Dungeons & Dragons 4th Edition Books Preview
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From a player's perspective, "Races and Classes" is definitely the more important of these two books. Acting as a stand-in for the upcoming Player's Handbook (due out in June of this year), it shows off the player races and character classes Dungeons and Dragons players will be able to choose for their first Player Characters (PCs). The book is broken up into five sections, with two devoted to the titular character aspects. The other three outline the process of rethinking the game's core. Each section is broken up into a series of short essays on specific subtopics. Each race and class gets at least one essay, with some requiring three or more to fully explore.
As a veteran DM of the 3.0/3.5 era, their choices for which races and classes to include are at the same time surprising and reassuring. Their picks have definitely shaken up the status quo, bucking traditions that date back to the late 80's. The Gnomish race, for example, won't be in the first Player's Handbook. Half-Orcs, one of the favorite races of the current edition, won't be addressed until the Forgotten Realms sourcebook in the Fall.
Instead, standbys like the Elf, Dwarf, and Hafling have been refined and polished to clarify their place in the world. Haflings in particular have been given a fictive solidness they previously lacked: they're now a nomadic boat-people, tending to the waters in the same way the Elves tend to forests or Dwarves to hills and mountains. New additions to the racial roster fill in gaps that have been patched previously in non-core supplements. The Dragonborn race, a reptilian species, is the most obvious of these. Previous 'dragon-ish' races have fit into campaign worlds roughly compared to the core races. Tieflings (half-demons) are another example of this trend. A popular player race in 3.0/3.5, it was challenging to play a Tiefling because of restrictions at character creation.
