D&D (2024) D&D 2024 Player's Handbook Reviews

On Thursday August 1st, the review embargo is lifted for those who were sent an early copy of the new Dungeons & Dragons Player's Handbook. In this post I intend to compile a handy list of those reviews as they arrive. If you know of a review, please let me know in the comments so that I can add it! I'll be updating this list as new reviews arrive, so do check back later to see what's been added!

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Review List

• The official EN World review -- "Make no mistake, this is a new edition."
• ComicBook.com -- "Dungeons & Dragons has improved upon its current ruleset, but the ruleset still feels very familiar to 5E veterans."
• Comic Book Resources -- "From magic upgrades to easier character building, D&D's 2024 Player's Handbook is the upgrade players and DMs didn't know they needed."
• Wargamer.com -- "The 2024 Player’s Handbook is bigger and more beginner-friendly than ever before. It still feels and plays like D&D fifth edition, but numerous quality-of-life tweaks have made the game more approachable and its player options more powerful. Its execution disappoints in a handful of places, and it’s too early to tell how the new rules will impact encounter balance, but this is an optimistic start to the new Dungeons and Dragons era."
• RPGBOT -- "A lot has changed in the 2024 DnD 5e rules. In this horrendously long article, we’ve dug into everything that has changed in excruciating detail. There’s a lot here."

Video Reviews
Note, a couple of these videos have been redacted or taken down following copyright claims by WotC.

• 2024 PHB Rules Changes D&D 5.24 (Treantmonk's Temple)
• Dungeons & Dragons Players Handbook 2024 Preview & Review | Key Takeaways and Comparisons with 2014 (Awesome Black)
• 10 Unexpected Changes in the D&D 5E 2024 Player's Handbook (This Effin' GM Games)
• Every Class and Subclass Change for 2024 (d4: Deep Dive)
• D&D Player's Handbook 2024 Winners & Losers! (The Character Sheet on ComicBook.com)
• 2024 Player's Handbook First Look Review (Dungeon Dudes)
• The 2024 Player's Handbook: Full Spoilers Review (DnD Shorts)
• Full Early Review! D&D 2024 Player's Handbook (JoeFudge)
• First Look at the 2024 Player's Handbook for Dungeons & Dragons (GameMasters)
• 2024 PHB Flip through (Jorphdan) [taken down]
• D&D New Player's Handbook, DM's Guide, Monster Manual, and Project Sigil Info (maturemindedgamers)
• 2024 Player's Handbook: Questions Answered! (Alphastream)
• D&D 2024 Player's Handbook Walkthrough (Sly Flourish) [redacted]

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Release timeline (i.e. when you can get it!)

• August 1st: Reviewers. Some reviewers have copies already, with their embargo lifting August 1st.
• August 1st-4th: Gen Con. There will be 3,000 copies for sale at Gen Con.
• September 3rd: US/Canada Hobby Stores. US/Canada hobby stores get it September 3rd.
• September 3rd: DDB 'Master' Pre-orders. Also on this date, D&D Beyond 'Master Subscribers' get the digital version.
• September 10th: DDB 'Hero' Pre-orders. On this date, D&D Beyond 'Hero Subscribers' get the digital version.
• September 17th: General Release. For the rest of us, the street date is September 17th.

 

[Corinnguard]

This review is from the DnD Shorts guy. It's about 1 1/2 hours long. I watched most of it, and it changed some of my earlier opinions on the 2024 Dragonborn.

 

[mellored]

Wondering if I'm the only one shocked that they changed the rules for grappling.

It was in the playtest, so most people already saw it.

Grappler rolls athletics, grapple-ee rolls choice of athletics or acrobatics, higher roll wins.

Seems like ALL skill contests are gone.

But why change something that was pretty flawless to begin with? I never heard anyone complain about the grappling rules in 5e even once.

Then you never saw a Rogue with expertise in athletics.

1d20 (minimum 10) + 5 Str + 6 proficiency + 6 expetise = 27 (minimum).

A creature would need 44 Str/Dex to have a 50% chance to break out.

Not counting Hex, Guidance, or any other thing that can boost skill checks.

Using skills for combat puts things well outside bounded accuracy.

 

[Mistwell]

My favourite organizational style in a rpg book is to have rules fully explained in the text, and brief explanations in the glossary/index. The glossary definitions provide quick reminders you might need and the rules in the main body are fully fleshed out, possibly with examples.

Mine is the opposite. On first read that's nice. But for actual play, over the years, I really much prefer a heavy glossary. It's just so much easier to access it in alphabetical order like that quickly during play.

 

[Nightfly]

Then you never saw a Rogue with expertise in athletics.

Actually, I haven't. I have not seen one strength-based rogue in all the time 5e has been out. I guess my friends aren't munchkin-y enough. Is it bad that I'm kind of happy to know that strength rogue was a thing, even in that weirdo broken form?

 

[Parmandur]

It's a glossary with rules, which based on the review I read, those rules don't appear in the descriptive book text.

The Glossary is the descriptive rules text, all of it in one place...?

 

[Nikosandros]

I'll have to see it and read it for myself, but - in principle - a detailed glossary is, IMHO, a true blessing and a colossal time saver when you need to look up a rule while playing the game.

 

[R_J_K75]

The Glossary is the descriptive rules text, all of it in one place...?

I understand this, but it makes me read the same topic in 2 sperate places. Here's a hypothetical example whether it's actually like this in the PHB is irrelevant. Say I'm completely new to the game and reading the Cleric entry and it says they can turn undead but doesn't actually explain how it works in that section. Now to fully understand how turn undead works I have to refer to the glossary. Doing this a few hundred times as I'm reading the book is going to make things pretty tedious. One of my expectations for this revised edition was that everything on a particular subject should be in one place without having to cross reference anything. As I understand it this is not the case.

 

[Chaosmancer]

So, if the rogue fails (or rolls low) they can just repeat the roll until they get what they like and then they enter the castle.

Why would you let them do that? You call for the roll after they enter the castle. They done it, if they choose to retreat, fine, but you are under no obligations to allow them to step in and out multiple times, re-rolling until they are happy.

 

[MarkB]

Wondering if I'm the only one shocked that they changed the rules for grappling.

The new rule seems okay, so I'm not complaining about it per se. But it's strange that they changed something that didn't need fixing, at all. I frequently cited the grappling rule as evidence of how streamlined and sensible 5e was: Grappler rolls athletics, grapple-ee rolls choice of athletics or acrobatics, higher roll wins. That's perfect! 10/10 no notes.

Now the target gets a strength or dexterity saving throw, which is...fine? And it preserves the idea that you can escape by being either nimble or strong, which is important. But why change something that was pretty flawless to begin with? I never heard anyone complain about the grappling rules in 5e even once.

It's because they've removed contested checks.

 

[Chaosmancer]

In as system like D&D where you roll for specific tasks, I don't know what would prevent the player from changing their mind then about entering the castle. Unless you make them roll only when there is a first chance to be detected, which would make sense to me.

Sure, you could do it that way. After all, at least the old rules stated that you only call for a check when the outcome is in question. If there is no question they can sneak over the wall into the courtyard, and the only question comes when they are in the courtyard, then roll then.

Again, I think the big benefit is it explicitly says you keep the result as the DC, so the rogue isn't expected to roll stealth to get over the wall, again to get past the courtyard, again to get in the castle, AGAIN to move through the halls, ect.