Guide.

 

[Yaarel]

Dice rolling Abilities loses out a few points.

Many people like rolling stats.

I prefer array be the default, and dice roll and point buy be the mention.

 

[Mistwell]

Advantage is worth roughly +2½. (Technically about +4, but its less useful when really needed for a high difficulty.)

If Inspiration allows the player to add +3 to the DC of a Spell, that would be fair.

Likewise, Fighters or any other class might spend the Inspiration to add +3 to the AC to defend against a specific attack.


But simpler is to impose a reroll against a targets Spell Save.

It's 3

 

[Yaarel]

I am really happy about the background and species having such a large amount of design space. Together, they can build a solid character concept at the start of the game.