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.

 

[FitzTheRuke]

We can talk about them from different perspectives.

Good idea!

From the perspective of character build changes and changing decision trees in combat I think those things will be quite a bit different.

Can you give me an example of what you mean by decision trees?

I think the game will clearly feel very similar to 2014 d&d otherwise.

I do too. I actually hope we're wrong, and that it feels different in a good way, but I expect it will be some bits are better, some are not, net... fine?

 

[Daztur]

Good idea!

Can you give me an example of what you mean by decision trees?

I haven't gone over 5.5e rules carefully enough but it looks like with all of the emphasis on ways to make monsters move around that have been added in 5.5e, default tactics will revolve around bopping enemies into AoEs and the like more than in 5e.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

While I agree that the custom option is preferable, and that I don't like it in the DMG.... are you not aware of the backwards compatibility text that does that exact same thing in the PHB? Literally, the exact same thing as the custom option.

That's a crude work-around that only highlights how extremely bizarre the decision to delete customization of backgrounds and custom backgrounds from the PHB was. It also requires the DM to agree to allow you to use a 2014 background with a 2024 character.

Also, while I can appreciate that we are describing the differences between beige and tan, moving a section of the rules to a different book is not the same thing as changing the rules.

They literally changed the rules, so I don't know what you think you're talking about here!

The RULES in the PHB 2014 and the Playtest, are that the PLAYER can CUSTOMIZE the backgrounds. Not the DM. The player. No DM permission is needed to do this in either case.

I can't be bothered to dig out the Playtest, but here's the 2014 wording:

You might want to tweak some of the features of a background so it better fits your character or the campaign setting. To customize a background, you can replace one feature with any other one, choose any two skills, and choose a total of two tool proficiencies or languages from the sample backgrounds.

Changing it so that you need DM permission to do this is a huge change, especially in the context of backgrounds now locking down what ability scores you're allowed to increase and what Feat you receive.

So you're just literally wrong when you're saying they didn't change the rules. This isn't from "beige to tan", this is literally removing something from player choice, and replacing it with 100% DM control. It's a bizarre move that no-one asked for.

 

[Shardstone]

That's a crude work-around that only highlights how extremely bizarre the decision to delete customization of backgrounds and custom backgrounds from the PHB was. It also requires the DM to agree to allow you to use a 2014 background with a 2024 character.


They literally changed the rules, so I don't know what you think you're talking about here!

The RULES in the PHB 2014 and the Playtest, are that the PLAYER can CUSTOMIZE the backgrounds. Not the DM. The player. No DM permission is needed to do this in either case.

I can't be bothered to dig out the Playtest, but here's the 2014 wording:



Changing it so that you need DM permission to do this is a huge change, especially in the context of backgrounds now locking down what ability scores you're allowed to increase and what Feat you receive.

So you're just literally wrong when you're saying they didn't change the rules. This isn't from "beige to tan", this is literally removing something from player choice, and replacing it with 100% DM control. It's a bizarre move that no-one asked for.

You can choosecany 2014 background, pick any origin feat, and allocate stat points freely. That is in the new phb. You can even choose "Custom Background."

 

[Ruin Explorer]

You can choosecany 2014 background, pick any origin feat, and allocate stat points freely. That is in the new phb. You can even choose "Custom Background."

It's still a workaround that relies on you having the 2014 rules available, and unless I was told wrongly before, relies on the DM allowing it.

What's exact wording that allows you to take 2014 Feats?

And again, this highlights how arbitrary and bizarre it was to take away the custom option from 2024. The fact is, the rules changed, there's no getting around that.

 

[Shardstone]

It's still a workaround that relies on you having the 2014 rules available, and unless I was told wrongly before, relies on the DM allowing it.

What's exact wording that allows you to take 2014 Feats?

And again, this highlights how arbitrary and bizarre it was to take away the custom option from 2024. The fact is, the rules changed, there's no getting around that.

The rules changed but its such a minute change and requires such little effort to accomplish a custom background that IMO it really isn't worth complaining about. There are more interesting problems 2024 has than this.

 

[FrogReaver]

The rules changed but it’s such a minute change and requires such little effort to accomplish a custom background that IMO it really isn't worth complaining about. There are more interesting problems 2024 has than this.

I view it as more of a microcosm.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

The rules changed but its such a minute change and requires such little effort to accomplish a custom background that IMO it really isn't worth complaining about. There are more interesting problems 2024 has than this.

It's not a minute change.

That's a really shortsighted and unrealistic perspective, imho. You may personally find it "boring" or "not interesting", but sadly most real problems with RPG rules design are pretty boring, rather than weird funky rules-interactions which might be interesting/amusing. LFQW was boring as well, and I got really tired of talking about. Didn't mean it wasn't a huge issue with 3.XE/PF1.

Anyone who starts with 2024 isn't going to have an idea that you can customize backgrounds, and the 2014 stuff is going to be OOP soon, and unavailable digitally even sooner, so for example someone starting playing today in a couple of months and wanting to allow players to use custom backgrounds via Beyond is likely not going to be able to, not even if they want to pay.

 

[Shardstone]

It's not a minute change.

That's a really shortsighted and unrealistic perspective, imho. You may personally find it "boring" or "not interesting", but sadly most real problems with RPG rules design are pretty boring, rather than weird funky rules-interactions which might be interesting/amusing. LFQW was boring as well, and I got really tired of talking about. Didn't mean it wasn't a huge issue with 3.XE/PF1.

Anyone who starts with 2024 isn't going to have an idea that you can customize backgrounds, and the 2014 stuff is going to be OOP soon, and unavailable digitally even sooner, so for example someone starting playing today in a couple of months and wanting to allow players to use custom backgrounds via Beyond is likely not going to be able to, not even if they want to pay.

Their ignorance to custom backgrounds being a possibility is indeed a curse upon them, but it is a curse they deserve.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

Their ignorance to custom backgrounds being a possibility is indeed a curse upon them, but it is a curse they deserve.

Why do people who don't start playing/running D&D until October or later "deserve" that lol?