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.

 

[Paul Farquhar]

There is a concept I have met is several fields - chemistry, project management - known as the rate determining step. This is a part of the process that takes so much longer than any other step that the other steps can be ignored.

My experience is that the rate determining step in D&D combat is the full casters deciding which spell to cast. Anything else can effectively be ignored. And of course, the duration of combat is directly proportional to the number of full casters in the party.

 

[Mistwell]

I need more context for this- it seems ridiculously fast. What level are these combats at? Can you give a few examples of what you consider "most combats," as those are what you finish in less than 10mins?

I'm wondering how different each tables combats are- how many rounds you go, how many players, enemies, etc. Obviously each combat isn't the same! But a few examples? 'Id appreciate the info!

I wonder if there are streams/videos of actual play with not-trivial combats consistently under ten minutes, I'd love to see how they go down in real time.

In my experience, in-person play goes faster than digital play, theater of the mind goes faster than using a map, and the combination of theater of the mind with in person play is fastest. Add in players who are both very experienced, and very experienced with that particular characters abilities, and you can fly through a combat.

My slowest combats are online using a grid, very persnickety VTT interactions where things often don't quite work right and you need to fix something in the moment, and players who are using a bunch of new stuff.

Oddly I've found the more advanced the VTT, the SLOWER things go. Foundry for example does a whole lot. It shows cool animations of spells, it measures distances automatically, it adjusts for cover, all kinds of cool things. And...it takes the longest by far for our table. Something is always not quite working right.

Casting a spell and asking the DM "Can I hit three guys with this?" and the DM on the fly making a ruling of "Yes" or "No, only 2" using theater of the mind is so much faster than measuring out a template on a digital grid, angling it, targeting your targets, etc... I know it seems like it would be faster, and sometimes it is. But more often than not, something gets messy and there is discussion about corners and cover and such, and things get bogged down.

Will you get "cheated" out of hitting an extra target here or there by depending on the DM to make a quick call on the fly rather than you tactically fiddling with the precision? Yeah, probably. But is it really cheated, if you're getting through nearly double the number of combats per session? Triple even? To me, I much prefer the DM keep things moving very fast over precision.

 

[ECMO3]

You have said that combat will take longer, because each round will be longer. They said that combat will not be longer, because there will be fewer rounds, even if each round is longer.

Go listen again. No that is not what they said. Treantmonk said Combat might not be longer. D4 said he thought combat will be longer.

I, personally, am not even convinced that the rounds will be longer.

I am.

It doesn't make sense to me that you want to come on here, insist on telling us that combat will be slower (a thing people have been complaining about the potential of, as a black mark against the new rules)... for the sole purpose of just informing us that you think the combats might be slower. Especially since, I keep telling you I have played characters during the playtest, and I have not seen combats take longer.

The playtest is not the 2024 rules. I played during the playtest as well but that is not the same thing and TBH much of the things from the playtest were scrapped and many of the new things being discussed and which will impact play were not in the playtest.

People didn't want the weapon mastery system, because they claimed it would slow down combat. They didn't want extra tactical options for the fighter because it would slow down combat.

Slowing down combat has nothing to do with my opinion of weapon mastery. I was not originally a fan of fighters having more tactical options than are available to other classes and I thought they should have opened WM up to all classes.

Originally I was against WM because it was martials only and I felt it would nerf the Gish full caster melee builds and those PCs would not be able to do cool things with weapons as well as martials. What we found in the playtest though is that it was pretty easy to multiclass for a level in Fighter to get that. Now with the new spell scaling Gishes have the option of Paladin or Ranger to get your weapon mastery in one level without even losing a casting level.

Given this I am now pretty excited about WM. I also think the current multiclassing system is going to heavily favor Gish builds and give them most of the cool weapon stuff that single class warriors can do and that is great IMO.

Now here you are, telling me how every single change is going to slow down combat... but that you love all the changes and that you like the new edition and that you don't care that it slows down combat?

I don't love all the changes, but overall I like the new rules.

Is it any wonder I'm confused as heck here?

I think my posts are pretty clear and speak for themselves.

 

[Vaalingrade]

Combat length wouldn't be a problem if combats were something fun you did instead of part of a slate of Way Too Many you had to deal with to stay on schedule.

 

[mellored]

My experience is that the rate determining step in D&D combat is the full casters deciding which spell to cast. Anything else can effectively be ignored. And of course, the duration of combat is directly proportional to the number of full casters in the party.

By that logic the biggest slowdown of 2024 would be from sorcerers getting extra prepared spells from their subclass.

 

[Paul Farquhar]

By that logic the biggest slowdown of 2024 would be from sorcerers getting extra prepared spells from their subclass.

Well, the current situation is no one plays sorcerers, so if more players play sorcerers rather than wizards is might speed things up a bit! It’s a complex equation.

 

[mellored]

Well, the current situation is no one plays sorcerers, so if more players play sorcerers rather than wizards is might speed things up a bit! It’s a complex equation.

Sorcerer now have more combat options. Not just in the number of spells, but also deciding how to modify it.

Wizards have rituals, and can change what they have prepared. Both can take plenty of time, but that's not combat time.

 

[Paul Farquhar]

Sorcerer now have more combat options. Not just in the number of spells, but also deciding how to modify it.

Wizards have rituals, and can change what they have prepared. Both can take plenty of time, but that's not combat time.

If more classes are given more combat choices, it might slow the games down a little. As things stand, the characters who just hit things have turns that take negligible time. If the decision paralysis is spread around more the game might play slower.

 

[ECMO3]

There is a concept I have met is several fields - chemistry, project management - known as the rate determining step. This is a part of the process that takes so much longer than any other step that the other steps can be ignored.

My experience is that the rate determining step in D&D combat is the full casters deciding which spell to cast. Anything else can effectively be ignored. And of course, the duration of combat is directly proportional to the number of full casters in the party.

I don't see that. I find that is usually done off turn and they know what they want to cast when their turn comes around. I realize not all tables are the same though.

 

[ECMO3]

If more classes are given more combat choices, it might slow the games down a little. As things stand, the characters who just hit things have turns that take negligible time. If the decision paralysis is spread around more the game might play slower.

I see almost no characters at all in 5E that just hit things any more. Aside from subclass abilities, almost all of them have magic of some kind, and over half have them have spells, to include many of the people playing "non-caster" classes.

The mythical non-magic PC that just hits it with a stick is nearly extinct in modern D&D.