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I've seen posts about how (un)convertable D&D Essentials characters are to 4th edition. This is a question about monsters/encounters/adventures.

People have been raving about the Essentials Monster Vault and the adventure included therein. My problem is I just invested in a stack of 4th edition books. Can the monsters/encounters/adventures in Monster Vault (or other Essentials materials) be effectively used with 4th edition characters and dungeon master rules?

If work is required to either adapt or convert the monsters, traps, XP, etc. What would that entail?

I'm trying to figure out if I can/should ignore Essentials materials when building my 4th edition campaign.

F. Randall Farmer
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2 Answers2

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D&D 4e and Essentals are completely compatible. They use the same rules and same basic ideals.

Looking at this review, as I trust the reviewer, it is better to say that the Monster Vault correctly obsoletes MM1. This is a very good thing, as the monsters in MM1 were, from the perspective of 3 years down the road, poorly designed.

Functionally speaking the only adaptation you will need to do is to older adventures which use poorly-designed monsters.

Brian Ballsun-Stanton
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I'm trying to figure out if I can/should ignore Essentials materials when building my 4th edition campaign

The essentials monster builds (and Dark Sun and MM3 monster builds) are intended to be more challenging and more fun for both DM and players.

They tried to tone down the ability of monsters to remove a player from play with stun, daze and dominate, as well as reduce the "grind" imposed by soldier monsters.

In addition they tried to ensure that the big bad solos have the ability to go toe to toe with the PC and be able to fight off action denial that often made the MM1 solo builds seem like boring bags of hit points.

Simon Withers
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