How will you incorporate Essentials?

[Tony Vargas]

I might be tempted to run it at a 'mini-con.' The club I'm in runs one now and then in Oakland, you have 4 hours to introduce players to an in-print game (no paleogaming). Essentials would seem ideal for that.
( Go Con 4 – 7/17/2010! :: EndGame )

Apart from that, I wouldn't add it to a campaign I was running - why add 'beginner' content to an ongoing campaign. But, I'm not running one at the moment. My wife is, and she's not planning to use Essentials, at all.

 

[Aegeri]

I am actually quite happy with the changes in essentials now that I have heard more about it. I dislike the Knight and martial classes approach immensely - but I can see the merit in doing so. Mostly I like the new feat and magical item approach. Having played a lot of epic tier, the concept that PCs are factories for infinite numbers of heroic tier magic items can be very annoying - plus pretty game breaking in some cases. It also sounds to me like they are taking the chance to consolidate and clean up rules issues that I have.

Overall I am quite keen on essentials and will be integrating it into my games as is. If my PCs want to use them or not is entirely up to them.

 

[LuckyAdrastus]

Perhaps we should wait to see it before guessing how difficult it would be to use? I mean, there is so much overheated speculation on the boards about it, but we've seen, what, 5% of the material? 2%?

 

[Vaeron]

Perhaps we should wait to see it before guessing how difficult it would be to use? I mean, there is so much overheated speculation on the boards about it, but we've seen, what, 5% of the material? 2%?

Given that 90% of the material is the old rules repackaged (They keep saying there are no actual rules changes in Essentials, it's just presented for a different audience), the 5% we have seen is a pretty significant chunk of what's left over.

 

[Wepwawet]

Yeah, I'll also incorporate Essentials just like any other core book or Power book.

I allow retraining only if it fits the character concept better, but the general idea stays the same. Like, you can't change race or ability scores.

Edit: Actually, my players can change race, if a new race published fits the orignal concept better. But to be avoided.

 

[Lord Ernie]

I allow rebuilds after every major power book comes out, and Essentials will be no different.

If anything, I may encourage some of our newer players to switch to an Essentials class, since after one and a half year of playtime with on average 1.5 sessions per month, they still don't full grasp the concept of powers, forget to announce which one they are using, or take up 5 minutes every round because of deciding what power to use.

 

[Jhaelen]

Will you let players rebuild their characters completely? Retrofit stats? Retrain powers? Perhaps none of the above and just wait for the next campaign to start? Or start a brand new campaign, ending the current one?

I'll just try to ignore it, unless it gets translated into German.

If it becomes available in German, I'll reboot my campaign (or start a new one) and only allow German source books.

 

[tyrlaan]

Maybe my thread title was a bit off the mark. I think really it's the "changes that come with Essentials" that are more of a debate to me. For example, new stat booster options for existing races. That's not really the same as something released in a new Power book.

For new class builds, feats, powers, etc I'm in agreement with the majority and would handle it just like any other Power book. But what about stat boosts, the human racial power, magic item commonality, etc? These aren't exactly errata.

 

[MrMyth]

Maybe my thread title was a bit off the mark. I think really it's the "changes that come with Essentials" that are more of a debate to me. For example, new stat booster options for existing races. That's not really the same as something released in a new Power book.

For new class builds, feats, powers, etc I'm in agreement with the majority and would handle it just like any other Power book. But what about stat boosts, the human racial power, magic item commonality, etc? These aren't exactly errata.

Our group won't really have to worry about it, since the current game is wrapping up, and the next one won't start until after Essentials is out.

Of course, we've had a pretty open rebuild policy anyway - when PHB2 hit, my Eladrin remembered he was just a Deva who spent too long in the Fey. Later on, our Changeling got 'stuck' in the form of a Tiefling and a few things like that. If a player has wanted to make character changes, we've tended to allow it. Smaller ones we stick to the usual 1/level rule.

I don't think the stat boosts or other stuff will actually be any trickier to handle than new class builds or other new options showing up. The magic item stuff - a bit trickier, but we'll see what advice they give with it, and I think it will mainly just inform the DM going forward rather than cause any issues with current gear.

 

[Nifft]

We will read it, steal the parts that deserve to be stolen, mock the parts that deserve to be mocked, and go on with our game(s).

Cheers, -- N