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.

 

[fluffybunbunkittens]

Speaking of their wings, which are magical in nature, can they be affected by spells such as Dispel Magic?

It's more of a Dispel Spell.

 

[Micah Sweet]

It's more of a Dispel Spell.

Perhaps they should change the name then.

 

[fluffybunbunkittens]

Two of my players picked Lucky as their origin feat.

2014 and the playtest Lucky acted retroactively after the roll. 2024 release version is just 'when you roll'. Now, from the player side, this is a fine nerf, it was mega-powerful etc...

But as the GM, I am not stopping before every single enemy attack to ask the players if they want to pre-emptively give the roll disadvantage. I'll just let that remain retroactive.

It's just a bizarre way where the way the game is actually played was no consideration for how the feat should work. They could've just removed the whole enemy attack part of it, and it would still be good.

 

[Stormonu]

So the two options, I think, are to come up with a system to mix-n-match species traits and let everyone go whole hog with mixed parentage, or to lean in to "part human, part elf" being something special.

You could use Khoravar, but that's way too single-world specific. It would need to be more generic. IDK.

For my homebrew, I went with naming them - half-elves are Faemanni and half-orcs are Orkin ("Orc Kin"). (Also, changed halflings to Hillenfaey).

 

[GobHag]

Personally I don't like the idea of Half-Elf/Orc being specifically human and elf/orc only in how DnD presents species now. I prefer if half-elf/orc work like subraces where you replace a race feature with something else., doesn't work too well in 5e though.

 

[Micah Sweet]

Personally I don't like the idea of Half-Elf/Orc being specifically human and elf/orc only in how DnD presents species now. I prefer if half-elf/orc work like subraces where you replace a race feature with something else., doesn't work too well in 5e though.

Works just fine in the right version of 5e (Level Up, for example). Just not official D&D.

 

[dave2008]

Works just fine in the right version of 5e (Level Up, for example). Just not official D&D.

It works fine in official D&D too.

 

[Micah Sweet]

It works fine in official D&D too.

Didn't think the official rules allowed for it.

 

[Corinnguard]

Didn't think the official rules allowed for it.

I think he is referring to how 5.5e allows players to create beings of mixed ancestry. A5e's method of creating mixed heritages is much simpler, pick one heritage and then pick a heritage gift from another heritage. Once this is done, it's a matter of which Culture the mixed heritage character is raised in, the culture of one of their parents or something completely different.

 

[Micah Sweet]

I think he is referring to how 5.5e allows players to create beings of mixed ancestry. A5e's method of creating mixed heritages is much simpler, pick one heritage and then pick a heritage gift from another heritage. Once this is done, it's a matter of which Culture the mixed heritage character is raised in, the culture of one of their parents or something completely different.

Ok, that just my bias showing then. I am aware of that method, but I like Level Up's version so much better I would not seriously consider using WotC's.