Upgrading from Version 4

Version 5 keeps everything you had. There is one step to know about, and this page is mostly about that step.

The short version

Your content is intact. It is D&D 5E content, and version 5 only shows content belonging to the game system that is loaded — so install the D&D 5E system and everything comes back. The app offers to do it for you, from a copy bundled inside the app, with no download needed.

What changed

In version 4 the app was a D&D 5E app. The content types, the character sheets, the stat blocks and the rules assumptions were built into the code, so supporting another ruleset meant rewriting the app.

Version 5 pulls all of that out into a game system: a self-contained definition of what content types exist, what fields they have, how their forms are laid out and how they are displayed. The app loads one system at a time and takes its shape from it.

D&D 5E did not go away — it became the dnd5e system. Nothing was cut, and none of the 5E behaviour was lost. What you gain is that the system can be updated on its own schedule without an app release, and that other rulesets are now possible at all.

Why your library may look empty

When your database was migrated, all of your existing content was tagged as D&D 5E content, because that is what it is.

The library only shows content belonging to the system that is currently loaded. Until the D&D 5E system is installed and selected, none of your content matches the loaded system — so the library comes up empty.

Nothing was deleted. No content needs to be re-imported, and no backup needs to be restored.

Installing the D&D 5E system

The app asks you. Whenever no game system is installed — on a first launch, and again after updating — you get a Game System Required screen with an Install D&D 5E button.

That copy of D&D 5E ships inside the app, so installing it needs no download, no network and no account. One tap and it is in; your library fills back up.

If you dismissed that screen and want to do it by hand:

1. Open Settings.
2. Tap Current System.
3. Pick D&D 5E from the list of installed systems.

If it is not listed at all, Settings → Package Manager downloads it, and Settings → Import installs it from a .system file you already have.

Note

The bundled copy is only offered while D&D 5E is genuinely absent. Once it exists it belongs to you — the app will not write over it later, so a newer version you downloaded from the Package Manager, or edits you made to the system folder yourself, are safe.

Legacy content you import yourself

Legacy .compendium and .pack XML archives from version 4 still import.

Because that content is 5E content, the D&D 5E system has to be installed before you import it — otherwise the import fails rather than guessing where the content belongs. If an old archive refuses to import, this is usually why.

The current formats are .module, .campaign, .system, .collection and .eplus; see Import and Export. Nothing forces you to convert — your old archives keep working.

Purchases

Purchases from older versions are honoured; version 5 is a free update, not a new app.

If something you own is not being recognised — after reinstalling, or on a new device — use Settings → Restore Purchases. It costs nothing and never charges you again. See Purchases.

Before you upgrade

Not required, but worth doing once: export your content from version 4 and keep the files somewhere other than the device. The migration is well-trodden, but an export is the one thing that protects you regardless of what happens — and it is useful afterwards as an ordinary backup. See Backups.

Still missing something?

Ask on our Discord or on r/EncounterPlus — include what you are looking for and which system is loaded under Settings → Current System.