Player's Handbook - Deluxe Edition: A 4th Edition Core Rulebook

Dungeons & Dragons

by Wizards of the Coast

This deluxe volume is a special edition of the 4th Edition core rulebook that every Dungeons and Dragons player and Dungeon Master can appreciate. This book features embossed premium foil covers and premium gilt-edged paper. The Dungeons and Dragons Roleplaying Game has defined the medieval fantasy genre and the tabletop RPG industry for more than 30 years. In the D and D game players create characters that band together to explore dungeons slay monsters and find treasure. The 4th Edition D and D rules offer the best possible play experience by presenting exciting character options an elegant and robust rules system and handy storytelling tools for the Dungeon Master. The Player's Handbook presents the official Dungeons and Dragons Roleplaying Game rules as well as everything a player needs to create D and D characters worthy of song and legend: new character races base classes paragon paths epic destinies powers magic items weapons armor and much more. This 320-page Player's Handbook is the first of three core rulebooks required to play the 4th Edition Dungeons and Dragons Roleplaying Game. The improved page layout and presentation enables new and established players to understand and learn the 4th Edition D and D rules quickly.

Genres: Role Playing Games, Fantasy, Gaming, Dungeons and Dragons, Reference, Games, Fiction

320 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 2008

About the author

Wizards of the Coast LLC (often referred to as WotC /ˈwɒtˌsiː/ or simply Wizards) is an American publisher of games, primarily based on fantasy and science fiction themes, and formerly an operator of retail stores for games. Originally a basement-run role-playing game publisher, the company popularized the collectible card game genre with Magic: The Gathering in the mid-1990s, acquired the popular Dungeons & Dragons role-playing game by purchasing the failing company TSR, and experienced tremendous success by publishing the licensed Pokémon Trading Card Game. The company's corporate headquarters are located in Renton, Washington in the United States.[1]

Wizards of the Coast publishes role-playing games, board games, and collectible card games. They have received numerous awards, including several Origins Awards. The company has been a subsidiary of Hasbro since 1999. All Wizards of the Coast stores were closed in 2004.

Reviews

[Ganglion Bard-barbarian · Rating 1 out of 5]

D&D is about improvised acting, cooperative story-telling, bonding with friends, and strategic thinking. At least that's real D&D played across the country by hardcore nerds who have resisted this awful new edition.

D&D 4th edition is about selling plastic miniatures, unnecessary rule books, and allowing pathetic people to live vicariously through obscenely overpowered player-characters.

Asethetically speaking the original D&D was a bizarre mix of the creators' diverse interests: Tolkien, Vance, Lieber, Moorcock, Lovecraft, Clark Ashton Smith, Greek mythology, samurai films, space opera, classic Universal Studios horror films, and so forth. The rust monster, land shark, and owl-bear were originally cheap plastic monster toys from Hong Kong that Gygax used as handy monsters miniatures. As contrast, 4th edition is focused around selling shitty, mass-produced "official" plastic D&D miniatures. Imagination has no place in 21st century roleplaying!

[Keelan · Rating 5 out of 5]

4e is the Twilight of roleplaying games. It's the edition that everyone loves to hate, but although I admit I've ranted about it's flaws on-and-off since I started playing D&D, I still like 4e.

Is it as good as Pathfinder? No. There aren't nearly as many character options, the feats are awful, each fight takes hours, and it's really hard to fiddle with the system as a DM.

Now, I've just thrown out a lot of opinion there without qualifying it; in a complete breakdown of logic, it is the 'badness' (technical term) of the mechanics which is why I like 4e.

To put it bluntly, 4e is bad because it tells you what to do and how to do it. Every class uses 'powers', a very video-gamey concept that locks each class into it's niche and doesn't allow much room for improvisation or roleplay. You don't say 'I'm going to draw my sword, kick down the door and charge the orc chieftain, howling a blood-curdling war-cry', you say 'I'm going to activate my power attack stance and use my basic attack on the orc chieftain'. For an experienced player, it kills the game.

Which is why I believe 4e wasn't designed for experienced players.

For new players, it's amazing. I always had a hard time trying to convince other people to play D&D. I finally managed to get some of my friends at school (back when I was at school) to give 4th a try, and they liked it. It was easy to get into because it's what they were used to, except instead of on a screen, it was all on paper.

4e has chapters dedicated on how to roleplay, how to write a good character background, which is something that my main system, Pathfinder, never really goes into detail on. With Pathfinder, it's assumed you know these things already, whereas 4e assumes you've never touched a d20 before.

When you enter into an entirely new hobby, especially one as alien as D&D, its nice to have a halfway-house like 4th edition, which is both familiar, and not. The learning curve is a lot less steep than Pathfinder or GURPs. So yes, 4e is the inferior system, but it has its place, and it does what it does very well.

And I'll say one more thing. I don't play 4e with miniatures. Same goes for Pathfinder.

Fight me.

(Or don't, because as much as I like to play human fighters, I've never even gone near aggressive contact in real life, and I get the feeling I'd only be worth a bit of XP, at best.)

[Bettie]

There is to be a D&D marathon overnight tomorrow. Four Gentlemen Nerds.

Opening - Imagine a world of bold warriors, mighty wizards and terrible monsters.

The art work alone is worth the skim through. Fab!

[Randy Lander · Rating 4 out of 5]

Like most relatively satisfied 3.5 players, I was somewhat skeptical of 4th edition. But the more I heard about it, the more I liked, and now that I've started GMing the game, I would never go back. Running a 4th Edition game is *so* much more fun and tons easier as a GM.

The adaptation of every class to an identical "power" system of at-will, daily and encounter is a good way to standardize learning the rules and applying them in play, but at the same time, there's a ton of variety in how the classes work. A party is now really integrated, with each character playing a different and important role. It's a little more structured than the multiclass-at-will 3.5 or even the chaotic nature of 1st and 2nd edition D&D, but it's also user-friendly and cinematic.

The skills, updated from a big list to a focused list and now with a "You either know how to do it a little bit or you're really good at it" mechanic, are not terribly realistic, but they work for adventurers that should have a bit of jack-of-all-trades about them, and using them is a snap compared to the point-based system of 3.5.

Feats, the key improvement of D&D 3rd edition, take a bit of a backseat to all the nifty powers, but they are a nice way to flesh out your character a bit and individualize them so that not every fighter looks alike, for example.

The rituals are a good idea made overly complicated, and unfortunately the focus on combat has left wizards a bit bleh, in some ways. No more clever uses of silence or illusion magic, it's all blast and fire now, and silence, mage lock and other spells are relegated to long-winded, out-of-combat rituals. It's a nice idea, but it probably could have used more time in the workshop to really let the wizards shine, instead of just making them secondary blasters ala the new warlocks.

As with all of WOTC's books, the organization is pretty terrible. The book looks beautiful, and it's actually a fairly readable book, which is not the standard for game manuals, but at the same time, it has a barely-functional one-page index (when it could have used something much more exhaustive) and the rules are not cross-referenced as heavily as they should be. A little more "see page XX" throughout would have been handy, especially given the uselessness of the index.

That said, the organization and some minor rules issues are just that... minor problems. Overall, this is a slick, very playable upgrade of the system.

[Dan · Rating 4 out of 5]

At the risk of being marked a heretic, I'm going to give the 4th edition revision of Dungeons & Dragons four stars. Why?

I've been playing D & D since the early 1980s, and though my fondness for the Tom Moldvay Basic Dungeons & Dragons and the 1st edition Advanced Dungeons & Dragons knows very few bounds one has to admit that those iterations of the game rules were arcane at best. I recall how difficult it was to bring in new players; how daunting they found the rules structure; and the high learning curve involved in what often ended up being many contradictions... and the many holes plugged by house rules. D & D 4th edition, although not my favorite manifestation of the classic game, is without a doubt the most elegant and balanced game system of the bunch... if you look at it as purely a game system, it is superior to all the previous versions. Go ahead and throw the rotten eggs and veggies now...
I have to further admit that I prefer the minor revision made to these rules in the Dungeons & Dragons: Heroes of the Fallen Lands, Heroes of the Forgotten Kingdoms, and Dungeon Master's Kit rule books -- the 4th edition system received its finest refinement in these publications. Still, I hold to my assertion that the rules don't matter as much as the enjoyment of the group playing and because of that I consider myself "system agnostic." If I had to choose a personal preference at gun point, that continues to be the 3.5 revision of the D & D rules but I've recently run both 1st and 2nd edition AD&D games for players who had never been exposed to those rule sets, and we had a blast... and I've participated in the D&DNext Playtest, and that rule set is fine as well. Are any of these rule sets perfect? Hell no... of course not. Like many things in the wide world of fandom, we love these games often more for their imperfections and for the rousing good time they're all capable of creating.

[Juho Pohjalainen · Rating 3 out of 5]

A lot of people dislike 4th edition because it's different - the redheaded stepchild of all the editions, that took things too far, made them too unfamiliar and strange for the hardcore fans. But it's not really all that bad at all: it has a perfectly fine function as a tactical small-scale battle system, even if that's not what you've played Dungeons & Dragons for up until this point.

That's still enough to give it a leg over the 5th edition, which by contrast isn't particularly good at anything.

[Evan Waters · Rating 5 out of 5]

D&D 4th Edition may, paradoxically, be the most underrated RPG of all time. Sure, it was on the NYT Bestseller List and D&D Insider was practically a license to print money, but historically it's been remembered as the edition that betrayed the essence of Dungeons & Dragons and let Pathfinder take the lead because they had the REAL game, and Thank God 5th Edition set everything to rights.

This of course is garbage. If the gaming public turned on 4th Edition it was no fault of the game itself, which in terms of actual design and enabling what it's supposed to, is equalled only by the classic BECMI books. It's dense and complex, but beautifully fair; there are no false choices, every class is about as good as each other, and non-magic types get access to a wonderful range of tactical options. While some may balk at giving all classes "powers" on the same structure, it opens up new space in design- Fighters can punish enemies who try to go after the softer, squishier PCs, Warlords can restore HP through sheer heroic inspiration, and even the spellcasters have unique roles.

The game simply works. It enables a specific kind of action heavy, kick-down-the-door fantasy which D&D sometimes seemed to promise (remember that Red Box cover?) but never fully supported. That may limit it somewhat, especially if you're fond of the more heist-like play suggested by early editions, but there's something to be said for doing one thing well instead of trying to be many things at once.

The real tragedy is, because this was never released under an Open Game License, we may never see anyone truly pick up the ball that Wizards dropped when support for this game was ended. Right now the RPG field seems to take a skeptical view of things like "tactical complexity" and "balance", but, well, things may change. I hope.

[Daniel · Rating 4 out of 5]

I liked it, sometimes even against my own will. I like the game that's in these pages, and I'm excited to play it. Whether it is/isn't D&D I'll leave for later; I'll take this game for what it is and enjoy it as such.

[Hano Tahir · Rating 4 out of 5]

The Dungeons & Dragons 4e player's handbook is a must have starter book for D&D 4e players. It comes with a whole new set of classes, such as warlock and new races like Dragonborn and Tieflings. But still it is very confusing and is more of a refernce than a guide.

[H · Rating 2 out of 5]

I liked it but it was a bit dense and technical, so I didnt finish in full.

[Roberta · Rating 4 out of 5]

Dungeon and Dragons released its 4th edition this summer, and it is a change from the other editions in a number of ways.


Some of the changes from 3.5 to 4.0 include different starting player races and classes, the change from feats and class powers to at-will, encounter, and daily powers, a smaller and streamlined skill list, new magic item system, rituals for more power spells.

The book itself is 330 pages and longer than the Dungeon Master's guide (DMG). In the past, the magic items have been in the DMG, but in 4E the magic items have been placed in the player's handbook.

The book is divided into 10 chapters. The first chapter is the intro for the new player and explains the core mechanic of the system aka the D20 dice, which is rolled for everything but damage.

Chapter two is character creation, which includes generating ability scores, alignment, good and unaligned deities, example personality traits, mannerisms, appearance, background, and basic languages.

Chapter Three lists the character races. Each entry is two pages and gives a short summer that includes racial traits for height and weight, ability scores, languages, and race related powers. Also included are physical qualities about each race, tips for roleplaying the race, sample names, and sample characters with short backgrounds to give the newbie ideas of what to play. The races include: dragonborn (lizard man with breath weapon), dwarf (same as before), eladrin (high elf), elf (wood elf in previous editions), half-elf (same as before), halfling (same as before), human (same as before), and tiefling (a race from the monster's manual that was a +1 ECL in 3.5). Left out of the basic edition were half-orcs and gnomes.

In this edition of D&D no race is penalized with negatives to an attribute. All base races except for humans get a +2 to 2 stats. You might think that playing a human would put you at a disadvantage, but the lack of a second attribute is okay since humans choose whatever attribute they want to put their single +2 in, they get an additional at-will power, +1 to all defenses, an additional feat, and an additional skill.

If you are not looking for a specific niche, I recommend you play a human just for the extras you would get. That being said, each race seems to have better builds than others.

The third chapter discusses character classes. The first section discusses briefly each class, the paragon paths, and epic destinies. Then, they explain each type of power and have a few pages on how to read the power descriptions.

One thing they left out in the powers section was what an entry such as 1 [W] means. They explain this particular shorthand in the weapon section and the combat section but not in the powers section in chapter three which is earlier in the book. For those who are curious an entry that says 1, 2, 3 or higher number followed by a [W] means multiply your weapon's damage by 1, 2, 3, or a higher number, so if you have a weapon with 2d4 damage and the powers does 2 [W] damage then you would do 4d4 damage.

After the explanation of how to read powers they list the classes. Each class has a two page description that includes what traits you get, what proficiencies, bonuses to defense, hit points, healing surges, trained skills, the build options, and the class features. Then you have all of the at-will, encounter, daily, and utility powers as well as paragon path powers listed following the basic description for each class.

The classes included in the base edition are cleric, fighter, paladin, ranger, rogue, warlock, warlord, and wizard. Left out were barbarians, bards, druids, monks, and sorcerers while warlock and warlord are new editions (Warlock was a base class but not in the main 3.5 players book). My understanding is that some of those classes will be in the Player's Handbook II coming out next year.

Some changes to note from 3.5. Each class has powers based on level. At first level, you get 2 at-will (unless you are human), 1 encounter (not counting racial powers), and 1 daily power. The at-will powers you can use on a standard action, the encounter powers you can use once during a battle and then regain after five minutes of rest, and the daily powers can be used once in a 12 hour period (you must rest 6 hours first). The paragon path is a specialization that you take in your class at 11th level, and epic destiny is what you want to do for your character's end game which decide at 21st level but should conclude when you make 30th level.

Each class has at least two options for what they call builds. As an example, you can build a battle cleric or a devoted cleric. The battle cleric concentrates on fighting first and healing second while the devoted cleric concentrates on healing first and fighting second. The paragon paths allow you to specialize even more so that a cleric can become an angelic avenger (servant for their god), divine oracle (deals in prophecy and omens), a radiant servant (probably aimed at undead but does radiant damage powers), and warpriest (you attack and gain healing abilities).

At the end of this chapter are descriptions of epic destinies of which there are only four options: archmage, deadly trickster, demigod, and eternal seeker. I assume that future supplements will contain more epic destinies as this section of the book is the weakest part in my opinion. Essentially, you choose one of these options and get extra abilities at level 21 and higher.

Also, each class is supposed to fulfill a role in the party. Fighters and paladins are defenders (up front), rangers rogues, and warlocks are strikers (attacking from range or moving quickly to strike and out of the way), clerics and warlords are leaders (attack and support the other players with healing) and wizards are controllers (staying in the middle and hitting opponents with massive area effect powers).

Some strange things to note--paladins are proficient in all armor and shields but not in martial ranged while fighters are proficient in all weapons except for superior melee/ranged weapons (formerly known as exotic weapons proficiencies), but aren't proficient in plate.

Chapter five details skills while chapter six details feats. There are 17 skills in the game now and they can be used trained or untrained by all classes. The feats are not as powerful but you get them every other level and they can modify divine abilities, racial abilities, class abilities, or simply give you a proficiency or skill you can't get because of your class.

To multiclass, you must pick up to 4 feats and you can gain some powers related to a second class, but you must forego a paragon path to get really powerful in the second class.

Chapter seven details equipment, which is broken down by armor, weapons, adventuring gear, and magic items.
There are fewer magic items, so I can only assume they will add more in future additions.

While they don't have treasure tables to roll random magic items anymore, they list each magic item by type alphabetically and have a chart listing each item by level from 1st to 30th level making it easy to select magic items to give a party as treasure.

Chapters eight and nine sum up the rules for adventuring and combat encounters.

The combat chapter is well detailed with tables and pictures to show how combat works.

I like the new combat system. For the GM, you can use your npc characters and the monster manual and easily run combats for a dozen or more creatures much easier than 3.5.

A battle map is extremely helpful for this gaming system, if you don't like using a battle map, I honestly would recommend that you stick with an earlier edition. I don't think this game translates well to combat without a battle map, but I suppose you can use the basic rules as guidelines and toss out a lot of combat items if you don't want to be heavy on combat moves.

The last chapter contains rituals for the game. Some of the move powerful magic abilities are contained in this chapter.

Overall, I think the game is very different from 3.5. It isn't for all tastes; it definitely has taken a page from collectible card games and MMORPGs, but that isn't bad. We essentially have a new, revamped game for a new generation of gamer. I like playing the game and running the game.

Some hard core D&D gamers will hate this version and burn it after reading it (okay they'll probably just sell it on ebay) and stick to the edition they like best, but I, for one, will enjoy playing it even if my gaming group says they'd just as soon play 3.5.

So yes, I like the game, I enjoy running it, I would enjoy playing it, but I would never play it without a battlemap, and I would recommend that everyone have the player's handbook (if you don't ever intend to GM, then you really don't need any other books unless you play a specific campaign setting or want to get the later releases of player's handbooks).

Oh, and Wizards of the Coasts is building online support that you can buy for a low monthly cost, but the website isn't finished yet. Look for D&D Insider to see what features they will be offering in the coming months.

Out of five stars, I would give this supplement a solid four stars.

[Dave Brothers · Rating 3 out of 5]

Not a terrible edition despite the amount of hate it gets. Played and ran a couple of games in this edition and while I enjoyed the time I had there, probably won't go back now.

I see how they were tweaking some of the mechanics and presentation to maybe appeal to a generation of folks who were turned on to the conceits of fantasy and RP in general through video games and movies. There were a lot of good, well-written, accessible resources for it. My biggest complaint is the sheer number of books needed to really get started -- Corellon help you if your friends and you didn't want to play the "right" set of classes to only need one of the Player's Handbooks...

[James W · Rating 3 out of 5]

As a novice who entered into my first DnD game last night, this comprehensive rule book provides a great introduction into DnD, helping explain the fundamentals and creating one's first character.

I will note that it is quite dense and can be really confusing at times, but it provides great background. Would recommend trying one of the apps which doesn't have chunks of text and cutes resources from this book instead.

[Liz · Rating 2 out of 5]

I get that they were trying to draw in new and younger players, but this edition was just a mess. If you felt that 3.5 was too rules and books heavy (and I do understand that there were A LOT of additional books outside of the core material); this could be good for you.

I'd skip this one and switch to 5e. It's got the same stripped down feel without the infantile attack system that 4e uses.

[Christopher · Rating 2 out of 5]

A mistake. An error. But not an unforgiveable one. You see what they were trying to do here. Its just unnecessary for a tabletop game to come out well past the point of the normalization of computer gaming to be like this. Had this come out instead of, say Second edition in 1989, it would have been revolutionary and dominated the field for a long time. But it came out in like 2008.

[Joseph Riina · Rating 4 out of 5]

4e
is
good

but i get why there were complaints about it
It's a very nice system, very clean, very organized, but I'm not sure D&D should be so regular and put together
It kinda loses the mysticism I guess
It's a great tactics game though

[Alexander Lenz · Rating 4 out of 5]

A good, colourful update to DnD that understood its basic mechanism and where the game was going. Sad to see that a lot of good was destroyed by its competitors. The book itself, well spaced, good texts, good mechanics, nice layout. Well playable from 1 to 30.

[Maurick Starkvind · Rating 4 out of 5]

The 4th edition of Dungeons & Dragons is what motivated me to write a fantasy campaign.

[Victoria Hawco · Rating 3 out of 5]

Honestly it gets a bad rap

[Eleanor Paul · Rating 5 out of 5]

If I am inexperienced and mediocre as a DM, dread being my ally. I have tried it once, and had no chance to find whether I enjoy it or not. My family assumes that I do best in the role of DM because I am the one who can build worlds in my head and thinks up stories. But another thing I enjoy I acting, so I can see this from the perspective of the plot and the player. I will also try to see it from a perspective other than my preferences for playing.
Race:
Dragonborn: my brother's race of choice. I think it is a perfect addition to the game. It is a dragon, a fantasy favorite, without the limitations of being a monster.
Dwarf: dwarf is not a favorite of mine, but that is personal preference. These dwarves are fine, but they are also nothing special in the fantasy world. The attempts to make them so are clearly that.
Eladrin: this is another fun, special race, but will never be truly independent from elves.
Elf: where would fantasy be without elves? They did not need to change the nature of elves at all to make them perfect for the game.
Half-elf: although this is a favorite of mine, it really is just a combination of human and elf. It has no special traits that so not come from either race or the fact that if us a mix.
Out of curiosity,if humans and elves can interbreed, can't elves and Eladrin? They are such similar races. What about humans and Eladrin? Who can half-elves have children with?
Human: in fantasy, humans are generally content in isolation and thus very stupid. I could tell that it was hard to think of what was good about them, because fantasy gives no clues. I think versatility was a good choice. Although, I am often surprised out of all the fantastic races, I would pick human, even though I often do.
Tiefling: this is another good race. They are independent of humans, but they have a story that leaves so much room. They seem fun and intriguing to play, and they do not seem forced into any role.

Class:

Cleric: clerics are the only class that is geared towards the rest of the party. This is clearer at the higher levels, so at the beginning they are a little to focused on melee fighting than healing, almost like less skilled paladins. It seems like it is best for those who can stick with it.
Fighter: the fighter class is exactly what it needs to be: high hit points and AC, expert at melee fighting.
Paladin: the best points of fighter and cleric, combined into one.
Ranger:
Rogue: the rogue class is geared towards the trickster rogue. I enjoy his the powers are heavy geared towards stealth and putting you and your allies at the advantage instead if direct attacks. In do not understand, though, how someone with a rogue-type background would have proficiency with a shuriken, which is supposed to be a more exotic weapon.
Warlock: warlock is a favorite class of mine. The powers for the different pacts are mostly different, but sometimes, they are very much the same.
Warlord: Warlord is not a personal favorite, but it is a good class. The attacks deal less damage, but they benefit other characters, and differently than clerics and paladins.
Wizard: wizard is exactly what is expected and needed. You blast enemies with some kind of energy, or inflict and ongoing condition while hiding behind tougher allies. They are perfect at what they are meant for, and without warlock, they might be favorite class. I just enjoy dealing with devils.

Feats: There is something here for everyone.

Equipment: everything's covered

[Max · Rating 3 out of 5]

So I was reading some stuff online about D&D that had me feeling nostalgia for Fourth Edition. Therefore I thought it'd be fun to revisit the books. Turns out the problem with that is a lot of the stuff I'm nostalgic for is all the neat setting/worldbuilding stuff - the World Axis cosmology that actually made the planes feel interesting to me, the Points of Light concept for the baseline fantasy world, and so forth. And generally speaking there's not a lot of that in the player's handbook.

Instead what is here is rules, and rules, and more rules, for an edition of D&D I still occasionally want to play but likely wouldn't. Even aside from the general problems of finding a group, 4E had a lot of patches and changes over the course of its lifetime. And while what's printed in this book isn't unplayable, it doesn't actually reflect the final form that a lot of the powers and other widgets reached - but that final form is now gated behind whatever process is involved in pirating the old support software or its data. So, you know, that kinda sucks.

It was still kinda fun to read through this, even if it ended up taking me a while. I do overall like the idea of the at-will/encounter/daily/utility powers model for giving everyone fun toys to play with, and it's cool to see that a lot of powers for the martial characters involve basically "do an attack and inflict a status ailment". The action economy also feels like one of the best versions and the Warlord is great and really needs a comeback. Plus there are hints of the cool setting stuff here, like the Eladrin from the feywild and the inclusion of Dragonborn and Tieflings as core races. Rituals, epic destinies, and including magic items in the player book rather than hiding them all in the DM's guide are all cool ideas. And while a lot of those things feel like they don't have enough options here, I appreciate that unlike the current edition where what you get in the core books is basically it, 4E was still during the supplement treadmill so there's plenty more cool toys out there in the supplemental books.

So it was at times kinda fun to revisit this. And I'm a bit tempted to read some more books, either stuff I remember loving back in the day like the Manual of the Planes and other cool setting stuff, or things I didn't read, like the Power books that have more fiddly mechanical bits. But on the other hand, given how long it took me to read this, there may be something to be said for reading an RPG rulebook that I'm more likely to actually use one of these days.

[Scott Lee · Rating 3 out of 5]

Reviewing this one, like reviewing Player's Handbook II is a little weird for me. I am not an experienced gamer, and so do not feel qualified to review the games itself (which is what almost every review does, either attack or defend 4th Edition D&D as compared to previous editions), at the same time, reviewing a rulebook as a book the way I'd review new Tad Williams or Orson Scott Card doesn't quite work either.

So I'm stuck with a halfway review. I'm currently playing my first D&D campaign ever, and am enjoying it tremendously. I borrowed my DM's copy of this book, and have read the 4th edition player's strategy guide and player's handbook 2 as mentioned above. I've enjoyed it enough to want to do that. The Player's Strategy Guide, which was closer to a normal non-fiction book, as it is not a rule book like these player's handbooks, I enjoyed tremendously.

These handbooks, as books, are a mixed bag. They aren't designed to be read cover to cover as I read them, and if they were, they wouldn't be serviceable as rulebooks. Parts of the book I found fascinating. My "gaming" experience is limited to video game RPGs as described above, but even there one of my favorite parts was creating characters. Reading about the races created for this game and then the various classes and their powers was, consequently, a lot of fun. Not a ripping, fantastic read, but fascinating in a way, and it got me thinking about all the characters I'd like to create and thoroughly explained my options and how they work. That's what a rule book is supposed to do right?

Other bits were more of a catalog of items, skills, or feats, and that while a little interesting, was not nearly as much fun to read, and I probably, if I were to do it over again, would wait and look as it became game relevant. Again, my review reflects the weird way I read the book, and an attempt to balance the book as a book, vs. the book as a tool.

So three stars. It usefully provides what I need to play the game, which is the purpose of a rule book. I found what I wanted, the self-referential material is fairly well indicated and referenced for easy comparison of related but separate sections of the text, and everything was clearly written and understandable. As book--well it wasn't meant to be read like a normal book was it?

[Michael Phillips · Rating 5 out of 5]

If I had known I could review gaming rulebooks on this site... woah boy...

To my friends and those few people following my reviews, sorry for the nerdy segue... which, as I wrote it, turned into a one-sided conversation for some reason.

Ok, I gave this book 5 stars because...

Yeah, 5.

No, stop that, I've heard all the arguments.

Yes, I loved 3.5 too.

No, I don't think they made all the classes feel the same with the new power system.

No, multiclassing isn't gone, they just gave it an actual penalty by making you use feats to...

If you don't think Dragonborn make sense as a basic race, don't allow them in your game.

Of course they're releasing partial information in each book to make more money... but is that anything new?

Look, the long and short of it is this:
When you're not in combat, most D&D games, in fact, most table-top role-playing games in general, are exactly the same, except when you're in combat. Skill checks may be done on different dice, etc., but 95% of the difference between any 2 game systems, will be found during combat. And 4th edition got combat right.

With a balanced party, combat in 4th edition combines elements of traditional table-top play with chess and card games. Combatants jockey for position, which is an important part of combat in 4.0, and the powers of different classes fit together in such a variety of interesting ways, that there's always a new edge to look for, always another angle to play.

If you're frustrated with combat, I highly recommend printing out power cards. It takes away a lot of the memory. I shuffle through mine during my teammate's turns, deciding what to do next, like a board game, and anything that gains me an extra square of ground is a boon not to be squandered.

Skill and ability checks are straightforward and mathematically balanced, and a good DM has always gone much farther than a good rulebook. It's the combat that keeps me looking forward to my Saturday games. Man, I can't wait to play.

[Matt · Rating 4 out of 5]

(See opening sentence on 3rd Ed review)

DnD 4th edition avoids most of the issues I have with 3rd edition. It's cleaner, it's simpler, it has a stronger and more consistent core mechanic, and above all it knows what it's trying to do. It also manages to swing the balance back towards the center from 3e's very combat-oriented rules (mainly by trimming combat rules rather than fleshing out everything else much more).

At the broad level, it does a nice job of handling both effects and states, it has a clean notation, and from fairly simple rules it creates some very nice interactions. In particular things like the interplay between say a Warlord and a Rogue (in terms of movement and positioning) stand out as giving a lot of emergent, strongly multi-player opportunities from fairly simple rules.

At a more narrow level, it manages to fairly thoroughly fix the problems previous editions had with both fighters and mages using a single system: a big stack of different powers for each class with varying reuse restrictions. Mages are no longer fun/overpowered until they run out of spells and become utterly useless until the entire party takes a break, and fighters now have something to do in combat.

The criticism often leveled at 4e of being MMO-like I honestly can't say I care about at a systems level. So what? A lot of MMOs are pretty well designed, why not steal from them? A slightly more damning charge is that the unified class system results in homogeneity and, ultimately, class-level blandness. This I can see the argument for, although ultimately I think it's a criticism rooted in a change of direction for the series rather than of the rules themselves. YMMV.

I would describe 4e as "very well designed, if a little lacking in character"

[Viktor Davion · Rating 1 out of 5]

Well it's about a year I'm playing D&D 3.5ed. Actually I played D&D later but it was only adopted PC games. When we started playing with friends we were very excited. It was really fun. And it is of course. Some months ago I took a look on 4ed. Well from first glance I didn't like it. Well when I finished reading PHB 4ed I didn't like it from more precise glance too. The main things I don't like:
1) All character classes become something similar (all of them have powers that works similar for all classes)
2) Save system smthing. vs smthing (e.g. Int. vs Ref. when casting AoE spells), I really like old system: saves vs DC. I don't think that this change simplify smthing.
3) Not obvious HP rate. Constitution doesn't affect HP much now. You almost always can tell what HP has opponent if you know his level.
4) New skill system. Bad, very bad. Now I can't put 5 points to Perform(dance) skill and 10 to Perform(sing), just because I want to be very good at singing and able to dance well. Oh shi...! There is no Perform skill! That's another point.
5) Social part of role playing is reduced almost to nothing! Your characters are just walking killing machines, not living creatures. Fail.
6) Where is system of craft magic items? Some rituals? WTF??? Fail!

Well, in conclusion I want to say one thing. If WOTC released this game not like D&D 4ed but like D&D Minis or smthing like this it will be fine. You ca really build sessions with just combat with this. That's ok! It can be fun. But it's not real D&D where your char is living in real world and his purpose is not only killing monsters and enemies but smthing else distinct from elimination monster population.

[David · Rating 2 out of 5]

I have not played a game with 4th Ed. so this review is just on the surface and based on impressions.

First off, just want to kudos to WotC for trying to simplify the D&D mechanics to attract new blood. Too bad they took it in a wrong direction.

As others have already mentioned, this edition was a step backwards. For years, it's always been CRPGs attempting to simulate the tabletop experience. 4th Ed. was the other way round. D&D became too mechanical - to the point that it feels like a video game, and not a role-playing game. There was too much focus on combat-oriented rules. The 4th edition did not come out of 3.5 - it came out of D&D miniatures.

I liked the skills simplification, but I disliked the class-specific powers. It felt like an attempt to provide options, but instead it created stereotypes ala MMORPGs. Multi-class no longer exists - just like MMORPGs... in their place are silly feats that lets you use powers from other classes.

Based on these almost enforced stereotypes, three of my favourite characters can't be satisfactorily recreated - the mechanics don't support the flavour. Some of the saddest changes (to me) are the revamp of ranger favoured enemy and animal companions (gone) and the removal of spell schools. But I did like the idea of turning some of the more utility spells into rituals - made sense. Oh, and I also hated the way they changed the way tieflings look.

But overall, it's too different from the D&D that I know. Perhaps I'm biased, perhaps I'm not. I had no problem transitioning to 3rd Ed. but I honestly don't like 4th Edition.

[Robert · Rating 5 out of 5]

I am completely pleased with the changes made to the Dungeons and Dragons game with this new installment. I have played several games, and read through the Handbook several times already, and I can't find any portion that does not make sense, streamline the game, or enhance the level of fun I am having with it.

Character generation is far easier than its ever been. The game can still cater to all kinds of players, from those who like to role play for most of the session to those who are just in it to kill stuff. Either way, creating a new character can go very quickly, and leave the player feeling like they got exactly what they wanted.

Each portion of the book is well thought out, and the new rules thoroughly explained in each section. Many areas are intentionally left open to interpretation, such as exactly how a spell looks when cast. But that is how the game should be, with each group settling on what they would like to see things do.

The classes and races are all well balanced between each other, leaving little room for unbalanced parties. It is now very difficult for one person to dominate the parties encounters, ensuring that every player has a role and a purpose, and making sure they get the chance to play out those roles.

[Love of Hopeless Causes · Rating 1 out of 5]

Best version ever. . . layout wise. Man do I love those clean white pages, the crisp blue accents, and the easy to identify colored headers. The art was. . . awkward, since everything looked flat and two dimensional somehow (does that nose really belong to that face?) It's 40K's little-big-head meets Star Wars vorpal-energy-sword-thingies. Okay, it sucks. Moving on.

At least it was bad enough to divide the gamer pool and make us reconsider what we wanted in a game. Judging by the number of retroclone successes, it was anything but this. Why?

Because miniatures are a pocket and time drain, many of us love them, but we also hate their delicate Constitutions. Furthermore, if we wanted to play video games with zero creative input, we were certainly spoiled for choice. Some called this the World of Warcraft version of D&D, some called it the Magic version of D&D. More accurately, it was the Dreamblade evolution of D&D, though few of you have enough geek points to acknowledge that without a Google assist.

Fourth managed to poison Fifth Edition as well, since I was still bitter about buying all those Fourth ed. books and never playing the game, even once. I played a 5E game at a con and said, "Meh, glad I moved on."

[Greg · Rating 4 out of 5]

Caveat on the review: I played D&D 35 years ago under the first edition rules. I am now jumping to the 4th edition without having passed go and without having collected $200. This rulebook is superior in so many ways to the first edition. It is actually well written. It covers the basics of character creation, role playing, and unlike the first edition, game mechanics. Coming at this from the first edition, there are a couple of aspects I don't particularly care fore. First, alignment has been simplified, which makes it less fun than building characters with ideologies and psychologies constructed on two orthogonal axes. The complexity of the old system was superior. Second, I don't care for the introduction of some of the new races. The original game was human-centric. Third, I don't care for the way magic users have been broken out into a whole host of different classes (when you count the Handbook 2 supplement as well). A wizard is a wizard in my book. Those criticisms aside, the general game mechanic has been streamlined and the introduction of power cards and refinement of the magic system are welcome additions.

[Matt · Rating 3 out of 5]

i like:

- the rolls are arranged vs. defenses.
- the powers (giving players more options is good.)
- that rogues are more powerful
- some of the simplifications of movement
- the reset button hit on some of the racial stuff.
- the layout of the powers is helpful for a player.

i don't like:

- #1 problem: healing is thoroughly broken. this makes the game nearly unplayable.
- spells were destroyed essentially. that sucks. that added a nice, growable flavor to the game. plus, why is fly level 16? lame.
- you know, having some weird rules actually adds to the mystique, the fun, the flavor. alignment for example... it's been dumbed down beyond being interesting.
- the exclusion of some favorite stuff like druids and gnomes.
- tieflings were better when there was more aesthetic variety in their look.
- the layout of the powers is not helpful for a dm.

I'm not sure if we'll play 4e going forward. Right now, 3.5e it is. That's not cool.