Every experiencedDungeons & Dragonsplayer ultimately ends up having some gripes about the game, but it only stands to reason that everyone has their own preferences when it comes to design choices. If anyone might be consistently happy with the approach, however, it should be the designers behind the decisions. Still, hindsight is everything, and evenD&DCreative Director Chris Perkins can end up bemoaning an annoyancefor a decade.
Taken on their own,D&D’s core rulebooks are critical texts for playing the game, but they also feed into everything else thatD&DpublisherWizards of the Coast releases. Campaign books are defined by what the rulebooks include and exclude, and if something foundational to the average adventure didn’t make it into a core rulebook, every adventure is doomed to explain it once again.One mundane concept that the 2014Dungeon Master’s Guideleft out was the workings of doors, and the 2024Dungeon Master’s Guidefinally fixes this lingering issue.
Doors In D&D Have Been A Persistent Annoyance
Chris Perkins Has His Complaints
Chris Perkins explained his frustration with doors in aninterview withScreen Rant, which ultimately comes down to the fact thateveryD&D5e adventure has been forced to offer some advice on how to handle doors. Cropping up repeatedly both in dungeons and outside of them, doors are a constant target of the average party’s interactions. While things are simple enough if the key for a locked door is readily at hand, the frequent use of a door as an obstacle means that the party is often using much less conventional methods.
How The 2024 Dungeon Master’s Guide Addresses Doors
One Page Can Do A Lot Of Work
To settle the issue,the 2024Dungeon Master’s Guidededicates a full page to doors, and not in the same way as the 2014 book’s appendix of random tables. This time, stats and rules are provided to help DMs adjudicate the party’s success in opening them. Armor class, health, and DC thresholds for dice rolls determine the odds of brute force succeeding, while a couple more tables and a paragraph-long explanation serve a similar role for locks. Appropriately for surprise-filled dungeons, secret doors are also covered, as are portcullises.
D&D’s 2024 Dungeon Master’s Guide Fixes My Least Favorite Thing About The Player’s Handbook
The 2024 Dungeon Master’s Guide makes some similar advancements to the 2014 Player’s Handbook while also avoiding one compromise that frustrated me.
It’s not the most thrilling material of all time, but it’s undeniably practical, andhaving the information on hand in the 2024Dungeon Master’s Guidecould be a godsendfor new DMs. To Perkins’s concerns, the consolidated resource could save on wasted space in future campaign books, which also has the benefit of making the reference more convenient forDMs running homebrew adventures.
The section on doors is a part of the DM’s Toolbox, a new chapter that consolidates a lot of useful materials into the span of roughly 50 pages. The approach falls in line with a greater emphasis on organized reference sections in the new rulebooks, most notably showcased byRules Glossary in the 2024Player’s Handbookand the Lore Glossary in theDungeon Master’s Guide.Major new features like Bastions might be more thrilling for DMs, but for Chris Perkins, the biggest relief in the 2024Dungeon Master’s Guidemight very well be the page on doors.
