Dungeons & Dragons Starter Set: Heroes of the Borderlands Review – It’s Never Too Hard To Start Playing D&D

Besides hoarding dice, one of the biggest topics when it comes to Dungeons & Dragons is how daunting it can be to get into the game. Buying the sourcebooks, reading the manuals, managing a character sheet, and building a background can be a monstrous task for those new to the game, and it puts a lot of prospective players off. However, the new Dungeons & Dragons Starter Set: Heroes of the Borderlands collection has taken that feedback and created a fantastic solution.

Heroes of the Borderlands is a compilation of tools to get first-time players going in D&D. The kit provides everything needed to begin playing within just a few minutes, removing much of the early prep while teaching critical rules for more complicated games down the road. It is the ultimate D&D resource perfect for anyone interested in joining a session for the first time.

Key Details

• Developer: Wizards of the Coast
• Format: Digital & Physical
• Price: $49.99+
• Where to Buy: DnDBeyond or local game shops
• Age Range: 12+
• Review Sample Provided: Yes

D&D: Heroes of the Borderlands Provides All The Tools

D&D: Heroes of the Borderlands isn’t just an adventure booklet and a DM guide. This kit has everything players need to get going on an adventure. The box comes packed with goodies, including a Player’s Guide, three adventure booklets, Class sheets, and character cards. The set also includes markers for gold and health, and offers a slew of maps and visual lists for locations, shops, and taverns.

Tools like these are the key to understanding D&D as a new player. So often, first-time tabletoppers are sat down with a dense Player’s Handbook, an overwhelming character sheet, and a prayer, and then they must fill everything in and learn the rules in a vague or intangible way. For those who attempt to play this way, it can create frustrating first impressions or alienate those who don’t feel comfortable throwing themselves into the deep end.

The Heroes of the Borderlands kit has done the hard work already, with cards filled out for Cleric, Rogue, Wizard, and Fighter classes. Players can grab these sheets and see the stats accurately filled in right from the start. This allows them to learn how to use these stats, and prevents accidents where an error damages learning or playing.

Additionally, the maps included for the adventures provide a clear space for those playing to visualize their adventure. For many new players, maps are easy to forget or set aside, and critical for creating a theater of the mind. The maps included in Heroes of the Borderlands are clear, large, and well-gridded, making it easy to see where players are investigating and how their attacks or movements can be applied to a space.

A New Level of Accessibility

Accessibility has always been a struggle in D&D. Whether a younger adventurer wants to jump into a campaign, or someone with learning or attention differences is trying to play for the first time, D&D hasn’t always been the most friendly. D&D: Heroes of the Borderlands feels like the answer to this accessibility gap.

Pre-built class sheets provide players with a clear understanding of what they are using and what they are meant to have, while also eliminating the need to build sheets that younger players might not understand. The shorter adventures included in the game are more friendly to those who can’t sit still for three-hour-long sessions, or even those who simply don’t have that sort of time.

I got started playing D&D just before my son was born. After his birth, we didn’t have the time to play extended sessions, and the options included in Heroes of the Borderlands would have been perfect for a fun and easy session that was friendly to the habits of a newborn.

Additionally, this is the perfect kit for an after-school club or library D&D group, as it has everything needed to teach young players how to enjoy the game, and it all comes in a perfectly portable box.

D&D: Heroes of the Borderlands Is The Tool I Wish I’d Had When Starting D&D

D&D: Heroes of the Borderlands is exactly the type of tool I could have used as a first-time player. My first experience with D&D was after listening to The Adventure Zone: Balance podcast, and I had no idea what I was getting into. We didn’t really understand all the tools we needed to run a campaign, and with our group all being first-time players, there was no mentor DM available to explain why maps are important or how shops and taverns should be set up.

Instead, we bumped and struggled through a half-homebrew campaign before jumping into Curse of Strahd, where it still took an embarrassingly long time for maps, spell cards, and other important tools to make sense. It would have been amazing to have physical examples of a correctly built character sheet.

While we had the resources from the original 5E Starter Set, that adventure provided only the very basic of instructions, and very little in the way of help. The pre-built characters weren’t easy to use or understand, and the full DM Handbook and Player’s Guide were still very much required to get a basic understanding of the game. It wasn’t young-player-friendly, and generally lacked the tools needed to really be successful.

Heroes of the Borderlands has taken a good, hard look at what was needed to really jump into gameplay and has done an amazing job of providing it in a digestible way to players.

Final Score – 9/10

Dungeons & Dragons: Heroes of the Borderlands is a great tool for new players. While it likely won’t scratch the itch for seasoned players looking to dive into something complex, Heroes of the Borderlands offers all the tools to get a new player started. It is also perfect for new DMs who aren’t ready to run a full campaign, as the short sessions and provided assets give a good example of what is needed to guide players through a story.

The tools in this set can be used with other campaigns, as the tokens for gold and health are a great asset that gives a visual count. Additionally, the accessibility level of this starter set gives everyone hoping to play a good understanding of how rules work, Classes function, and gameplay progresses.

D&D: Heroes of the Borderlands is a staple 5E set that anyone with a love of tabletop should keep on hand.

**Bonus Action was provided with a sample set of Dungeons & Dragons: Heroes of the Borderlands for the purpose of this review**

About the Author

Laura Gray

Administrator

Laura Gray, known as Ezra when not putting pen to paper, is a D&D enthusiast with a love of all things written. They are a collector of fantasy and sci-fi novels, a lover of cooking weird food, and a player of farming sims and Pokémon games. When not engrossed in a re-read of Anne McCaffrey or a deep dive into the Adventure Zone: Balance, they can be found sniffing the cats and napping in half-finished crochet projects.

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