Why has the site gone away from allowing me to buy races and spells separately? I will sadly no longer use DNDBeyond unless this changes and that makes me incredibly sad because I have been a member for years. Wizards would make more money allowing the continuation of micro-transactions rather than expecting their clients to buy entire books they'll never use. :( I used to talk DNDBeyond up a lot and now I am sad that I can no longer recommend them.
You also can't buy The Book of Many Things piecemeal because..... actually I have no idea why this book can't be bought piecemeal. Perhaps another forum user knows the reason, however every other book definitely works.
Edit 4th May 2025 - This feature has been removed (without prior warning to users) by Wizards of the Coast.
Have the Physical Books? Confused as to why you're not allowed to redeem them for free on D&D Beyond? Questions answered here at the Hardcover Books, D&D Beyond and You FAQ
Looking to add mouse-over triggered tooltips to such things like magic items, monsters or combat actions? Then dash over to the How to Add Tooltips thread.
It seems to be with the newer things they are releasing, starting with the Book of Many Things.
The older books definitely work and I bought the races/ backgrounds/ and spells from those. If they aren't doing it with the BoMT I fear this is the new standard. :(
we dont know that this is a portent of things to come. i wouldnt count third party content in that either as who knows what behind the scene negotiations with those creators entailed.
right now, it's one official first party book that has eschewed the trend. i also don't know why either, but it may be a one off and then things return to normal with the next set of books that are due to drop.
To me, this just feels like wizards encouraging me to either homebrew everything in to DND beyond from now on, or to go to other websites.
I already own your physical book of many things! I just want to make it easier on my players to use some of the cool new magic items YOU created and sold to me to begin with. Why does this have to be such a mess?
If I wasn't running 3 campaigns with good people who I don't want to let down, I would just quit 5e all together. Whats the point of using this site, if they won't do the 1 of 2 things this site was actually useful for? No one uses maps, and everyone just looks monster stat blocks up online. Buying the book for anything beyond the character options/items is a complete waist of money.
since quite a lot of the magic items in the book of many things aren't supported anyway so homebrewing would haven been needed even if you bought the digital version (which is why i haven't bought it)
It sucks that D&DBeyond no longer cares about its users. Being able to buy things separately made it easier for us to rationalize giving them our money in our current economic situation. It also meant that subsequently, more people were giving them money. This decision will sink them, but since the people who own D&DBeyond now don't know business strategies, they don't understand how detrimental of a decision they just made. I just checked Eberon and found that I could not buy the Artificer subclasses that I do not have because of their decision to stop making money. They will receive very little money, only from the desperate, who have no other method of getting what they need for D&D games. It is a shame that such a beloved website fell so far and is now just run by people who do not know how to make money, even when their customers tell them what to do in order to get them to pay. Unfortunately, the people who run this website now believe we are all idiots, and they underestimate our intelligence, so they believe we will spend $30-$60 to get an entire book, which contains, perhaps, one singular thing we will use. We are not that stupid, or that wealthy. But unfortunately, they don't understand that, and believe us to have small minds. They laugh at us from their mighty pillars of wealth and privilege, and believe that we will freely, and without reason, place more bricks on top of their pillars in order to raise them higher as we fall into the pits of destitution, where we are no longer of use to them. When do you think they will realize the error of their ways? When there is no more money for them to gain, for all their customers have died from homelessness, and the very products which they bought for them have been reclaimed by the banks and businesses who allowed for the transactions to transpire in the first place? When there is no higher for them to climb, do you think they will still be unsatisfied with their lot? Surely, they will be, for their gluttony and greed are insatiable. Then they will sit atop their pillars of power and slowly they will descend, and nothing will be left to bring them back up, to even the tallest point, where they were still unsated, for all of us shall be long gone, and the only place where the money shall still be flowing, is the almighty banks. The banks have no one to pay but themselves, for they are the keepers and the dealers of the cards. They are the house of the casino. All money is gambling and playing cards, and all of us gamblers and players. But in the end, no matter how dirty you play, or how many tokens you steal, the house always wins, no matter what. The Wizards of The Coast will fall. All gamblers do. And when the time comes that they are dragged out of the casino kicking and screaming, for they will have no more cards to play, and their winning streak will have long been over, as it already is, I wonder if they will reflect on the steps they took to reach that point. I wonder if they will care. Or if they will understand that it was they themselves who orchestrated their own fall. That it was their own folly that failed them. And in that moment, I wonder if they will be sorry, and look to us for a new hand. And I wonder if they will be sad when they realize we have no more hands to deal, for they stole all our tokens and played them dirty. Unfortunate indeed, and yet so easy to correct right now. But I know they will not correct it. They remain blind and are unwilling to remove their blindfold, so the light of truth will never reach their eyes until it is too late, and the light has died out.
REDACTED Deleting the option to buy things separately is one of the worst things they done. Not a single dollar will go to them from me. Greedy corporate ****s
Notes: Remember to abide by the forum rules, please.
If my understanding of what is happening is correct, the "homebrew" features will probably be removed/changed to specifically cover the fact that people can add "actual content" into it, and not just "custom content". If every player out there just starter pouring copyrighted content into the "homebrew" sections, I can't see any way that WoTC would just sit back and accept that.
Well.... I thought the whole OGL debacle was tone deaf idiocy
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#Open D&D
Have the Physical Books? Confused as to why you're not allowed to redeem them for free on D&D Beyond? Questions answered here at the Hardcover Books, D&D Beyond and You FAQ
Looking to add mouse-over triggered tooltips to such things like magic items, monsters or combat actions? Then dash over to the How to Add Tooltips thread.
This is really disheartening for me. I'm just getting into the game and then this happens. I'm a player in one game, a new DM in another, and about to start another game as a player. When I first started about two years ago, I bought the eldritch knight subclass because it was my first game and didn't want to pay too much for a game I may not keep playing. While I haven't spent tons of money since, I have bought some spells, items, and other subclasses for additional characters that I wanted to try out. The only time I felt I needed to buy an entire book was when I wanted to run my first ever campaign. I plan on running the campaign for the next few months at least but probably would have needed at least one more player character before then. There's no way I'm spending $30 to play one character. The value isn't there as a player. They were the perfect toybox that people could pay to have access to. Now the box is locked and I think they will find that not a lot of people will pay for keys.
this sounds odd to me, no warning and they pulled the abiltiy to purchase the rest of the books i have partially bought.. there was a discount before and now its all gone.. lawsuit waiting to happen when you remove the ability to purchase something you partially bought. so dirty once this campaign is over im outa here.
Removing a la carte purchases took me from a DDB Stan to critic. I buy the books physically from my LGS because they sell the alt cover, then buy the pieces I need for the character sheet or to give a player an option. Now they want me to pay full price TWICE?! If buying the book alone got me DDB content, or hell a discount code slip that comes in new shrink wrapped books so I can get all content for like $10 that’d be okay. But a $50 book then $30-40 digital package to only access one or two items is RIDICULOUS. I’m not making another new purchase until it comes back. I’ve sank hundreds to this site because over time the piecemeal is pick up would eventually entice me to buy the rest of the sourcebook when they had site wide discounts. Have fun making no money WOTC!
You can but they made it so much more difficult and inconvenient by having to contact customer service. Like why the hell would they do that?! I could go to the marketplace and see in each product page exactly which pieces I picked up, now I’d have to open each of my orders individually to see which was which and write them down.
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Why has the site gone away from allowing me to buy races and spells separately? I will sadly no longer use DNDBeyond unless this changes and that makes me incredibly sad because I have been a member for years. Wizards would make more money allowing the continuation of micro-transactions rather than expecting their clients to buy entire books they'll never use. :( I used to talk DNDBeyond up a lot and now I am sad that I can no longer recommend them.
Are you sure it's gone? I just went to Tasha's Cauldron of Everything (which I already own) Planescape: Adventures in the Multiverse in the store (which I don't own) and you can definitely still buy things piecemeal.
The only things I'm aware of that you can't buy piecemeal are any Third Party Content such as Tal’Dorei Campaign Setting Reborn or Dungeons of Drakkenheim.
You also can't buy The Book of Many Things piecemeal because..... actually I have no idea why this book can't be bought piecemeal. Perhaps another forum user knows the reason, however every other book definitely works.
Edit 4th May 2025 - This feature has been removed (without prior warning to users) by Wizards of the Coast.
#Open D&D
Have the Physical Books? Confused as to why you're not allowed to redeem them for free on D&D Beyond? Questions answered here at the Hardcover Books, D&D Beyond and You FAQ
Looking to add mouse-over triggered tooltips to such things like magic items, monsters or combat actions? Then dash over to the How to Add Tooltips thread.
It seems to be with the newer things they are releasing, starting with the Book of Many Things.
The older books definitely work and I bought the races/ backgrounds/ and spells from those. If they aren't doing it with the BoMT I fear this is the new standard. :(
we dont know that this is a portent of things to come. i wouldnt count third party content in that either as who knows what behind the scene negotiations with those creators entailed.
right now, it's one official first party book that has eschewed the trend. i also don't know why either, but it may be a one off and then things return to normal with the next set of books that are due to drop.
To me, this just feels like wizards encouraging me to either homebrew everything in to DND beyond from now on, or to go to other websites.
I already own your physical book of many things! I just want to make it easier on my players to use some of the cool new magic items YOU created and sold to me to begin with. Why does this have to be such a mess?
If I wasn't running 3 campaigns with good people who I don't want to let down, I would just quit 5e all together. Whats the point of using this site, if they won't do the 1 of 2 things this site was actually useful for? No one uses maps, and everyone just looks monster stat blocks up online. Buying the book for anything beyond the character options/items is a complete waist of money.
since quite a lot of the magic items in the book of many things aren't supported anyway so homebrewing would haven been needed even if you bought the digital version (which is why i haven't bought it)
Why wouldn't they be supported? You just gotta have the chart for card reference
It sucks that D&DBeyond no longer cares about its users. Being able to buy things separately made it easier for us to rationalize giving them our money in our current economic situation. It also meant that subsequently, more people were giving them money. This decision will sink them, but since the people who own D&DBeyond now don't know business strategies, they don't understand how detrimental of a decision they just made. I just checked Eberon and found that I could not buy the Artificer subclasses that I do not have because of their decision to stop making money. They will receive very little money, only from the desperate, who have no other method of getting what they need for D&D games. It is a shame that such a beloved website fell so far and is now just run by people who do not know how to make money, even when their customers tell them what to do in order to get them to pay. Unfortunately, the people who run this website now believe we are all idiots, and they underestimate our intelligence, so they believe we will spend $30-$60 to get an entire book, which contains, perhaps, one singular thing we will use. We are not that stupid, or that wealthy. But unfortunately, they don't understand that, and believe us to have small minds. They laugh at us from their mighty pillars of wealth and privilege, and believe that we will freely, and without reason, place more bricks on top of their pillars in order to raise them higher as we fall into the pits of destitution, where we are no longer of use to them. When do you think they will realize the error of their ways? When there is no more money for them to gain, for all their customers have died from homelessness, and the very products which they bought for them have been reclaimed by the banks and businesses who allowed for the transactions to transpire in the first place? When there is no higher for them to climb, do you think they will still be unsatisfied with their lot? Surely, they will be, for their gluttony and greed are insatiable. Then they will sit atop their pillars of power and slowly they will descend, and nothing will be left to bring them back up, to even the tallest point, where they were still unsated, for all of us shall be long gone, and the only place where the money shall still be flowing, is the almighty banks. The banks have no one to pay but themselves, for they are the keepers and the dealers of the cards. They are the house of the casino. All money is gambling and playing cards, and all of us gamblers and players. But in the end, no matter how dirty you play, or how many tokens you steal, the house always wins, no matter what. The Wizards of The Coast will fall. All gamblers do. And when the time comes that they are dragged out of the casino kicking and screaming, for they will have no more cards to play, and their winning streak will have long been over, as it already is, I wonder if they will reflect on the steps they took to reach that point. I wonder if they will care. Or if they will understand that it was they themselves who orchestrated their own fall. That it was their own folly that failed them. And in that moment, I wonder if they will be sorry, and look to us for a new hand. And I wonder if they will be sad when they realize we have no more hands to deal, for they stole all our tokens and played them dirty. Unfortunate indeed, and yet so easy to correct right now. But I know they will not correct it. They remain blind and are unwilling to remove their blindfold, so the light of truth will never reach their eyes until it is too late, and the light has died out.
REDACTED Deleting the option to buy things separately is one of the worst things they done. Not a single dollar will go to them from me. Greedy corporate ****s
Ya this is a terrible decision.
I've seen people posting new sites that are allowing you to do the same thing we used to be able to do on DNDBeyond. Time to jump ship.
Yeah this is bad and I don't understand the decision .
Any links to other sites?
If my understanding of what is happening is correct, the "homebrew" features will probably be removed/changed to specifically cover the fact that people can add "actual content" into it, and not just "custom content". If every player out there just starter pouring copyrighted content into the "homebrew" sections, I can't see any way that WoTC would just sit back and accept that.
Well.... I thought the whole OGL debacle was tone deaf idiocy
#Open D&D
Have the Physical Books? Confused as to why you're not allowed to redeem them for free on D&D Beyond? Questions answered here at the Hardcover Books, D&D Beyond and You FAQ
Looking to add mouse-over triggered tooltips to such things like magic items, monsters or combat actions? Then dash over to the How to Add Tooltips thread.
So what you are saying is this website is dead, and we should stop paying for the subscriptions here.
Damn, which ones? Don't be afraid to name drop I need it bro
This is really disheartening for me. I'm just getting into the game and then this happens. I'm a player in one game, a new DM in another, and about to start another game as a player. When I first started about two years ago, I bought the eldritch knight subclass because it was my first game and didn't want to pay too much for a game I may not keep playing. While I haven't spent tons of money since, I have bought some spells, items, and other subclasses for additional characters that I wanted to try out. The only time I felt I needed to buy an entire book was when I wanted to run my first ever campaign. I plan on running the campaign for the next few months at least but probably would have needed at least one more player character before then. There's no way I'm spending $30 to play one character. The value isn't there as a player. They were the perfect toybox that people could pay to have access to. Now the box is locked and I think they will find that not a lot of people will pay for keys.
this sounds odd to me, no warning and they pulled the abiltiy to purchase the rest of the books i have partially bought.. there was a discount before and now its all gone.. lawsuit waiting to happen when you remove the ability to purchase something you partially bought. so dirty once this campaign is over im outa here.
Removing a la carte purchases took me from a DDB Stan to critic. I buy the books physically from my LGS because they sell the alt cover, then buy the pieces I need for the character sheet or to give a player an option. Now they want me to pay full price TWICE?! If buying the book alone got me DDB content, or hell a discount code slip that comes in new shrink wrapped books so I can get all content for like $10 that’d be okay. But a $50 book then $30-40 digital package to only access one or two items is RIDICULOUS. I’m not making another new purchase until it comes back. I’ve sank hundreds to this site because over time the piecemeal is pick up would eventually entice me to buy the rest of the sourcebook when they had site wide discounts. Have fun making no money WOTC!
You can but they made it so much more difficult and inconvenient by having to contact customer service. Like why the hell would they do that?! I could go to the marketplace and see in each product page exactly which pieces I picked up, now I’d have to open each of my orders individually to see which was which and write them down.