A Nerd Dad’s Review of Dungeons and Dragons 2024 Player’s Handbook

Most players of Dungeons and Dragons within the last couple of years are probably aware that an updated ruleset was on the horizon, to coincide with the 50th anniversary of the game. This new ruleset has included names such as “One D&D”, or jokingly “5.5 edition” and so on. Nonetheless, the new Player’s Handbook came out, and I got a limited edition copy at my local game store a couple weeks ago. My kids and I hadn’t really played any TTRPG in many months, both due to demanding schoolwork for the oldest, busy schedule for the family, malaise with Pathfinder Second Edition¹ and just unhappiness with Hasbro shenanigans.

But we all agreed that we missed our old family D&D sessions during the early Pandemic, and my oldest child’s school schedule this year is much lighter now. So, we agreed to block out a time on weekends and start playing again.

Further, my kids wanted to try the new rules, so I went to the local FLGS (friendly local gaming store), skimmed over the new 2024 Player’s Handbook, felt it was intuitive enough that I could adapt, and within a couple weeks, we were running a basic Forgotten Realms campaign, borrowing elements from R.A. Salvatore’s original Icewind Dale trilogy.²

I have my old copy of the Sword Coast Adventurer’s Guide to help with the world-building. old resource books for the Sword Coast. Also, before the game, I tested the new rules by creating a couple characters using 2024 rules to help provide sidekicks to our small party.

The kids, having experience with 2014 5th Edition D&D quickly picked up the new rules and were able to get a couple fun characters created in an hour:

• a dragonborn paladin (my son)
• a tiefling cleric (daughter)
• plus sidekicks I made: dwarf druid of the sea, and drow eldritch knight.

From there we’re back on familiar turf, having a good time, enjoying a classic bar fight opening and subsequently getting thrown out. Wulfgar and Regis from the Icewind Dale trilogy made a cameo too.

In short, getting up to speed with the 2024 rules was easier than expected. The character creation processed has definitely changed in a couple essential ways :

1. Character race no longer determines stats, it’s based on chosen background now. The result doesn’t really change the process all that much, but it is a philosophical shift.
2. The racial subclasses get net abilities to help with “flavor” more: elves for example are still divided by wood, high, and drow elves, but each one gets different innate spells at certain levels. Same with Tieflings, and so on. I found this change more fun than expected.
3. Many character class paths are homogenized to match other class paths. This means that clerics now choose their domain at level three, not level one for example. Wizards similarly choose school on wizardly later than before. However, even at level one there are choices you can make with character creation, so this isn’t as limiting as one might expect. However, clerics and wizards as of writing only have 4 subclasses only versus 8 previously.

Because classes and backgrounds are so strongly emphasized, these sections comprise most of the book by a long shot. The book covers species (character races), spells and equipment toward the end which is different from the classes 2014 PHB. The intro includes a nice, updated walkthrough of how a typical D&D session looks like so if you’re new to D&D, this is a good read.

Most of the other rules have not drastically changed, so in most cases they will feel familiar. There is a comprehensive list here as well.

Spells have often changed and take some careful reading to get re-acquainted. Many of these updates provide much-needed fixes and balance updates. For example the 3rd level Daylight spell now actually counts as sunlight for mechanics purposes (handy for vampires). The classic Cure Wounds spell heals 2d8 damage, not 1d8.

In short, some spells are weaker or more limited now than before. Spells that were seldom used such as Barkskin now have a new life. Again, if you played fifth edition before, you should definitely reread your spell list and familiarize yourself with the new spells.

All in all, despite my personal misgivings toward Hasbro, I must admit that the 2024 Player’s Handbook is a welcome update. It fixes a number of oddities, balance issues and deficiencies of the original while keeping its essence more than I expected. I can still use my old resource books without much effort to convert, which is greatly appreciated. Meanwhile, new players will have enough to get started with the PHB without needing to refer to older material.

I am eager to see what the 2024 Dungeon Master’s Guide brings as well.

Edit: I “butt-published” this too early. I had to write the last third of the post in a hurry. Apologies for the rushed effort. 🤦🏼‍♂️

P.S. another reason for investing in the 2024 PHB is that Adventurer’s League requires rebuilding characters to conform to 2024 rules anyway. I don’t play AL too often these days but I don’t want to get left behind.

¹ While we did have a good time initially, especially with character creation, the biggest challenges with maintaining the Pathfinder campaign was a lack of coherent fantasy settings. Most of the research and prep I did as a DM was to pore over Wiki fan pages, which inevitably referred to modules I never bought (and weren’t interested in purchasing). There just wasn’t enough compelling lore, characters or story modules to get immersed in to replace classic D&D lore, plus they are scattered across so many books anyway that it was impossible to find anything. Plus the fatigue in keeping up with the constant stream of new classes, new ancestries, and so on. A TTRPG hobbyist has the time to keep up with this, but not a working parent who just wants to spend a weekend with the kids. Pathfinder 2e Remaster has good rules, and good design, but outside of this and the Beginner Box there is not enough support for more casual players especially those who have some nostalgia about classic TTRPG lore.

² I’ve been reading the Icewind Dale trilogy shard to my son at night, after we finished the Lord of the Rings Trilogy, the Hobbit, and the original Dragonlance chronicles. LOtR was great, the Hobbit was great, Dragonlance wasn’t as good as I remember, but the Crystal Shard has been a solid read, though I have to skim over certain scenes that are inappropriate for younger audiences. He loves the main cast, even more so in teh second book Streams of Silver. It does feel like a D&D adventure for him, and he enjoys listening to the story, and (in his opinion), my voice acting.