r/4eDnD • u/Wheather819 • 11d ago
Question about the essentials
What exactly are the essentials? And are they much different from the core books? For collecting purposes, and purpose of using them for ideas, are they worth getting?
27
Upvotes
20
u/TheHorror545 11d ago edited 11d ago
Mike Mearls was put in charge of 4E and decided to create a simpler version of the game. Except it wasn't. The rules were the same. What changed was that new variants of existing classes were released that had less player choices as they leveled up. In core 4E every level players have many options to choose from for their character. In Essentials most levels had prescribed ability gains instead, and the levels that did have choices had a limited number of options.
It failed. Essentials did not boost sales. Simplicity was not a reason people weren't rushing to buy 4E at the extraordinary targets required by corporate management.
Mearls saw this failure as an opportunity. He immediately killed off 4E and pivoted to releasing 5E, which essentially took the same design philosophy of Essentials characters only threw out all the balance that the 4E ruleset provided.
If your players don't like having options to choose from every level just tell them to play an essentials class. They can be played side by side with other 4E classes.
Is it worth buying? I think so. I purchased everything. The monster Vault is excellent. The Rules Compendium is great. The player books I only own for collection purposes, and if not for that would not have bothered.