The cost of official D&D books is going up. Wizards of the Coast, the company behind the world's most popular fantasy TTRPG has been garnering interest for their latest edition. This has included playtesting material overhauling certain martial classes to getting feedback from creators regarding the future of the game. But these D&D price increases may make certain players hesitant to buy in when the latest wave of books comes out.
The D&D price increase announcement
According to a recent news post on D&D Beyond, Wizards of the Coast announced that upcoming first-party books will be getting more expensive. The post states that the company has tried to keep the prices of its books stable. However, due to the rising cost of goods and shipping, their newest releases will be marked up in order to maintain their standards of quality.
The post states the first book to be affected by the D&D price increases will be Bigby Presents: Glory of the Giants. According to WOTC, if you pre-order the physical-digital bundle of the book on their official store page during the pre-order window, it will be at an MSRP of $59.99 Once that window has passed however, the MSRP for the bundle will increase to $69.99. This new price will become the standard for their physical-digital bundles. The post also confirmed that this price increase will not affect any digital purchases and that this price increase will not impact any backlist books.
Curiously WOTC didn't provide a breakdown of details for these D&D price increases or how this would affect individual physical releases. As it stands right now, a physical D&D book is sold at an MSRP of $49.99 while buying it on D&D Beyond is $29.99. Since digital sales will not be impacted, how much more will customers pay for just the individual book at retail? This uncertainty is contrasted by Games Workshop's announced price increases of their various Warhammer products, which went into detail about what products were affected and why.
