2024 Player's Handbook: The Barbarian and what they got wrong D&D5e 

OK, Wizards has posted a release schedule for next week. Every single weekday next week. I will react to all of them, so I guess I'll need to catch up on other stuff some other time. So ignore my comment at the end about taking next week off...quite the opposite.

While they do not go into details about the Path of the World Tree in this talk, the Dungeon Dudes got to do a reveal about it, so those of you who are interested in the the details can see them over on their channel.

World Tree Barbarian, especially at high levels, feels like a class I WOULD love to have in any party at level 14 and up for sure. That is shocking in dnd!

I really appreciate you covering and clarifying stuff i feel other content creaters are being too wordy and losing the clarity i need to know whats being talked about ❤

I really appreciate these videos and I hope you get the vacation you deserve after the dust settles. I can’t imagine how much of a pain it is to have your work schedule being unknown until wizards publicly releases their video schedule just a couple days in advance

As far as the mistakes in the video go, I can imagine it is VERY EASY to get things confused when he has all these different classes to go through and hundreds of skills rattling around in his head. All that said - super glad we have you here to let us know when things are said that we should strike from the record.

Thank you for clarifying what Crawford didn't clarify in the video regarding Brutal Strikes. I was waiting for that and I knew you wouldn't disappoint.

I assume for Primal Knowledge JC misread Perception as Persuasion.

I'm sure Jeremy has 50 different versions of what they worked on rolling around in his head, it makes sense that the occasionally one of the things he is thinking about didn't make it into the release version. Especially on classes that they had to keep iterating on to get right.

FYI for World Tree Barbarian, Dungeon Dudes previewed the whole thing including text for anyone who is curious about the final wording. The group teleport did change from the playtest

I've never been so excited for anything related to a tabletop RPG in my entire life, barbarian is my favorite class and I can't wait to play with it in the new version

Crawford getting things wrong doesn’t surprise me. I mean you’d figure a lot of things just blur together so it makes it hard to keep it all straight. So I am everything he’s saying with a grain of salt unless Treantmonk confirms it to be true. Can’t wait til the gag order is off and all my favorite D&D RU-vidrs are free to go wild with what they’ve been allowed to see.

Getting rid of the free reviving with Warrior of the gods is a shame. Even if it rarely came up, I felt like it *strongly* contributed to the flavor of being a zealot, someone who does not care if they’re felled in battle as long as they’re fighting for what they believe. Same thing with rage beyond death, tho we still need to see the full mechanics of that feature and at least from what we’ve heard it still has some of that flavor of not fearing death but now applied to the people charging into battle alongside the zealot.

12:10 I thought rage was about letting loose your primal energy/emotion, now all the sudden they have perfect control XD; thought that was more of a monk thing the crunch is great, the fluff is weak

Been refreshing since the showcase

Good afternoon Chris! Perfect timing for me to start watching this on my final break at work! Thanks for the company for half of the rest of my shift! Looking forward to hearing your takes on the changes! Have an awesome weekend, much love! 💜 Thanks for all your work keeping this awesome channel running!

Yeah, I clocked that Persuasion mix up as well. Whoops. But I really like what I'm hearing about the Barbarian!

Looking forward to these everyday!

Thanks TM! 2024 Barbarian is one of the revisions I'm the most excited about. Lots of additional lateral flexibility, plus some additional raw power and quality of life improvements.

Outside any other changes to the Wildheart subclass, just being able to choose which animal spirit to manifest makes all the difference and hugely improves the subclass. I’m really excited to see the deets

Do they mean PERCEPTION?

J Craw and making rules mistakes; name a more iconic duo

There is a lot of re-rolling now. Between Barbarian abilities and Inspiration, that's a lot of re-rolling that's going to take time. Not to mention all of the extra abilities on these classes and subclasses to decide between. I suspect combat is going to take visibly longer.

Primal knowledge in the UA is one of the biggest reason why I got excited for barbarian. That and the improvement to rage make me actually consider playing it.

Ah yes barbarians are in “more control” while raging, and that’s why their “reckless” attack gives enemies advantage to hit them, right?

Appreciate these videos helping us get an idea of whats actually in the books. I hope they release a video about their guidance of playing old subclasses with the new classes, if thats even possible.

I will say, there seem to have been a lot of moments in these videos where Jeremy Crawford went, "We've given (class) a brand new feature in (names feature that was introduced as optional feature for the class in Tasha's)." Like, I get what he's getting at, but calling an optional feature from a 4 year-old book "brand new" is pretty misleading. There's nothing wrong with just saying, "We found that (optional feature) from Tasha's Cauldron of Everything was quite popular, so we decided to incorporate it into the base (class), so it will be available to all (members of the class) moving forwarding."

great to hear about many of these changes that were kept from the playtest even better that brutal strikes had those questions answered, it really is a relief that we won't have to question ourselves and make judgements about it

As much as I love any new info I cant wait for the warlock and wizard videos specifically. Glad to know they're coming soonish

The idea that world tree can teleport the whole party, and it sounds like based on your playtest quite far, is really promising. One of the biggest reasons for the martial casters divide imo was the difference in scale of effect casters could have. I brought this up in one of your other videos in a comment thread because Crawford kept talking about how tactical the fighter would be, but that was essentially one of the issues- martials were stuck only doing things of tactical significance, ie small affects in the battle. Where as wizards and other spellcasters had stuff that was of greater significance, especially after 5th level. If you continue with the same terminology as tactical, spellcasters could get operationally or strategically significant abilities, and even giving martials tactical options does nothing to solve the fact that the strongest abilities for casters were often on a categorically more significant scale than martials. Fairly long range Group teleport though is moving into the realm of operational significance and shows a good sign that they might finally be giving martials some of these abilities of larger significance than just tactics. It’s not in the strategic class some of the most powerful high level spells can fall into, especially in some circumstances, but that’s ok. Often those types of abilities are the kind everyone has to sort of agree not to use to their full potential anyway because they can just end campaigns, so it’s probably better if those slowly get nerfed rather than other characters get buffed to have them, but stuff like fairly long range group teleport that can completely reshape your groups capabilities or change the balance of a combat single handedly, but don’t invalidate the wider campaign at the exact kinds of things that martials need to close the divide

"The Eyes of the Hawk, Ears of the Wolf!" - BraveStarr I'm excited to hear that the Path of Wildheart(totem) will be more like Marshal BraveStarr now(a cartoon I grew up loving)! Able to tap into different beast more often sound awsome! Path of the Worldtree seems a bit OP, but I might want to play it after PHB2024 is released(after I finish playing a monk if they fixed that class)!

Awesome vid and info as always!!

Thank you for the note asking people to not be rude due to mistakes. They are recording so much and likely have an insane schedule so likely easy for a miss or two. Super happy about the drip feed reveals and tons of content creation potential.

Thanks for all the comments and keeping tabs on UA through now. Great video.

Maintaining rage has never been an issue. If you don't have a valid target for an attack you can hit yourself with an unarmed strike. It's a very barbarian thing to punch your chest or smack yourself in the face to keep it up. No matter what level you're at you won't take a lot of damage and RAW it keeps your rage going

I like to think of Treantmonk's reaction videos as being in the vein of "critical readings of the text". :)

A persuasive Barbarian?! That would put Bards to shame!🤣🤣🤣

"Persuasion is not one of the skills that Primal Knowledge touches." Don't worry, they are just home brewing out loud.

In the Fighter video they all but read off of the book, the lack of specificity in the Barbarian video was really weird.

Treantmonk strikes again!

I really love this series. I can't wait to hear your opinions on august 3rd

Ah, the inevitable "User Acceptance Testing" phase of a new RPG... Nice work, Chris! That, or Jeremy is trying to strong-arm some features into the PHB by publicly announcing them... 🤷‍♂ Great content, keep it coming!

I'm still slightly confused on brutal strike and how forgoing advantage to utilize. Do they clarify if you only forgo advantage from reckless attack, or all advantage sources?

I think JC misspoke when he said persuasion and probably meant perception and they just kept rolling with it using it as an example in a way as to not say which skills primal knowledge gives, but also to say you can explain the skills multiple ways.

I'd love to see a semi caster barbarian subclass to be a counter point to the eldritch knight or the arcane trickster. I think they should have charisma based casting, but while they are raging they could substitute strength instead. They should also have the ability to concentrate while raging.

It's not in the UA either, but Perception is there, so they might've just mixed those up.

I mean, its cool that Barbarians get to use Strength for non-Strength checks... but as a DM, I'd usually let my Barbarian use Intimidation with Strength? I feel like this MIGHT have an adverse side effect of DMs not wanting to let players be creative and change ability score usage with different skills? Point at Barbarian Strength-Stealth/Intimidation. "Get a feature for it." Vs "Oh, so you're trying to make yourself seem bigger and stronger to intimidate the bear? Strength!"

So rage isn't really RAGE it should be called Battle Trance or something like that.

If Bear Aspect ends up being resistance to the same damage types that Nature Cleric gets that would still be a nerf but wouldn't be horrible. It would go from 9 to 5 which is much better than the UA which knocked it down to two.

Great Videos Chris

Dungeon Dudes got to do a full review of World Tree Barbarian in their video yesterday, and in their video they mention using your strength mod for Perception. Maybe that's where Jeremy screwed up in this video. They mis-read it, i know me and my players mix up the two all the time.

Brutal strikes is gonna be a blast and I'm very excited to use it, also I see the seeds of a very fun monk multi class

Barbarian at a ball rages. "May I have this dance?"

I wonder if the buff to Reckless Attack made it, the one where u get advantage till the start of your next turn instead of just the turn u activated it, i don't think it was mentioned in the video and if it was i missed it, but judging it by the fact that people liked it and it just makes so much sense, i think it made it here

A couple of Dudes gave a break down of world tree a couple days ago.

They made a mistake in the broader PHB video too, where they specifically say (and go on to discuss) that the Nick property allows you to make an extra attack without using your bonus action, but you CAN still use your bonus action to attack again (and Kenrick specifically says “so you can throw three daggers” and Crawford agrees). But you can’t.

In a lot of ways I really wonder if making rage more granular, say rage dice that can be burned over the course of the day or maybe in a short rest context. Only a few rages seems to frequently induce too much hoarding. Oh well, I guess it is what it is.

I can forgive them for making a mistake like that about persuasion and rage. There was probably a previous version that they were tinkering with that they really liked but it got sidelined or left out for various reasons. Because they aren't directly reading from the new PHB for this interview. They're recalling 4, 5, even 6 years of edits and revisions they've planned or wanted to do. And this is why I prefer watching Treantmonk's videos intead of the ones on D&D Beyond. I'm still glad the D&D Beyond videos exist. And honestly, regardless of mistakes, I just can't wait to get that physical book in my hand and pour over the pages for myself.

Thanks Chris

I really don't appreciate how they're portraying so much stuff as brand new ideas they've come up with for the 2024 books that's actually just lifted from Tashas & co. Taking the good stuff from a good supplement is great, I don't get why they feel a need to mislead.

Ah man, I really wanted to know how Brutal Strike will work. Glad they clarified it in the book but bummer that they didn't say anything here.

I wonder if the Path of the Beast Barbarian will be able to use a Weapon Mastery on their claws/tail/bite. I forsee a compatibility problem with that.

I assume they meant Perception and mixed up the words because they start the same?

World tree is going to become a fan favorite.

does the bear totem let you pick the resistances? or do you get to not pick 2 different ones depending on situation everytime you use bear totem?

Just remember! "Sit back and have some fun. DnD is for everyone! Didnt ya say it felt like the video.was missing something!

I believe the “rage uses return on short rest” was a play test thing. I always thought a short rest made more sense for this non-spellcaster. It doesn’t feel as powerful as fighter’s action surge and shouldn’t have the same long cooldown.

In my brothers campaign, I'm currently playing an ancestral guardians barbarian. I don't know if I will want to continue in that, maybe get a revision or two to it, or switch to World Tree should the chance open up. Thanks for making this reaction, Treantmonk. I greatly appreciate your takes.

God. I hate that they're still requiring Barbarians to attack or waste bonus actions to keep raging. I wish they would just make it like every other buff in the game and just say 'rage ends after 1 minute or when you become incapacitated.' I hate that Rage (and Barb in general) has such stupid and restrictive limitations that basically no other class has to deal with.

Thanks Treantmonk- super excited to get your take on all of this. It’s gonna be an optimization bonanza when you can start making 2024 builds! 🌲🥷❤️

The barbarian is basically one of the coolest classes now! As It should be

Treantmonk: I don't know why they are making these mistakes. The AI that edits and proofreads the book: I have no idea either, human! Move along!

You're my go to resource for information! I appreciate some of the other creators talking about the new material, but I find some lack the explanation of the mechanics and what has stuck from UA. I know I will get all I can learn from you, appreciate your hard work and hope that vacation comes soon!

Chris loving the 5e update videos I really hope you will do update videos on DC20 when the beta comes out with the subclasses and updates through out the beta. I love the game mechanic analysis and would love to see your takes on what I think are some pretty awesome game mechanics, and I am itching for more DC20 content. I would also love to hear your thoughts on the new armor update and multiclass update.

Persuasion check. I saw that LOL.

Watch out Treatmonk! I see a Pinkerton behind you!

Todd as Scorpion. "Hey, come over here."

I am loving their focus on giving martials additional tools for exploration! Again, can’t wait to pirate it. Also i’ve always sprinkled world tree lore in my campaigns, so i am hyped for that subclass. Barb & Lock are my faves.

Have you prerecorded videos about the new players handbook?

I mean the mistakes make sense. We have seen a handfull of UA, they have seen every single idea from the drawing board. Getting some minor details wrong is only human. Not to mention the possibility that they didn't actually make a mistake and it's just your version of the book not being the final project.

Hey @treantmonk, any chance you can confirm if Light & Nick now require holding both weapons at the same time as indicated by the DnDBeyond article? It’s been officially released there so you should be allowed to share clarification right?

Sad to lose rage beyond death but berserker sounds playable now so ill take it

I guess, while enraged it would make sense to be some kind of persuasive so you could potentially animate some bystanding npcs to fight for your side. 🤔

Regardless of the game mechanics, I find the paths of the Zealot and particularly of the World Tree uninspired on the level of fluff with the barbarian class. They seem like ideas, maybe even good ones, randomly attached to the barbarian without any real connection to the core of the class. Why then not a World Tree peasant? Or a World Tree sorcerer or monk instead of a barbarian? What I mean to say is that it seems to me to be a forced connection to the core class, as opposed to, for example, an archetype like the assassin, to which I immediately think of the rogue, because it is consistent with the core of the class.

I personally liked the idea of brutal critics. In my opinion, they could just give it also a 19-20 or even 18-20 crit range for barbarians. It annoys me a little bit that for every marcial class problems, they address giving them a “tactical” effect, so you can push, pull, shove down someone, etc. It seems that when they don’t know what to do to fix a martial feature, just make it have that kind of tactical feature

With all these reaction video’s dropping, I’d prefer you put the other video on hold to get these out, & also, your reaction videos are freakin awesome!!! They are so vague, & even though you can’t say everything you want, you clarifying stuff and just letting us know the general buffs is awesome

I miss the free raise for Zealot. It gave me story ideas.

To be fair, in context I think they meant the colloquial use of "persuasion" (as a non-D&D keyword) via the Intimidation Skill when talking about "Primal Knowledge", rather than the "Persuasion" Skill being tied to that feature... I think I have seen a RU-vid video, from several months ago, where the person mentioned that from a "game design" perspective, that potential for equivocations/confusion makes "Persuasion" problematic as a game keyword.

In the D&D Beyond article about the 2024 Barbarian they revealed the Epic Boon of Irresistible Offense. The wording is however unclear as to whether, upon scoring a crit, you deal total damage equal to the ability score used for the attack or you ADD damage equal to the ability score to your damage rolls. Could you confirm which one is true?

May be there are different advance copies of the PHB so that if the text is found on the net they can identify who leaked it?

Im worried about my Zealot.

I fear that the Bear Nerf isn't going to have the result they desired. Monsters are poised to do more Elemental damage than ever, and Barbarians are gonna be squishy as heck because of it. Just having 1/3 of a monster's DPR come from elemental damage totally negates the resistance bonus that Rage grants while using Reckless Attacks. Given that Barbarians have Lowish AC (and a high number of incoming crits) they are going to deceptively fragile.

I know I am an oddball whatever I played the totem warrior barbarian. I never really cared for the bear. I always enjoyed playing as the elk just for the sheer movement increase. I always felt with that added movement increase I was able to get to my opponents easier instead of having to rely on whether there be some sort of ranged weapon or some other shenanigans to keep my rage up. I have either the elk option is still available or they have something similar. Otherwise I am probably not going to play as a barbarian.

Some of the stuff they said about Zealot sound interesting, and I do also see the parallel they talked about with Zealot Barbarian being Paladin-like. Of course, with the changes to how Divine Smite works for Paladin, it sounds like Zealot's going to be better at the "Divine Warrior smiting evil creatures with Holy fire" niche out of the two. And depending on how the base Warlock turned out, along with any potential changes to the Celestial patron, I'm wondering if the same might end up being said about Pact of the Blade Warlocks.

That new beast totem barbarian is stepping on the toes of the path of the beast with their ability to be adaptive and change their body to climb/jump/swim every short rest.....I guess path of the beast is not going to return or have a very different feeling.... I love my path of beast barbarian, feel its really underrated in its ability to be so versatile in so many scenarios. Idk what it woudl look like now with weapon masteries and now having its level 6 traits gutted.

why not just go barbarian for reckless attack and battlemaster for the same effects that brutal strike gives so i dont lose advantage?

i didn't know there was anything wrong with their use of the word "race" but HATE that they're going with species. thanks for clarifying a lot

Wish there was a place we could get a message from Jeremy or the dev team to confirm if they misspoke or if there are further changes. Or maybe - the prerelease copies the influencers received were not the final issue? :/ Makes me worried.

The way Primal Knowledge is written in the UA it sounds like you pick one skill, but it doesn't say when to pick. Did they clarify that in the 2024 Player's Handbook, or am I just reading it wrong?

"DM, I am going to RAGE hide!"