D&D (2024) 3,000 Player's Handbooks Available At Gen Con

At Gen Con (August 1-4), there will be 3,000 copies of the Player's Handbook available. These copies will include a gold foil D&D logo and a commemorative bookplate.

RENTON, WA – July 18, 2024 – It’s a banner year for DUNGEONS & DRAGONS! Coming off the acclaimed film Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves, and the smash hit video game Baldur’s Gate 3, D&D is celebrating 50 years of the WORLD’S GREATEST ROLEPLAYING GAME. More than 64 million D&D fans love rolling dice, slaying monsters, and envisioning themselves as the amazing heroes they all are inside. This year at Gen Con 2024 in Indianapolis, Indiana, DUNGEONS & DRAGONS will be debuting the 2024 Player’s Handbook making D&D more accessible than ever before. Wizards is bringing 3,000 copies of the 2024 Player’s Handbook hot off the presses to Gen Con 2024 – each of which features the 50th anniversary logo in gold foil, along with a commemorative "Gen Con 2024" bookplate making it even more exclusive and distinguishing it from other first-run copies.

"The energy at Gen Con is always electric. Being able to put copies of the 2024 Player’s Handbook, fresh from the printer, directly into players' hands on the floor of the convention is something truly special,” said Jess Lanzillo, VP of D&D Franchise and Product at Wizards of the Coast. “We can't wait to see the excitement as our fans dive into the possibilities contained within!”

The Player’s Handbook goes on sale everywhere on September 17, 2024, and fans can pre-order the D&D Beyond Digital edition and/or bundlenow for character sheet bonuses: 10 frames, 5 backdrops, and 12 digital dice sets—one for each class!

Pre-order the core rulebooks bundle now on the D&D Beyond Marketplace to receive the Dragons of D&D digital art book, D&D BEYOND Gold Digital Dice set, and a 50th anniversary digital Gold Dragon mini in the upcoming 3D sandbox. Fans will learn how to sign up for the closed beta at Gen Con!

How to Purchase the First Publicly Available 2024 Player’s Handbooks

Gen Con attendees will be the first fans to have an opportunity to purchase the 2024 Player’s Handbook. Here’s how:

Where to Buy

The 2024 Player's Handbook will be available at Lucas Oil Stadium, Northwest Concourse. It will be in a shared sales area with the USPS D&D Stamps.

Sales Dates

August 1: 3:00 PM - 6:00 PM EDT
August 2/3/4: 9:00 AM - 12:00 PM EDT

Pricing

The 2024 Player’s Handbook is $49.99 plus tax. Credit card sales (Discover, Mastercard, Visa) only.

At 7:00 AM EDT on each sales day, tickets to reserve an opportunity to purchase will be released in the Gen Con event ticketing system as an event. The event will be listed as a free ticket and will be titled “D&D 2024 Player’s Handbook Early Release Sale.” A Gen Con attendee may claim one digital ticket for that day, subject to availability. The digital ticket serves as your access to purchase for that day only.

Once you have your digital ticket, you will show up at the sales location during the sales hours listed for that day. Sales will not be processed outside of those hours. You must be in line by the end of the sales window to ensure you are able to purchase for that day.

Rules and Restrictions

Only one digital ticket will be redeemable per person per day. Upon redemption, we may issue a wristband to denote that you have been checked in for your purchase, even while in line - this means you no longer need to show your digital ticket. There will be no sales to non-ticket holders (e.g., no "walk ups"). One book per redeemed ticket only; all sales are final.

 

[UngeheuerLich]

It's not entitlement to think that they might try to release the PHB at the Con. It's entitlement to think that they have to have copies for everyone or they are "planning to disappoint fans" - as if they are disappointing fans on purpose.

It is not entitlement. It is trying to spin everything WotC does in an evil manner.

For some people, WotC doing nice things is contrary to their evil corporation narrative. There is also readiness to believe every rumor that paints WotC in a bad light and the resistance to believe more balanced reports.

There is also a believe that WotC is totally incompetent at everything they do. Rules design, organization, customer surveys, and so on.
There is a lot of Dunning-Kruger going on, as there is in sports or politics. If I would train the national team, I would do x. Y is so incompetent. If I would run the country, I would easily solve all problems.

 

[KYRON45]

It is not entitlement. It is trying to spin everything WotC does in an evil manner.

For some people, WotC doing nice things is contrary to their evil corporation narrative. There is also readiness to believe every rumor that paints WotC in a bad light and the resistance to believe more balanced reports.

There is also a believe that WotC is totally incompetent at everything they do. Rules design, organization, customer surveys, and so on.
There is a lot of Dunning-Kruger going on, as there is in sports or politics. If I would train the national team, I would do x. Y is so incompetent. If I would run the country, I would easily solve all problems.

As an expert in not being an expert in anything....I concur.
Hows that for an endorsement?

 

[Scott Christian]

As the article notes, you need to get a ticket in order to buy a book. I'm assuming that they will do 750 tickets per day.

At 7am each morning, 750 tickets will be released. The first 750 people to get a ticket at 7am is guaranteed a slot for purchasing a book that day.

There won't be a mad rush to the WotC booth. No ticket, no purchase. There is an allotted time each day (3 hour window) to stop by the booth at the Lucas Oil Stadium where you can complete the purchase.

Attached image of the ticketed "events".

So it's Thursday morning at 7am, you're on the GenCon ticket portal... and you hope that your click is among the fastest 750 people. You can then go buy the book from 3pm to 6pm at Lucas Oil Stadium.

If you aren't fast enough on Thursday, you can try again on Friday. Wash, rinse, repeat.

View attachment 373763

Thank you for the info. And god that is terrifying. When the portal opened and I had my 12 choices all queued up, and I was clicking at the ding of them opening - yet I still was 7,500th in line. Fingers-crossed for both of us.

 

[Queer Venger]

I will be curious to see how many end up on Ebay etc and how much they'll go for.

this happens ALOT at comic con, exclusives start popping up on Ebay literally within. minutes of release. This is what people do, they sign up for a ticket, get t he exclusive, then mark it. up 500%. It's like. the Ticketmaster of nerds.

 

[Zander]

Well, Comic-Con has almost double the attendance of GenCon. If more than half of Comic-Con attendees play D&D -- which is certainly possible -- that would make it the biggest gathering.

But if they were going to sell a bunch of PHBs there, we'd know by now, since it's happening before GenCon.

And gamescon has about 2.5 times SDCC's numbers but, like SDCC, their D&D gamers may not be very committed in terms of engagement: time, years played, DM vs not DM, spend etc. I suspect that Gen Con has more players who would be willing to slap down $50 for a D&D book than any other gathering. Can't prove it of course - just a hunch.

 

[Zander]

It's not entitlement to think that they might try to release the PHB at the Con. It's entitlement to think that they have to have copies for everyone or they are "planning to disappoint fans" - as if they are disappointing fans on purpose.

They're doing so knowingly and should have been better organised. It's not a wild expectation that they might have had enough copies. The only valid excuse is that the planning might date back to the covid time when it wasn't clear whether Gen Con would be happening or not. If that's the case, I can't fault WotC. They couldn't be expected to know when the pandemic would end.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

And gamescon has about 2.5 times SDCC's numbers but, like SDCC, their D&D gamers may not be very committed in terms of engagement: time, years played, DM vs not DM, spend etc. I suspect that Gen Con has more players who would be willing to slap down $50 for a D&D book than any other gathering. Can't prove it of course - just a hunch.

Yep. Until a major publisher like WotC makes a concerted, multi-year effort to make tabletop gaming a thing at one of these other conventions, it's impossible to prove there's a market there.

I do know that Comic-Con attendees tend to throw around a lot of money. A $50 PHB isn't terribly high-priced compared to a lot of other limited releases available each year in San Diego (and which, frankly, offer far less value -- my wife has a $50 A-Team van Hot Wheels, still in its original box that we bought for ... reasons).

 

[Zander]

It is not entitlement. It is trying to spin everything WotC does in an evil manner.

For some people, WotC doing nice things is contrary to their evil corporation narrative. There is also readiness to believe every rumor that paints WotC in a bad light and the resistance to believe more balanced reports.

Actually, I was never one of those who harboured ill feelings towards WotC even during the OGL debacle. As someone who focuses almost entirely on WotC content, what was going on in the third party world wasn't very salient. I wasn't very aware of what was going on.

 

[UngeheuerLich]

Actually, I was never one of those who harboured ill feelings towards WotC even during the OGL debacle. As someone who focuses almost entirely on WotC content, what was going on in the third party world wasn't very salient. I wasn't very aware of what was going on.

Then you might be the exception here.

 

[KYRON45]

Then you might be the exception here.

He's not.
Wotc is a company that does company things. When they stop making things I want to buy then I won't buy the things they make. I expect nothing more from them than I do the company that makes my cookies, socks or toilet paper.
The market is big enough now where if Wotc stopped existing tomorrow the TTRPG segment would still go on.