D&D Beyond brings back a la carte purchases in the form of Starter Packs

Each Starter Pack costs $4.99.
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D&D Beyond is returning to piecemeal purchases in the form of new Starter Packs that allow for access to class rules, as well as a limited number of subclasses and species rules. The new Starter Packs, available for all 12 core classes, and now available for sale on D&D Beyond. Each Starter Pack comes with character rules for a specific core class, three subclasses (the three from the Player's Handbook that are not available via the Basic Rules), and two species from Mordenkainen Presents: Monsters of the Multiverse. Also included are seven feats, including several general feats.

D&D Beyond originally had a la carte purchases in which users could individually purchase subclasses, spells, or even monsters for a modest fee. Wizards of the Coast removed this site feature in 2024, meaning that a user needed to purchase an entire rulebook if they wanted to access to any single bit of content from that rulebook. While these Starter Packs aren't quite the same as true a la carte purchases, this does mark the first time in years where individual chunks of content have been available at a lower price point for users.
 

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Christian Hoffer

Christian Hoffer

Would you like to cite a source for this conspiracy theory or are you opting for "it was revealed to me in a dream"?
I've been buying D&D since before WotC bought TSR and there's ample evidence this could happen just from prior patterns of publisher behavior. Though personally I lean on the 3E era approach where they didn't bother to replace or update certain 3E books when 3.5 came out (except with lengthy errata).
 

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they didn't bother to replace or update certain 3E books when 3.5 came out (except with lengthy errata).
Didn't they? The stuff that people that I think mostly cared about -- the class books -- did have their prestige classes, etc. carried over. Nearly all of the content in the floppy 3.0 class books showed up in the 3.5 hardcover Complete books, although a few bits and pieces got lost along the way.

For the other 3E stuff:

The Hero Builder's Guidebook didn't get updated/replaced (no loss there), nor did Savage Species (arguably more of a loss). Enemies & Allies (again, no loss), Deities & Demigods, Monster Manual II, Fiend Folio, Oriental Adventures, Ghostwalk, Manual of the Planes (still a great book even today), Stronghold Builder's Guidebook and the Book of Challenges were published before the 3.5 transition, but except for a few noisy folks upset about skill points being wrong under 3.5, I don't recall any real issues in using them in 3E.

The Epic Level Handbook (which no one was super-happy about, for various reasons) and the Book of Vile Darkness (also a book that I don't recall anyone unreservedly loving at the time, for multiple reasons) were also 3E books that people used with 3.5 without much issue, to the extent that people used either of them that much.

And 3E adventures continued to be used by nearly everyone in the 3.5 era.

I would expect a similar model in the 5.5 era, although I do think WotC in 2026 will take the opportunity when reprinting older adventures to update the trade dress along with the errata. But I think the most valuable stuff, like the Everything books, will have its content republished in new 5.5 books, much like the floppy 3E class books were.

Similarly, I don't think we'll see Fizban's, Bigby's or the Book of Many things republished, and if the books don't sell consistently enough to merit regular reprints, I'd expect them to go out of print and have their most popular player-facing content and monsters reappear in new 5.5 books.
 
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Similarly, I don't think we'll see Fizban's, Bigby's or the Book of Many things republished, and if the books don't sell consistently enough to merit regular reprints, I'd expect them to go out of print and have their most popular player-facing content and monsters reappear in new 5.5 books.
A lot of the later (post Tasha) books are already pretty close to 5.5 standard. Especially the ones which gave a bonus feat for backgrounds and used the MotM style species rules. The changes to subclasses and redoing backgrounds that didn't have feats seem to be the priority.
 



Didn't they? The stuff that people that I think mostly cared about -- the class books -- did have their prestige classes, etc. carried over. Nearly all of the content in the floppy 3.0 class books showed up in the 3.5 hardcover Complete books, although a few bits and pieces got lost along the way.

For the other 3E stuff:

The Hero Builder's Guidebook didn't get updated/replaced (no loss there), nor did Savage Species (arguably more of a loss). Enemies & Allies (again, no loss), Deities & Demigods, Monster Manual II, Fiend Folio, Oriental Adventures, Ghostwalk, Manual of the Planes (still a great book even today), Stronghold Builder's Guidebook and the Book of Challenges were published before the 3.5 transition, but except for a few noisy folks upset about skill points being wrong under 3.5, I don't recall any real issues in using them in 3E.

The Epic Level Handbook (which no one was super-happy about, for various reasons) and the Book of Vile Darkness (also a book that I don't recall anyone unreservedly loving at the time, for multiple reasons) were also 3E books that people used with 3.5 without much issue, to the extent that people used either of them that much.

And 3E adventures continued to be used by nearly everyone in the 3.5 era.

I would expect a similar model in the 5.5 era, although I do think WotC in 2026 will take the opportunity when reprinting older adventures to update the trade dress along with the errata. But I think the most valuable stuff, like the Everything books, will have its content republished in new 5.5 books, much like the floppy 3E class books were.

Similarly, I don't think we'll see Fizban's, Bigby's or the Book of Many things republished, and if the books don't sell consistently enough to merit regular reprints, I'd expect them to go out of print and have their most popular player-facing content and monsters reappear in new 5.5 books.
Well...as I said it was certain books that weren't updated. Specifically the ones I recall never getting more than basic errata in pdfs were Fiend Folio, MM2, Monsters if Faerun and such. But I think the point is....the scenario as I see it today is very similar. 3E to 3.5 wasn't a big hurdle to use content from both versions. It is less of an issue with 5E to 5.5 where the differences are even less, so it seems to me like the approach would be similar.
 

I don't give that guy views. Can you make your point without him?

It's now spread kind all over the place on the DnDBeyond and the DungeonsAndDragons.com websites. For example:

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I still don't understand why you're in denial about this one. What does it really matter that they're calling it 5.5e?
 
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