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.

 

[Parmandur]

Actually, there are a few of them named in the Species section: Corellon, Lolth, Gruumsh, Bahamut, Tiamat, Moradin, Reorx, Garl Glittergold, Baervan Wildwanderer, Baravar Cloakshadow, Yondalla, Brandobaris, and Charmalaine!

Oh, interesting! But nowhere near the Clerics section, still. Lol

 

[Clint_L]

Oh, interesting! But nowhere near the Clerics section, still. Lol

I like that the choice of deity (or not) is left to a discussion between the DM and player, presumably in the context of setting.

 

[M.L. Martin]

I mean, I think that's probably sensible, at least in the sense of not forcing WotC to take on merchandised IP RPGs, most of which are only very moderately successful and only for a short time.

The amount of effort and staff you'd need to support such a project at a "WotC-appropriate level" would be completely disproportionate to how successful it would be.

And you have to justify devoting resources to that project instead of something for D&D, which will almost always be more likely to produce better return on the same resources. IMO, this is why we'll probably never see another non-D&D ever again from WotC.

 

[DarkCrisis]

Like where is my Thundercats RPG, Hasbroooooo!?!?

Edit: Also Silverhawks

 

[Corinnguard]

Like where is my Thundercats RPG, Habroooooooooo!?!?

Wou

That would be interesting. For 5e, I hope.

 

[R_J_K75]

I mean, I think that's probably sensible, at least in the sense of not forcing WotC to take on merchandised IP RPGs, most of which are only very moderately successful and only for a short time.

I dont know exactly how successful the GI Jow RPG by Renegade Games is but its been out for 2-1/2 years and gets supported at least as much as 5E does with adventures and supplements.

The amount of effort and staff you'd need to support such a project at a "WotC-appropriate level" would be completely disproportionate to how successful it would be.

This I have no idea about how many more staff WotC would need, but Renegade has quite a few RPGs and would imagine that if their RPG team isn't smaller than WotC they are probably the same size, I cant see them being bigger, but who knows.

And that goes for pretty much all the Hasbro IPs that could potentially be TT RPGs, that I can think of. There are a few that could have done better than that, but even those are past their sell-by date (like MLP, they missed that window by about a decade even at the most generous).

I agree to an extent, MLP (I think there is a RPG planned by Renegade Games) and Power Rangers has a limited market and as far as I know, I dont think there are toys still, nor a cartoon. GI Joe on the other hand still has toys, comic books, and the target audience is people like myself who grew up in the 80s watching the cartoon, playing with the toys and reading the comic books. The toys out now are marketed as collectibles. So it would appear the fan base is still there

I feel like WotC might do another TT RPG at some point in the next decade, especially if D&D flags slightly, but I don't think it'll be from a non-WotC-owned IP, not even a Hasbro-owned IP.

I dont think they will for the foreseeable future at least as long as 5E is around and doing well, because they havent done one already in the last 10 years. Lets face it, even if they did, I can see it being a rehash of something that was already done by them or TSR

 

[R_J_K75]

Like where is my Thundercats RPG, Hasbroooooo!?!?

The toys were made by LJN

 

[DarkCrisis]

The toys were made by LJN

Whatevs. Someone still needs to get on it.

 

[MarkB]

I agree to an extent, MLP (I think there is a RPG planned by Renegade Games) and Power Rangers has a limited market and as far as I know, I dont think there are toys still, nor a cartoon.

Netflix has multiple recent series and movies of both. No idea of the quality or popularity.

 

[fluffybunbunkittens]

So... the new Exhaustion affects all d20 tests. I had assumed saves were somehow their own category separate from that, but they really mean all d20 tests.

That's all of a sudden such a big deal that we're back to not being able to use Exhaustion. What was wrong with penalty to attack, ability and spell DCs, WotC?