Dungeons & Dragons Goes Free(ish) For 5th Edition!
May 28, 2014 by brennon
Dungeons & Dragons 5th Edition is going free(ish) when it launches later this year. Mike Mearls laid out the plan in the latest post on Daily D&D where he explains that Basic Dungeons & Dragons will be available to all...
The PDF will be available to all and give you the rules and means necessary to build heroes for the Fighter, Rogue, Wizard and Cleric alongside their archetypal races of Human, Dwarf, Elf and Halfling. You'll be able to take your heroes all the way from level 1 to level 20 with this PDF and that's a massive slice of the Dungeons & Dragons pie.
This also provides the framework for what the D&D Starter Set will be like with a selection of basic monsters and rules for dungeon masters to follow. Expanding this will then be totally in your hands with the Players Handbook providing everything you need to play rules wise as well as a few more monsters and dungeon master hints. The Monsters Manual and Dungeon Masters Guide will do something much similar.
There's no reason that you need to actually buy anything though. To keep 'free' players up to date with the long running campaign narrative they will be providing updates to keep you in the loop. This is of course very specific but worth while if you don't want a big investment.
A great start to Dungeons & Dragons I'd say!
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Sounds like they are confident in their system, that people will buy stuff after testing the free stuff, good news!
I think they’re right. I can’t imagine there are many people who’ll start a campaign with the free download material and not wind up buying at least some of the books given how limited the free stuff is. The people who do just use the free downloads likely would never have bought the books anyway. I think giving a free taste of the product is a great idea. It’s drug dealing 101 lol.
Totally agree. It is a fantastic idea! It is bound to get people playing that wouldn’t bother otherwise. Kudos to WotC for taking this business initiative.
I know I starter Vampire the masquerade with just a free booklet.
I have quite the WoD collection now.
Sensible move, particularly given a lot of older players shifted to pathfinder. As @matthias says shows confidence in the product as well.