D&D Player's Hanbook 2024 WINNERS & LOSERS!

The Character Sheet is back with more Fantasy and TTRPG news as we bring your our intitial review of Dungeons & Dragons Player's Handbook 2024...and which classes, abilities, and systems were the biggest winners and the biggest losers of this semi-new edition! Are Rangers really as bad as everyone says in Player's Handbook 2024? Was Wizards of the Coast and D&D correct to nerf the Paladin? What about the new spells, and the new Weapon Mastery System? Find out which parts of Player's Handbook 2024 are taking D&D in teh right direction, and which appear to be a step backward, as we give you our honest review of the 2024 Player's Handbook!

#dnd #playershandbook #dungeonsanddragons

[davidmoseley]

I was watching to who you thought were the winners and losers and you basically said this book exisists without answering the question

[MetaGrave]

Hunter's Mark should be a passive ability of the Ranger and not require an attack. Just line of sight. It also should not cost Spell Slots and be dependent on your PB for amount of uses during a Short Rest.

Speaking of, the Ranger should be a Short Rest class like the Fighter and Warlock before it. Its abilities also shouldn't be dependent on Hunter's Mark. It should have that exploration and survival and nature thing built into it. Maybe even give it a swim/climb speed at later levels if they don't already have it.

Ranger was severely let down (again) with this edition and only further confirmed I was right to distrust WotC.

[bltate]

I agree with the criticism of the 2024 ranger that it's lost a lot of its flavour: we lose the OG Favoured Enemy/Favoured Foe, the Natural Explorer option, Primeval Awareness, Land's Stride, Vanish etc in return for spells and proficiencies open to other classes.
Admittedly these older features needed some communication between the DM and the player to shine but without them the ranger doesn't feel very distinct as a class anymore.

[brilobox]

If people really want to buff the Ranger I think I mostly solved it with a single rule:
Some time between Ranger Levels 4 and 7 (table’s preference) you are able to concentrate on 2 spells at once if one of those spells is Hunter’s Mark.
Bonus rule: if you fail a concentration save while concentrating on Hunter’s Mark, roll an additional d20. If that save result succeeds, you maintain concentration on Hunter’s Mark only.

[The_RealWilliam]

Did I miss what the winners and loser were?

[falconnm]

Very strange to hear the opening comment questioning whether the book is"groundbreaking". The community during UA pretty much demanded backward compatibility and reacted poorly to major excursions from the prior classes. Pretty much they said don't make this groundbreaking. I was expecting a compatible but cleaned up edition, that seems to be what wizards delivered

[TheJamieellis]

The part that REALLY gets me about Rangers is the lack of flavour. Barbarians get a perfect marriage of flavour and mechanics by being allowed to use STR for certain checks when raging, tapping into their primal instincts to guide them. But Rangers gets the same thing as Rogue and Bard, expertise. Except Rogue does it better now, because they get reliable talent at level 7. So, at level 7, a rogue cannot roll lower than a 15 on Survival checks if they took expertise in it. And Druids obviously outshine ranger in the spell department... so what actually is unique to ranger? Hunter's Mark. They're the Hunter's Mark class. Awesome, thanks WotC.

[donkeydeck]

Hot take: i dont like the art, it has a modern genric feel to me. I may be biased as i still have all the old books my dad used for 1e but it comes off too polished to me. It doesn't have its own aesthetic, its detailed, but generic.

[socialcommentary]

Producer Pete with the save to give some very necessary commentary on the Ranger! Well done!

[IronTon]

I agree The ranger was not treated fairly compared to other classes, especially like the monk got reworked to make it much more stronger. I'm still not excited about the books. I don't want to get them. I still don't know what the new monsters are going to be and how balanced they are compared to the new classes. And also it felt like they were listening to more of the DM than the players feedback

[joshuadadad]

Standardising things has reduced flavour and individuality of many things. For a DM O think it generally cleans things up and is an overall improvement. For players it is a mixed bag. I think the playtested parts from Unearthed Arcana improved (mostly classes, some cleaned up rules) are an improvement, but much else is a step backwards. I can see myself using bits from both the new and old books (new classes, old races) or just allowing custom player creations (especially backgrounds).

[chaosthegod]

I've been wanting to really like these revised rules, but I can't say I do. Not because some of the changes aren't good, they are. We needed some changes in the spells and to nerf the Paladin. But most of the changes doesn't makes me wanting to trade my 2014 PHB + Tasha's and Xanathar's books for this. I know there's retrocompatibility, but as far as I've seen it'll be a bit clunky, so I rather stick with what I have and maybe incorporate one or two changes for a better gaming based on this new ruleset, than actually get this book and use it as my core material for future campaigns.

[vpuigdoller]

I will Probably never play this version of the game but I do enjoy reading the changes and ideas behind them.

[EunoiaRPG]

I wonder if they tried divine smite being a reaction instead of a bonus action. I'd rather keep my bonus action spells and lose a potential attack of opportunity that I can't smite on anyway
I might end up homebrewing it to be that way if I still don't like it after a while

And I always saw ranger as 'ranger is to druid as paladin is to cleric.' The martial sibling that shares some of the flavour. In my heart of hearts I was hoping they would give rangers an ability that played with vulnerability. Like, if you hit the target of your hunters mark, you can choose to end the spell in exchange for making the target vulnerable to your weapon attacks until the end of your next turn

[DaVeO]

is it better art though? That's subjective I guess. Maybe compared to its previous version. But it's not the best in the field by far.

[lexmtaylor]

Grappling is nerfed. There is very few ways to improve your ability to connect on a grapple. Expertise was a great way to allow a skilled player to be good at grappling.

[Itachi]

I can’t say much about ranger but the Only good thing the book gives so far is rules that needed to be addressed that was never clarified are now explained or expanded I don’t agree with subclass leveling being all the same especially the warlock narratively and some of the nerfs to classes but I’m glad to see actual work done but some areas are not as groundbreaking as it’s being portrayed

[jspsj]

I'm very excited for these books. And if they keep the playtest changes, I'm overall very satisfied.

[philippemarcil]

Based on your review, I feel the the changes are very minors and my players would likely enjoy playing with third-party classes, subclasses or lineages rather than playing with updated base class.

I'll wait for the free creative common version to add the relevant changes to my games as to not give any money to Hasbro/WotC.

[sortehuse]

I think the new Ranger look good. The Ranger has more spells and many of their spell have been improved. Hunters mark now does force damage. Also most of the subclasses have been greatly improved.