Quick Question about Essentials. (Some newbie questions)

[teknolaiz]

I am just starting to dive into this FG II stuff and I was wondering if it supports D&D essentials? I am looking to run my first game and I think I would pick that up and a campaign of some sort and just run them from the books.

I am also semi interested in voice modulation, because it's not really something I would do in a normal face to face tabletop game. We are using ventrilo as a means to communicate.. anyone have tips on that?

Is there anything else I should know as a FG II newbie?

Thanks in advance for everyones help. I'll be watching this thread anxiously :D

[gmkieran]

Welcome to the fun, Tekno! Not certain about Essentials, but it might be more under FG's 3.5 ruleset than 4e. 4e has a great deal of automation and built-in functionality (effects, multi-layer image handling, drag-n-drop weapons, etc) but it's almost all straight up 4e, none of the refinements. Regarding voice modulation, I've never tried it, but found a couple Ventrilo-related resources here:

https://support.audio4fun.com/tutorials/av-voice-changer-software-products/vcs-diamond-tutorials/40-how-to-change-voice-while-doing-voice-chat-in-ventrilo-with-voice-changer-software

and here:

https://www.ehow.com/how_7259564_replace-voices-ventrilo.html

There are all kinds of things you should know as a newbie. Check out some of the video tutorials on the Downloads page and the manuals in the Library. There's also a wiki full of cool info on campaigns other folks have built/run, how to create your own custom rule-sets and all manner of craziness.

Cheers!
GMK

[Griogre]

Hi, teknolaiz. The 4E ruleset supports all of the 4E rules, including D&D Essentials, Heroes of the Fallen Lands, Heroes of the Forgotten Kingdoms, Monster Vault and the DM Kit. That said, what the 4E ruleset does is supply just the rules.

Basically the ruleset is the same as the Essential's Rules Compendium with no Powers, Feats or Monsters. WotC did not make it possible to distribute the Powers, Feats or monsters with the ruleset the same way it did for 3.5 and distributing the libraries would be illegal.

However, the good news is there is a tool that allows an individual to scrape the DDI Compendium if they have an account. This tool, the 4E Parser, will build library modules that do have all the feats, powers and monsters. It is worth getting a month's worth of DDI to scrape the modules if you don't already have an account.

The 4E Parser is at the mercy of the arrangement of the DDI compendium database structure. Every time WotC changes their database it can cause the scraper to break. Currently the 4E scraper crashes if you scrape magic items. Fortunately you can tell it not to scrape magic items.

There *is* one problem with the HotFL and HotFK. WotC did something different in the essential's classes, they basically added sub classes. IE in HotFL both the Knight which is a defender and the Slayer which is a striker are *both* considered Fighters in the database so their powers are mixed together as one entry.

If you have further questions just ask.