D&D (2024) WotC Fireside Chat: Revised 2024 Player’s Handbook

In this video about the upcoming revised Player’s Handnook, WotC’s Jeremy Crawford and Chris Perkins reveal a few new tidbits.

• The books are near final and almost ready to go to print
• Psionic subclasses such as the Soulknife and Psi Warrior will appear in the core books
• Named spells have art depicting their creators.
• There are new species in the PHB.

​

 

[FitzTheRuke]

Well, the thing is that it just doesn't seem like a good idea but a good idea thst would be easy to sell in a corporate meeting without requiring massive resources to pull off.

Yeah, again, it's a good idea that's also easy - the risk is far outweighed by the reward. There's a LOT of potential D&D players out there RIGHT NOW that would like to make their own Lae'zel! Throwing Gith into the PHB and you fill a niche, build cross-promotion, use unique-to-D&D IP, and please a brand new fanbase. I can't see a downside.

 

[Yaarel]

Re Gith species in the 2024 Players Handbook.

Since ability score Improvements no longer matter for the species design space, Githyanki and Githzerai can easily be two native cultures of the Gith species.

Something like:


GITH

Creature Type: Humanoid
Size: Medium
Speed: 30 feet
Lifespan: adult about 20, living to about 75 on average.

Astral Knowledge. Whenever you finish a long rest, you gain proficiency with a weapon and a tool of your choice.

Innate Spellcasting.
Level 1: cantrip, Mage Hand
Level 3: slot 1 spell, Shield
Level 5: slot 2 spell, Misty Step

Psychic Resilience. You gain Resistance to Psychic damage, and Advantage to saves against the Charmed and Frightened conditions.


(Heh, I would be fine with Detect Thoughts for the slot 2 spell if this spell didnt suck.)

 

[Kobold Stew]

Thematically it's good, but it's always bugged me that Psi Warrior gets a "Resistance to psychic damage" class feature and most of the innately psionic races like Gith and Kalashtar also get it as a trait. I know it's not a big deal, but that sort of overlapping redundancy is like an itch I can't scratch.

I can only hope they tweak it as part of updating Psi Warrior.

This is exactly what I think when I want to make a goblins, whose Nimble Escape largely overlaps with Cunning Action.

A goblin is better being any class except rogue.

 

[Parmandur]

Yeah, again, it's a good idea that's also easy - the risk is far outweighed by the reward. There's a LOT of potential D&D players out there RIGHT NOW that would like to make their own Lae'zel! Throwing Gith into the PHB and you fill a niche, build cross-promotion, use unique-to-D&D IP, and please a brand new fanbase. I can't see a downside.

Only potential downside is page real estate being limited: but I think that is pretty slim compared to the pluses, particularly IP branding.

 

[Remathilis]

Thematically it's good, but it's always bugged me that Psi Warrior gets a "Resistance to psychic damage" class feature and most of the innately psionic races like Gith and Kalashtar also get it as a trait. I know it's not a big deal, but that sort of overlapping redundancy is like an itch I can't scratch.

I can only hope they tweak it as part of updating Psi Warrior.

This is a problem with species and class being separate packages of abilities: oftentimes they come with redundant abilities. For example: dragonborn draconic sorcerers should never pick the same dragon type for species and class features. Tritons and other aquatic species should avoid fathomless due to redundant water breathing abilities. The reborn should avoid the Undeath warlock pact since they both grant the ability to avoid eating, drinking and sleep.

 

[MNblockhead]

My only issue with psionic classes is that in my 5e campaigns, the "spells" and abilities of aberrations, like Mind Flayers are treated as not magic and, therefore, not subject to being dispelled, antimagic fields, magic resistance, etc. Keeping that ruling could still work, but I think it would work best in a campaign where you enemies with psychic abilities play an important role. More likely, I'll just run it RAW, with psychic spells and abilities just being a flavor of magic.

This is also why adding psionic classes feels pretty "meh" to me and why I don't have much of an issue with having them in my campaign. Whether academic research, divinely granted, less-godly supernatural entity granted, ki, or psionic power, its all just a flavor of magic. It really doesn't change anything.

 

[Levistus's_Leviathan]

Thematically it's good, but it's always bugged me that Psi Warrior gets a "Resistance to psychic damage" class feature and most of the innately psionic races like Gith and Kalashtar also get it as a trait. I know it's not a big deal, but that sort of overlapping redundancy is like an itch I can't scratch.

I can only hope they tweak it as part of updating Psi Warrior.

This is a problem that applies to other races, too. Goblin Rogues get the redundancy of Nimble Escape giving most of what Cunning Action gives. There are subclasses that give resistance to damage types that could be redundant based on which race you chose, so you're incentivized to choose a race that doesn't thematically match your subclass. There are like 7 different ways to get telepathy that all work differently and don't synergize with each other.

The inner powergamer in me is always annoyed at these. Because being an Aasimar Celestial Warlock would be cool, but I don't like that both the race and subclass give Radiant resistance. Same with stuff like Triton and Fathomless Warlocks, most Genasi and their corresponding Genie Warlock patrons, most psionic races and Aberrant Mind Sorcerers, and so on. I wish that 5e gave additional benefits when stuff like this comes up.

 

[TrippyHippy]

My only issue with psionic classes is that in my 5e campaigns, the "spells" and abilities of aberrations, like Mind Flayers are treated as not magic and, therefore, not subject to being dispelled, antimagic fields, magic resistance, etc. Keeping that ruling could still work, but I think it would work best in a campaign where you enemies with psychic abilities play an important role. More likely, I'll just run it RAW, with psychic spells and abilities just being a flavor of magic.

This is also why adding psionic classes feels pretty "meh" to me and why I don't have much of an issue with having them in my campaign. Whether academic research, divinely granted, less-godly supernatural entity granted, ki, or psionic power, its all just a flavor of magic. It really doesn't change anything.

I don’t have any problem with ‘psychic’ magic using Classes. It’s all just fluff to me that an Aberrant Sorcerer or a Great Old One Warlock is classified as ‘psychic’.

However, I think including psychic martial Classes is a waste of an opportunity to get some more compelling archetypes for non-magical types - like Assassins, Masterminds, Scouts or Investigators for Rogues especially. In the case of Fighters, I actually find the various combat styles (outlined in Tasha’s) for Battle Masters actually gives a lot of good archetypes I like. I would have still preferred something like an Archer or a Cavalier as preference over psychic archetypes though.

 

[LuisCarlos17f]

My opinion is the ardlings should be a more marketable option than goblins. I suspect the idea of angel-touched furries was to sell toys later.

Giths have got some tickets, some possibilities to be the new PC specie in the future PH because a githyanki appeared in BG3.

* About redudant abilities for specie+class combo that should be fixed offering alternate class features. For instead some other adventage instead the original, or a free bonus of a metamagic feat.

 

[Kurotowa]

The inner powergamer in me is always annoyed at these. Because being an Aasimar Celestial Warlock would be cool, but I don't like that both the race and subclass give Radiant resistance. Same with stuff like Triton and Fathomless Warlocks, most Genasi and their corresponding Genie Warlock patrons, most psionic races and Aberrant Mind Sorcerers, and so on. I wish that 5e gave additional benefits when stuff like this comes up.

On the one hand, I agree that it annoys the optimizer corner of my brain. But on the other hand, objectively something like water breathing or a single elemental Resistance is only one step above a ribbon feature. They're really not that important, nor are they a major part of anything's power budget. So like the song goes, sometimes you just gotta let it go.

Kobold Soup is right, though, and goblins really get the short end of the stick. That species trait is their main feature, and it's completely useless for Rogues. Monks too, as soon as Revised 5e comes in.