Integrating Active Directory into our Mac Mavericks Open Directory Domain Help... :)

We are adding an Active Directory server to our network, to assist with larger groups and email issues.  Problem is, through searching I've found people who say it is easy and others who say it will just fall apart.  But...  Nothing concrete about how to properly go about making sure it works the way it is supposed to...

Anyone know of any good articles or documentation about adding in a AD server?  Eventually we need to promote it to the master and still have the mac servers as replicas (or at least still part of the system, so we can update them as needed).  

Any thoughts?
You can integrate Active Directory with Open Directory in Mavericks, but it's a much different process then before. You have to give the AD user access to the services you want them to use before adding them to a group. (For instance FileSharing) If you don't you will get some weird errors, especially with Window's users. Once you give them access, then you can add them to groups. Apple wants you to use Profile Manager for all Management purposes, and not use groups at all. I find Groups are nice for server access, and auto mounts, but that's it. Everything else should be done in Profile Manager or a product like Casper.