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.

 

[Valetudo]

5e combat is fine, it's the players.

 

[Uni-the-Unicorn!]

But still, it's a real pain to do a traditional dungeon crawl in 5e because combat takes too damn long.

Really. That is interesting, we find 5e combat pretty fast. We get through most combats in less than 10 minutes. Trivial ones we can blast through in about 5 minutes.

 

[Demetrios1453]

Then you have not seen a majority of the reviews, or you're spinning. I am not going to go for a point by point running down all the reviews, but the overwhelming majority end with a positive overall.

People with negative views interpret viewpoints to reflect their opinions, news at 11...

 

[Mistwell]

What an interesting interpretation of what I wrote.

What about my interpretation is incorrect, given you said, "So far all of the YouTube vids I’ve watched seem to mostly gush about all of the PC upgrades and more clarified rules and almost none off talk about the concern I have."

Are you saying the reviews you've watched are overall negative like he claimed?

 

[Mistwell]

People with negative views interpret viewpoints to reflect their opinions, news at 11...

Yeah I am pretty sure that's what is happening here. Guy was quoting almost directly from Treantmonk's review, and yet Treantmonk was very clear his overall opinion of the new rules is very positive. But he made a couple videos of the things that didn't get changed that he wanted changed, or changes he didn't agree with, and I am assuming that's what he's using to claim it was overall negative even though it definitely was not.

 

[ECMO3]

And what reactions are a problem here?

These are all things you can use off turn, most use your reaction, some do not use your reaction but will still slow down the game with rerolls or similar off turn:

Retaliation
Branches of the Tree
Countercharm (changed, now a reaction, unlimited uses)
Inspiring Movement (Reaction attack essentially at will for a use of a BI)
Unbreakable Majesty
Cutting Words (more uses)
Warding Flare (much more uses and usable on allies from level 3)
Beguiling Twist
Protection (rarely saw this before now mechanically probably the best fighting style)
Indomitable (more uses)
Battlemasters get unlimited d8s for maneuvers at higher levels (presumably meaning unlimited reaction maneuvers)
Heroic Reroll (gives Heroic Inspiration every single round, unlimited use)
Deflect Attacks (works on all attacks, not just ranged, this is going to be used almost every turn)
Steps of the Fey
Beguiling Defenses

This is not a complete list it is just a sample and does not include all the class or subclass reactions. It also does not include spells and feats and the feats in particular are going to generate far more reactions and off turn things than before.

It is not that these are bad individually, it is that there are going to be so many things happening off turn by virtually every player at the table that it will slow down the game. The example I gave of a terribly frustrating turn is going to be the new normal I think.

I didn't see any additional reactions than 2014.

More bonus actions. But not more reactions.

There are more reactions, those that already existed are usable in more circumstances and have more uses per day. Additionally, many which were optional from feat/fighting style were not used because they were not very powerful and they are now way more powerful meaning you will see them a lot (protection and Defensive Duelist in particular). Finally any character can get the Shield spell through an Origin Feat without multiclassing.

What new reactions?

Quote from Treantmonk in his video on spells that were not fixed:

"They gave a whole bunch more reactions defenses"

They playtested them as reactions, but they didn't make the cut.

Thanks for the correction

 

[ECMO3]

Then you have not seen a majority of the reviews, or you're spinning. I am not going to go for a point by point running down all the reviews, but the overwhelming majority end with a positive overall.

I am not spinning and I have watched about 20 hours in the last two days and read more than that. As I said most of them have been neutral but I have not seen one that I would call generally positive overall. I've watched a bunch, especially from Treantmonk, but also from D4 deep dive, D&D shorts, and some others.

Maybe you're spinning or maybe we are just interpreting things differently or maybe I didn't listen to the specific parts where these reviewers were positive. What I know for a fact though is that you are purposely misrepresenting what I said to prove some point or win some kind of message board recognition and with that in mind I find it difficult to believe you are being completely honest and forthright.

Do you have an example of an objectively, definitive positive review? You don't have to run down "all the reviews" to provide just one example.

 

[ECMO3]

So to be clear you're sick of reviews gushing about 2024 concerning things you don't like, while ECO3 is claiming all the reviews are negative.

Please do not lie about what I claimed. I never said that "all the reviews are negative" nor that they were "overall negative" as you claimed in two other posts.

What I claimed was "most of the reviews [I saw] have been neutral and some of them negative". I stand by that statement.

 

[Micah Sweet]

That’s fair. I’m hoping people like Slyflourish and myself are wrong and it does end up being easier for a DM (when conducting combat).

So far all of the YouTube vids I’ve watched seem to mostly gush about all of the PC upgrades and more clarified rules and almost none off talk about the concern I have.

Time will reveal all though. Im glad you approve of it so far.

Perhaps the thought is, "WotC isn't concerned about DMs, do why should anyone else be"?

 

[Micah Sweet]

Interesting. I always took the 4e lore as completely option. It was often presented that way IIRC.

I don't recall anything "optional" about that lore, or any lore prior to 5e Tasha's really, going back to the TSR days. The 4e stuff was just markedly different from what came before to greater degree, and it snapped my suspenders.