moving a module from 3.5 to 5 for example....

[shardan]

i'm about to make a big FG purchase, and i want to stress first that what i'm asking is not about copyright, i will not be violating any copyright issues. This is, however about my fondness for some games from my past, and my desire to make them as modules in fg for my personal use. well mine and the group's okay. but i have af ew friends who want to play 3.5 and a few who want to give 5E a shakedown trial. i'm planning on using some of the official releases, but i also have these scenarios i would like to compile. having said that, the question follows (I know, i ramble)

is there any way i can create a scenario for 5E that i can then port to 3.5 or do i have to build it seperately for the two rulesets? in part this is to create as much of a feel of continuity for the players beuase i figure we're likely to move fro one to the other at some point.

[LordEntrails]

Welcome to the community!

I can't fully answer your question, but I can get you started and then others can chime in with some of the more technical details.

Campaigns and modules are built around a specific ruleset. Kind of like a database which has specific types of functions and object types (i.e. the game mechanics). Both the 3.5 & 5E rulesets are both built on the CoreRPG ruleset.

Therefore, you could create your modules in CoreRPG and use them in both 3.5 & 5E campaigns. But, doing so you want have the full functionality of either 3.5 or 5 in those campaigns (because you would only have the CoreRPG functions). One of the things this would miss is having your encounters linked to monsters that you would then be able to place in the Combat Tracker and enjoy all the automation.

Here's where I'm not sure of the best approach for you. After creating your module in CoreRPG (i.e. the maps and stories) you could then open then module in a 3.5 campaign, update it will all the 3.5 specific info and functions, then do the same thing in 5E. You also might be able to create it specifically in one ruleset and someone here might now a backdoor way to get it to the other. I don't :(

Note, also know that if you want to do it directly in 5E, their is the PAR5E tool that can help automate the process for you. See the sticky in the 5E sub-forum.

[Nylanfs]

You could build a core module that contains the fluff, and then a separate module that has the crunch for the system.

[Zacchaeus]

Hi Shardan welcome to Fantasy Grounds and to the Community.

You will (effectively) have to build the two campaigns separately becasue there isn't any commonality between the two. You can't use FG to port a mudule built for 5e into 3.5 or vice versa.

That said the stories and maps are clearly common features and that represents a great deal of what is in a module. Everything else however is different. If you are using a story from a PDF for example then all you would need would be the NPCs, encounters, maps and treasures in FG and you could read the text from the pdf; you wouldn't need to put any text into FG. The other thing of course is that an encounter with 3 Orcs might not directly port into 5e; you might need 5 Orcs or only one or another type of NPC altogether becasue Orcs in 3.5 might me more or less powerful than they are in 5e.

Overall it's hard to give precise advice because there are a lot of differences in the game mechanics between the two systems.

[Moon Wizard]

You could do a combination of what nylanfs and Zacchaeus proposed.

Build one module with the story text and image/maps in CoreRPG, and then you can edit the module to be used in 3.5E or 5E by editing the definition.xml file inside the module.

For the creatures and items, I would just pull from the the included rulebooks (for 3.5E or 5E SRD) or the purchased rulebooks (for 5E) when needed.

Regards,
JPG

[Trenloe]

Some additional info about changing a module to be usable in another ruleset can be found in post #4 here: https://www.fantasygrounds.com/forums/showthread.php?23772-Converting-PF-3-5e-FG-modules-to-5e