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CapedCrusader
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Volunteer Data File Contributor
 
Join Date: Aug 2009
Posts: 1,550

Old April 4th, 2017, 11:58 AM
Well, Pathfinder gets the most attention for a couple of reasons. There's so much material out there for it. It's allowed them to create a model where people will pay to have someone else enter all the data for them. Folks could go in and enter all of that data themselves, but they don't need to.
Savage Worlds, on the other hand, doesn't have anywhere near the level of content that Pathfinder does. Also, the Savage Worlds fans were a little more pro-active, and had a tendency to enter the data themselves.

Also, the material presented for Pathfinder is all the same game system/setting. It's more in the nature of more material than completely different setting. Savage Worlds is much more variable. Each Setting can completely re-write the game system in certain ways. Savage Rifts is one of the worst. It bends the game system rules in ways that are tough to duplicate with Hero Lab, considering everything else it has to support for Savage Worlds.
The other issue is that, because of licensing issues in the early days, the Savage Worlds community took to writing Setting files and then passing them around. So no one made any money off of the deal, Lone Wolf or the folks that owned the IP. This had the side effect of removing Lone Wolf's capability to make a business out of Savage Worlds supplements. Even now, except for the Companion books, Lone Wolf doesn't charge/make any money from the Savage Worlds modules except for the base module. None of the Setting files cost anything.

The delays in the code releases is also part and parcel to this. I only do this part time, fitting it around my day work. On their end, they are very busy with their other offerings, because that's where their money is. It's the nature of the beast. We've got an update in the final stages of testing that's almost ready to go out, but I had a convention to help run last weekend, and my mother is in the ICU. So, there are other priorities that must be dealt with.

We kind of made our own bed in the Savage Worlds fan community. We created those Setting files ourselves, and gave them away.

I feel that Hero Lab is an extremely useful tool. As a GM, having the ability to quickly spin up characters is invaluable. I also use it for my own characters. In our defense, I will say that you did pick the most complicated Setting. It's also the newest. There's a Setting file in the works, but Rifts does some things that no other Setting does, and some of them are really difficult to arrange. To do it right, we'll need to make base code changes that affect a lot of things. The ability to have more than one Arcane Background is a killer. We have to be so amazingly flexible to be able to support all of the Settings that Savage Worlds has, it causes some issues when we get to some of the specifics.

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Currently In Development: Savage Pathfinder, SWADE Fantasy Companion
Future Development: SWADE Super Powers Companion, SWADE Sci-Fi Companion
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Currently Running: Savage Unity Inc. (homebrew multiverse theme)
Setting Files Supported: Deadlands: Reloaded, Flash Gordon, Gaslight, Hellfrost, Interface Zero 2.0, Seven Worlds, Slipstream, Solomon Kane
Future Setting Files: Savage Judge Dredd

Last edited by CapedCrusader; April 4th, 2017 at 12:07 PM.
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