D&D General How many of your 5E D&D books have you used?

billd91 · Oct 12, 2021

I use 7-8 of the books regularly since they've got character options and/or monsters in them that I use. The others (I think I'm up to 10?) are generally campaign books/adventures that I use as I run the adventures or steal ideas from for the other adventures I run.

el-remmen · Oct 12, 2021

I wasn't counting 3rd party books, of which I have a handful - Kingdoms & Warfare, Strongholds & Followers, Spells of the Ages, and a PDF about locks and doors - I forget its name. Of these, I have only cannibalized some stuff from Kingdoms & Warfare.

sterndisgust · Oct 12, 2021

I have the core 3, Volo's, MToF, and Xanathar's in print and on Roll20. I use all of them extensively and I doubt I'll get more WotC product that I actually like and will use since I don't really care so much for the adventures.

At this point if I get anything else it will be 3P content, which I also use! Tons of Kobold Press, MCDM, and Sly Flourish makes it to my table.

Scribe · Oct 12, 2021

Core
Volo, XGtE, MToF, SCAG
Out of the Abyss, Princes of the Apocalypse, Rime.

Used them all in some capacity.

I will get the Dragon book, want a Planar book.

5atbu · Oct 12, 2021

About 10. Used 6.
3 Kobold Press, used them all.
That's much better than some games I own, less than some.

Malmuria · Oct 12, 2021

I have 4 books (phb, mm, mtof, xgte), but have looked at other ones. Currently only use the phb, but when I was dm I used the others. Thinking of running "ghosts of saltmarsh" but in OSE (I know, I can just use the original modules).

guachi · Oct 12, 2021

Starter Set/Free Basic Rules- Devoured the Basic Rules when they were released before the PHB was. Lost Mine of Phandelver is a great adventure.

Core Rules
Player's Handbook - Used so much I had to get my copy replaced for free
Dungeon Master's Guide - Read and used
Monster Manual - Used a lot

Supplementary Rules
Volo's Guide to Monsters - The expanded sections on humanoids is nice. Never used the other monster entries though I appreciate having them.

Xanathar's Guide to Everything - The new subclasses are great. Used those so much I've stripped them out and made a separate Word Doc/PDF of all the classes/subclasses. Very useful as a player-facing handout. The rest of the book is a disappointment.

Mordenkainen's Tome of Foes - I enjoyed reading the sections on demons and devils quite a bit. The demihuman stuff was decent. The kind of book that combined what likely would have been 3-5 separate leatherette books in 2e into one book. Glad I own it even if I've never actually used it.

Adventures
Tales from the Yawning Portal
Dungeon of the Made Mage
Candlekeep Mysteries

I've never actually read through any of these or even read more than a few pages, which makes me wonder why I bought them. As I recall, the first two were on a big sale on Amazon for around $20 and I figured that last one would have a few nice standalone adventures.

Other
Galeforce 9 Spell cards - Exceptionally useful for newbie players

3rd Party
You didn't ask, but it's the internet so it's not like that will stop me but here are the physical 3rd party books I own.
CAL1 - Calidar, In Stranger Skies
CC1 - Calidar, Beyond the Skies
CA1 - Calidar, Dreams of Aerie
CAL2 - Calidar, On Wings of Darkness
CST1 - Calidar, Under the Great Vault
CST2 - Calidar, Skies of Fury (All of the Calidar books are by Bruce Heard, former lead for the BECMI line at TSR)

Cthulhu Mythos for 5e, by Sandy Petersen

Ptolus for 5e, by Monte Cook (This is exceptionally good)

Survivalist's Guide to Spelunking, by Douglas Niles, et. al.

jasper · Oct 12, 2021

Adventures not use so far Princes, Giants, Hoard. Not used the Non Adventure League campaign books but bought them due to a good impulse buy price. AKA under $20.

pukunui · Oct 12, 2021

I'm still buying them all (or having other people buy them for me) but have fallen pretty far behind in reading through them, let alone actually using them.

Obviously I use the core rulebooks, and I refer to Xanathar's regularly for the downtime rules. I've run Tyranny of Dragons, Curse of Strahd, Storm King's Thunder and Tomb of Annihilation in their entirety and have used bits and pieces of some of the others. I am currently running ToA again (with Acq Inc elements) and Dungeon of the Mad Mage (but we're only on level 2 and I have no idea if we'll make it all the way to the bottom).

THEMNGMNT · Oct 13, 2021

I have 100+ D&D books from all editions in hardcover and a few dozen more in PDF. Not to mention a few dozen Pathfinder products.

Specific to 5E, I have most of the hardcovers, plus D&D Beyond. I've not purchased most of the recent setting guides -- Eberron, Wildemount, Richtoffen's, and all the MtG stuff. In summary, I've got a lot of sh*t!

So what have I used?

Well, I've run about 200 games of 5E spanning 3 campaigns. I've used material from the Starter Set, the Essentials Kit, Tyranny of Dragons, Storm King's Thunder, Dragon Heist, Descent Into Avernus, Curse of Strahd, Tomb of Annihilation, and Princes of the Apocalypse. In some cases I've run large parts of the storyline. In other instances I've pilfered and repurposed a few maps, grabbed magic items or monsters, etc.

And all the splats and monster books have gotten use as well.