Defective PHB

[Celcey]

Greetings, Playgrounders! I recently bought my PHB, and today I found that some of the pages were falling out. I did a little Googling and found that it's not just me, so I called WotC and they said I could ship it to them and they'll replace it. They'll also give me a $5 coupon to I think Dragon Comic? I don't remember the exact name, but that's to reimburse me for the shipping.

I figure other people will have this problem, so here's a link to the WotC website that deals with these problems. Just follow the instructions provided, and they'll send you a new copy.

http://wizards.custhelp.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/409

[Mellack]

My DM had the same problem and they replaced his with no trouble. However, now the second one is also falling apart. We are questioning if it is worth getting a new one (again), or will this just keep happening? Was this a problem only with a certain printing? Does anyone know if it has been fixed?

[MaxWilson]

My DM had the same problem and they replaced his with no trouble. However, now the second one is also falling apart. We are questioning if it is worth getting a new one (again), or will this just keep happening? Was this a problem only with a certain printing? Does anyone know if it has been fixed?

Must be bad luck. Mine is fine, hopefully your next one will be too.

[Kyutaru]

This happened to me with the 4th edition books, but it was because I left them in the car. The bindings can't handle heat. If you live in a part of the world where they had to ship the books through a hot area, it may have melted the bindings.

[GiantOctopodes]

It's very common in book publishing for them to get successively cheaper and worse in quality each run, until they hit a point at which they start getting a lot of complaints, at which point they kick it up a notch. Note that I am referring to those who actually assemble the book, not WotC themselves of course. So ink running, pages falling out, etc, may well persist through the inventory from this print run, but the normal expectation is that future runs will see an uptick in quality, just high enough to not result in massive complaints. It's the price we pay for getting books published very cheaply.

On the upside, the more that you get replaced if you have an issue, the faster we churn through this run, so I not only recommend but actively encourage you to get any such less than ideal books replaced, for, ehrm, entirely unselfish reasons.

[Mellack]

I appreciate all the replies. I hope that we will not have the same problem with the new DMG.

[ghost_warlock]

Not too uncommon, no. I didn't buy many 4e books, but a bunch of my 3.5 books have issues with the text rubbing off a bit when touched. It never got so bad that it was illegible, but it did smear a bit on the pages and leave a residue on your hands.

[Kornaki]

Not too uncommon, no. I didn't buy many 4e books, but a bunch of my 3.5 books have issues with the text rubbing off a bit when touched. It never got so bad that it was illegible, but it did smear a bit on the pages and leave a residue on your hands.

Conversely, all of my 3.5 books were beacons of excellence and quality, and my 4e books had ink smearing issues. I thought at the time that it was because 4e was the devil, but now I suspect that publishing quality might be independent of edition.

[Totema]

May I recommend using barge cement to fix the bindings? I had that problem with my second copy (and the first one, but I just had it replaced) and applied a bit of cement, and now it's as good as new.

[Frenth Alunril]

What do they do if the ink runs off the page? Something about my hands causes all the ink to run... :(

[Celcey]

What do they do if the ink runs off the page? Something about my hands causes all the ink to run... :(

Common problem. I think just send it in like you would if the pages were falling out. The ink shouldn't run like that.

[Socko525]

I had the same problem and sent mine to WotC for repairs. It took a month or so to get it back and as an apology for the defective book, they sent me a $5 voucher to the DM classics webpage at Drivethru RPG