TarionzCousin
Second Most Angelic Devil Ever
Quick, everyone: Hold Gilwen down and take the Mountain Dew away. I'll get the hose.Awesome announcements! Glad I'm going to Gen Con this year! Geek meter exceeding safety thresholds here
D&D 5E [Merged] D&D Next/5E Release Schedule Threads
- Thread starter fjw70
- Start date
The Wizards Premier Retail Program or something like that has the relevant details. Basically, it says that you get product two weeks in advance. Mearls has confirmed it on twitter as well; players who have a store in their area could have their PH prior to GenCon.
Ruin Explorer
Legend
Not always. My first experience of D&D was buying the "wrong" PHB (2E for a 1E group). It happens.
Hussar
Legend
Heh, apparently emblazoning the edition across the front doesn't help as much as people might think.
thalmin
Retired game store owner
Actually it is 11 days earlier (12 for the Starter so it will be available on July 3) Just like they did for the 4E run, their WPN stores should be able to sell the new line on the 2nd Friday before the street dates. I believe this will include the new Minis line as well, but not the D&D Attack-Wing game line. Thus the PHB on August 8. This is info from my distributors and http://www.icv2.com/articles/news/28656.html
Ruin Explorer
Legend
Heh, apparently emblazoning the edition across the front doesn't help as much as people might think.
How would a new player know, though, that's the thing? I didn't know what editions were. It was AD&D, it said so right there on the cover!
I wasn't looking for any edition information, because I had no reason to think it was relevant.I think most people new to RPGs, and not familiar with the fact that many RPGs have editions which are wildly incompatible with each other (and many others have highly compatible ones, to help confuse the issue further!), aren't, instinctively, going to be looking for an edition logo, they're going to be looking for a title.
The one thing that works in 5E's favour is that people normally buy the newest thing (as I did), but you know people out there are going to do things like buy a 4E PHB because it was cheaper, and it said Dungeons & Dragons Player's Handbook on the cover, didn't it?
Even as an adult, one of my friends nearly bought a 3.5E PHB not all that long ago (we play 4E). This is a very smart man (a very senior doctor, actually), he was just enthusiastic, buying online, and looking for the best price, and didn't look closely enough, but he did check with me so it was narrowly averted! I know I've seen other people actually buy wrong-edition stuff before, though.I'm not saying this is a huge problem or anything, just that it will happen, from time to time, and it doesn't have much to do with people being dumb or whatever.
Indeed. In my experience, this is how a first D&D book purchase usually goes:
- Newbie player joins an existing group.
- Not having any of the books, newbie player borrows somebody else's PHB when necessary.
- After a few games, newbie player is having a blast, but is getting tired of having to borrow somebody else's books all the time.
- Newbie player goes out and buys a PHB.
I started playing in the 1E era, but I didn't start buying my own books until early 2E. At the time, there was a mix of 1E and 2E books floating around, and I made my purchases without realizing there was a difference. It was quite a while before I figured out the reason for all those odd little inconsistencies between my Player's Handbook and my Dragonlance hardcover. I imagine people who started shortly after the 3.5 release had similar experiences.
Of course, the upshot of all this is that having an edition number on the cover isn't necessarily helpful. 2E had "2nd Edition" right there in the logo, and I never noticed it. As Ruin Explorer says, the only really foolproof fix is to change the book title, but that would arouse the wrath of all us grognards who don't feel like we're playing D&D if we don't have a Player's Handbook.
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Hussar
Legend
How would a new player know, though, that's the thing? I didn't know what editions were. It was AD&D, it said so right there on the cover!
I think most people new to RPGs, and not familiar with the fact that many RPGs have editions which are wildly incompatible with each other (and many others have highly compatible ones, to help confuse the issue further!), aren't, instinctively, going to be looking for an edition logo, they're going to be looking for a title.
The one thing that works in 5E's favour is that people normally buy the newest thing (as I did), but you know people out there are going to do things like buy a 4E PHB because it was cheaper, and it said Dungeons & Dragons Player's Handbook on the cover, didn't it?
I'm not saying this is a huge problem or anything, just that it will happen, from time to time, and it doesn't have much to do with people being dumb or whatever.
That's what I'm finding funny though. The argument is that because there's no indication of edition on the 5e books, a new player will be confused as to which books to buy.
Your books had "2nd Edition" emblazoned on the top in big red letters and it still didn't help you. Why would having "5th Edition" help someone else?
