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!

---

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]

---

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.

 

[Minigiant]

(The entirety of survival gameplay is "I cast goodberry" once per day)

Again the mistake is people thinking survival challenges for an Archmage, Knight Commander, Prince of Thieves, Ranger Captain, and High Bishop is starvation and thrist.

 

[Frozen_Heart]

Again the mistake is people thinking survival challenges for an Archmage, Knight Commander, Prince of Thieves, Ranger Captain, and High Bishop is starvation and thrist.

(you can get goodberry at level 1)

 

[Chaosmancer]

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.

As Hatmatter and Kurotowa point out, the major two issues that this solves are

1) Imposing a condition (Grappled) is a saving throw, like all other conditions.
2) The best grapplers are no longer Rogues and Bards, who were previously the best grapplers in the game, bar none.

 

[Chaosmancer]

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.

OH! Okay.

No, it isn't going to work like that at all.

What they are referring to is more like, the cleric Turn Undead feature will say that it is a Magic Action with effects X,Y,Z where the enemy will need to make a wisdom save. However the text won't tell you exactly what a "Magic Action" means in the rules, or a what a "D20 Test" or a "saving throw" is in the rules. It will instead gather all of that information in the glossary of terms.

 

[UngainlyTitan]

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.

I think that the biggest advantage for a DM is this reduces cognitive load. The pcs are in stealth mode, the guards if alert are taking a search action every round and perhaps less often if they are less alert and the DM can roll a search for the guard to find the PCs and only worry about the outcome unless they roll well.
The only thing I would explain to my players is that if you want to cross a corridor with a guard and not be spotted then you can peek to see if he is looking and cross and not break stealth but if you walk up the corridor toward him, he will spot you.

 

[R_J_K75]

OH! Okay.

No, it isn't going to work like that at all.

What they are referring to is more like, the cleric Turn Undead feature will say that it is a Magic Action with effects X,Y,Z where the enemy will need to make a wisdom save. However the text won't tell you exactly what a "Magic Action" means in the rules, or a what a "D20 Test" or a "saving throw" is in the rules. It will instead gather all of that information in the glossary of terms.

Have you read the new PHB yet?

 

[Minigiant]

(you can get goodberry at level 1)

In some settings, the Archmage, Knight Commander, Prince of Thieves, Ranger Captain, and High Bishop are level 5.

D&D is a poor model for food and drink based survival due to the level of magic available to PCs at low levels.

Default survival gameplay should be hazard based. Hazard and trap avoidance and recovery should be core aspects of classes and it's sad 5e2024 did not embrace that.

 

[Kurotowa]

Have you read the new PHB yet?

Go back a page and there's a video of a page by page walkthrough of the book. We do not have to guess or theorize as to things like layout.

 

[Argyle King]

Interesting.

More of a 4E vibe with how some of the things are written.

 

[Tales and Chronicles]

I usually don't use Stealth as a "mode" you enter when you start sneaking. You just use the Hide action and -boom- you are hidden as long as the basic requirement are met. The actual d20 stealth roll is only made against the Passive Perception when you would be spotted.

I don't understand the need to have a primary roll to enter stealth mode with a floor of 15 or whatever.