I know what you may have heard – “Don’t you Christians think Dungeons & Dragons is satanic? Way ahead of you. So, why are we reviewing the 5th edition again? Well, the people over at Wizards of the Coast have been tooling around with different rules for the past few years, testing edits in optional rulebooks known as *Unearthed Arcana*’s. After enough finagling, they’ve finally codified those changes into the 2nd edition of, uh, 5th edition. (We’re just going to call it 5.5, ok?) While the purpose of this is to be backwards compatible with the 5th edition, in this review we’re going to see if it truly gels. We’ll look at what is new, as well as how the new Player’s Handbook stands up to the old one. If you’re new to role playing games, read Homs’ article linked above – he goes over the basic rules. Let’s delve in!
The first thing that you’ll notice is the vast amount of art added to this book. While I thought there was plenty in the 5th edition at the time, looking back it feels much more barren than 5.5. The new illustrations are sumptuous; most are even downright inspiring, which is exactly what you want for people new to the hobby. The art will sustain their interest while they learn the ropes, and it rekindles something in us more seasoned adventurers. In particular, the art in the character creation chapters is just fantastic.
But there’s more to this book than just a fresh coat of paint. Let’s go over some of the rule differences, rapid fire:
- Influence – as an action in combat, you can attempt to sway a non-player character’s (NPC) behavior towards you. Using animal handling, you can even attempt to sway a creature’s attitude towards you.
- Mastery properties – every weapon, even your rusty farm scythe, has mastery properties now. If you gain mastery through your class, background or feat, the weapon gains an additional effect.
- Tools more clearly defined – (p. 220) Tools are more clearly defined and have more function – now you can use a toolset to craft certain items, and the ability checks a toolset lets you make are more clearly spelled out. In 5e, tools feel mostly like flavor that you can use in any which way – certainly more free, but most people will just forget it’s in their inventory.
- Consumables – potions and anti-toxins now only take a bonus action, instead of an entire action. This is a change that seems small that will have a bigger impact than you’d think, as now people won’t have to choose between attacking or healing themselves.
- Rules glossary – they’ve added a beefy rules section at the end of the book, clarifying any of the rules that are only lightly sketched earlier in the book. This will be a fantastic resource in the middle of a session whenever a rule check is called for.
- Various name changes – Monks have focus now, not ki – I suppose this allows for a wider interpretation of different monastic orders. I’m not sure why else they’d change it. Inspiration is now called heroic inspiration. When creating a character, you choose a species now, not a race. This change is a bit odder – firstly (and least importantly), it sounds a smidge overly scientific for a fantasy world. (“The race of men are doomed” just sounds better than “the species”, I’m sorry.) But that’s just a quibble.
This name change presumably came up because of racism in our world. The word can certainly be fraught when gamified – “ah yes, that race is much better at running and hiding, while this race is better at athletic feats.” But taxonomically, race is not really accurate. Species is more accurate to the differences between us and our fantastical counterparts – it’s an objective fact that a dragonborn would be stronger than me (well, if dragonborn were real). But what confuses me is they removed stat bonuses from species as well, grafting them onto backgrounds instead. It’s not like there are no differences between species – now each species gets around 3 traits, which is a concession I’m happy to get. It just feels like when a species is physically different than you, that would affect your physical stats. I’m not mad or disappointed, just ludonarratively confused. (It does allow for a more free approach to character creation though. Now you can make an orc rogue without it feeling like it hampers your gameplay.)
In our review for Fabula Ultima, I noted that I liked the layout for the 5th edition handbook. You learn the most basic rules, and then it fast tracks you to character creation so you can stay invested while more rules are introduced. In 5.5e, they still keep this structure, but the basic rules are padded with plenty of examples. For some maybe this will help, but to me it felt overly long – I was itching to get my character made and was annoyed at all the clarifications it felt were necessary. Rules are fine, but it’s got to stay accessible for those not yet on the hook. You want them to keep their eyes on the prize and get into the nitty gritty in the rules glossary later. On that note, I wasn’t a fan of the new character sheet either; specifically, it was difficult to find where my ability scores for certain skills were. There were some aesthetic improvements but if it doesn’t retain the function, what’s the point of it as a tool?
Overall, even with my nitpicks, the 2024 edition of the Player’s Handbook does enough heavy lifting to convince me it was worth making. It will be a handier reference than its preceding edition, and its gorgeous presentation will mean all I’ll have to do to be inspired is crack the book open.
See you next time, when the Dungeon Master’s Guide is rereleased November 12th.
Scoring: 86%
Gameplay: 4.5 / 5
Structure: 4 / 5
Art: 4.75 / 5
Accessibility: 4 / 5
Morality/Parental Warnings
Due to the nature of tabletop role-playing games, its moral content will vary based on who you play with. So choose your party well, and have a “session 0” where the tone for the campaign will be set ahead of time! In my opinion there are narratives that warrant exploring, which might mean your character makes an evil choice. Others will disagree with this and argue one should make moral choices even while roleplaying. For me, because it’s a role and people are imperfect, it feels narratively more true to life that my characters are flawed too. Those evil choices can redound back on my character, or lead to consequences they needed to experience. In short, you need your Boromirs just as much as you need your Faramirs.
The Player’s Handbook itself doesn’t have much that needs calling out for parents. Maybe an immodest illustration or two, if I’m looking for something, but overall it’s a tame and family friendly book.
