Hero Lab Community Repository for Shadowrun 5th?
 

Is there any Hero Lab Community Repository for Shadowrun 5th?
Something that allows shared user data and characters?


I figure we GMs reinvent the wheel a lot.

i've got a shared dropbox folder with tons of herolab characters.
you wanna share?

Yes. I'm working a the Spikes Troll gang leadership

How do they do the Pathfinder shared user content?

A shared data repository would be awesome. Is there anything like this already?

I also have a bunch of NPCs pre-sorted and ready to share!

Maybe we could get a space on the hero lab website, with a handy options menu indicating which data packs were used to create them.

or we could just post dropbox shared folder links here?

'A shared data repository would be awesome. Is there anything like this already?'
Not to my knowledge.

If nothing else we need to get a shared google drive or something like that.

I think we need to agree to use good naming convention on the NPCs.
Archetypes and race are good things to include in the title of the NPC.

Omae for Chummer is awesome. A searchable data base of NPCs is really useful.
We might want to also do PDFs of the NPCs for when someone doesn't have all of the Herolab shadowrun content.

I should have a nice collection of Spikes Troll Go Gangers. I have Prospects, Patched members, and Chromed Patched members. Plus a few heavy hitters for special occasions like a Spike Fighting adept and a Spike Combat Biker rigger.

i already name my npcs this way (troll rigger, orc ganger, etc).

Hey all. I am the person who runs the d20 (3.5), Pathfinder and 5e D&D repositories. I just saw this thread by chance but figured I could give some information.

The first step is to use a source code repository tool like GitHub. HERE is a link to the Pathfinder one currently in use. This is very helpful as it allows multiple people to make changes to the .user files and to be kept in sync. In addition it has communication tools for collaboration and even bug tracking. The really great part is that its 100% free as long as you are ok with your source code being seen by anyone. This is perfect for such OpenSource tools like HL addons. Take a look at Pathfinder Community Standards post I did for Pathfinder and GitHub as it has some information including desktop software to make things easier.

The second thing is the ability to create a .hl file which is a Hero Lab install file. This file is a compressed file that can contain .por, .stock, .user files and even custom output files. It also is designed to work with version numbers so that it notifies people when a new higher version is available. HERE is an article from LW about creating the .hl file for the iPad. But the .hl can be used with any HL software.

Third you need a static URL address to host the file so that gamers can get to the install file. For this I actually provide a server to all three community groups. I would have no issue adding a fourth for Shadowrun. What I do for Sendric for d20 I gave him his own user id/password that allows access to a single subfolder of my server. He then uses a FTP Client to easily change the .hl file and .xml file when a new version comes out. This works out really well and means one less thing for me to do. :)

HERE is an article I wrote up for others on how to use DropBox, hl install files, and how to craft the URL xml. That should cover allot of the specific details that anyone could have. I don't recommend DropBox for large scale repository as DropBox under heavy use will shut down the link. For small gaming groups it works perfect but in example my Pathfinder repository can get 10,000 downloads in a month. Dropbox would shut that down with a quarter of those downloads. :(

The last and most important part of this is the PERSON who is in charge. For d20 its Sendric, for Pathfinder myself, and for 5e its daplunk. But you need one person to take charge who going to be around and available. They need to be able to take the reins and run with them. I don't hang out in areas outside of the D&D stuff on these boards so I don't know who that would be here. :(

I will try and monitor this thread. But feel free to PM me with questions also.

Thank you so much for laying it out for us.

Step 1 Set up GitHub. Owner David Blank - Start Date Evening of 02/07/2017.

You can also do releases through GitHub directly like we do at PCGen.

So what are we looking for here?

I was hoping to share be able to share NPCs, contacts, and player characters with other GMs.
Conversions from an earlier shadowrun edition to 5th would be great too.

I think with the info provided we can move forward with Github.
Right now I just want to be able to share NPCs and PCs.

Can we do that individually or do we need to create data packs for them?


We also need either some sort of good naming conventions (Group, Race, Archetype, or something like that) or some sort of data base where we can search like Omea.

Being able to do a search on a Yak Troll melee Adept would be nice.

Any other suggestions or concerns?
Three day weekend coming up so I'll work on step 1.

i have bunch ready to go when you get it sorted and ready to accept entries pm me

Hey guys,

If you want to see how the Community Packs work for the other game systems you can just use Hero Lab to test it.

As an example:

Open Hero Lab > Select D&D 5e > Download the official pack.

You will be able to open it in Demo mode. Have a poke around and you should be able to assess that it is rather limited in contact due to the copyright restrictions.

Go back to the Select A Game screen and hit the Find Updates button. Click Add Source and copy the URL below in as a new source. It will download and prompt you to restart Hero Lab.

Do that and then jump in and have a look at all the new content. Remember to check the source options at the player create screen. You will notice that the bulk of the content is player options.

Now reading through the thread it doesn't sound like this is what you are trying to do.

What you can do though to include NPCs, PCs and Creatures is create stock files. These are just Hero Lab portfolios that are saved with the *.stock portfolio. You then put it in your data folder and restart Hero Lab to make them available in the encounter builder.

You would then package it up like Shadow described which would give you a URL that people could add just like the process above. When an update is make Hero Lab prompts the user to update.

Anyway, hope it helps and goodluck. Who ever takes on the responsibility of owning the content be prepared. It can be a bit of work. Sometimes an official patch changes how things work and we need to go back through and change things or we introduce a bug and break things for people and need to provide support.

One of those with great functionality comes increased responsibility situations.

Totally worth it though tbh :D

If you can its news to me. Because I don't see how you would get gitHub to host the updates.xml file in a format that HL can read. In addition you would have to store the .hl file in the repository itself.

Let me know if you can trick GitHub into doing that.

I assume "contacts" things stored in a .por file like NPC/PCs are? If so what you would want to do is combine these together into a single .por file and place them into the Shadowrun data folder. This is where the encounter builder tool expects to find the files.

Then you can include .por files or .stock files into the .hl updates file. The one issue here is that .por/.stock files can get really big. For Pathfinder I am over 1.3 gigs already. If the files got that big you would need to start finding alternative hosting options. In addition you would want to break it up in multiple downloads. Not many people are going to be happy to download half a gig in data... :(

But if these are not that many its a good place to start. But if any of you have .user files that make those .por files then you need to include the .user file in the .hl file when its made.

I've created a repository
https://github.com/runnerblank/Commu...-Shadowrun-5th

Now I need to figure out what I'm doing ;)

I've made encounters for Pathfinder, but it has been a few months.

I've a couple days off so I'm going to start working on this.
Got some Spike Troll Gangers, Night Hunters, and Tamanous organ leggers to post.

How does everyone feel about posting both the Hero Lab .por file and a PDF or stat block of the character?

It would make the site useful to any GM that way.

happy to do both
let me know when you get it setup and ill dump mine in there

Posted Two Banshees.
One is a mage and the other is rather new.
Both PDF and POR.
Please see if you can view/download them.

https://github.com/runnerblank/Commu...-Shadowrun-5th

Cascade Ork Pirates
 

Cascade Ork Smuggler/Pirates.
These boy are far from their mountain homes, but their Corsair Panther can get them places where other ships would attract too much attention.
Lead by a Brawling Adept Captain, plus a Pistol Adept First Mate, a Rigger Pilot and a Shaman plus more mountain boys for muscle, anything not nailed down is fair game.



https://github.com/runnerblank/Commu...-Shadowrun-5th

Looks very useful. I will have to see about getting some NPCs ready to help out.

The more the merrier!!!!

how do i upload files?

I'm getting this from github right now:

Uploads are disabled.
File uploads require push access to this repository.

The usual process is to fork the original repository to your own github account, commit and push the changes there (in a new git branch), then create a pull request to let the owner of the source repository know that there is something new to merge. Effectively, you upload it to your own area, then tell the owner where to get it. With some wrapper stuff, that makes the 'tell' and 'get' a few clicks.

The alternative is to have the owner authorize you to have shared administrator access to the original repo. Normally only pre setup teams use that. The first way is more secure, allowing anyone to request a change to a repository, without giving the whole world access to mess things up.

I'd like to do it the first way.

ugh.

is there a reason to use github over something simpler like dropbox?

Well send it to me and I'll load it. Just include a good description.

ok, how do i send it to you?

can i send you a drop box link?

Sure. It also automatically supports revision control and history, provides a wiki where extra usage information can be added over time, provides a place to ask questions and report problems. All for free.

Oh, it also provides a common place to go get the latest version of anything collected there. Other than the 'free', dropbox does not do any of that.

Is that enough reasons?

Lets see if the moderator lets me respond to you this time without censorship..

for me, not really.

These are character files not programs that need versions tracked.

In this instance imho simpler = better