Polymorph Support Announcement

[Aaron]

We'll be supporting polymorph effects with the next release. You can see a sneak peak and get the down-low by checking out today's blog post:

http://www.wolflair.com/blog/2015/02...ph-wild-shape/

[ShadowChemosh]

So first I wanted to say Awesome Job! Looks crazy useful. Obviously way better than what I built.

My first question is this thing "totally" hidden or will it be in the editor allowing to make custom/houserules to the Polymorph rules?

Next question is that "window" suppose to show "all" the abilities you gain? Cause it lists Bite, Flight and Scent. But it seems to be missing Low-Light vision then?

Also what Fly speed and maneuverability is being set?

[frumple]

That looks awesome!

[Aaron]

You won't have access to the UI of the form, as usual, but you should be able to copy the spell adjustments and other stuff which uses these mechanics to make your own or tweak them. Because the system is so complex, most of the code is in nested procedures (so happy users can copy/view those now!), so when designing your own you'll probably want to copy and modify the existing ones to create new procedures. For simple modifications, like Allow Ability X which normally isn't allowed, or Forbid Ability Y which is normally allowed, those are handled by applying certain tags.

Congrats on being the first person I know to spot a bug before we've even released a new system. It looks like the example race is getting Low-light vision from the type rather than from bootstrapping it directly to the race. That's a complication, thanks for pointing it out.

The basic premise of the system is that you add the race that you are polymorphing into (the "new form race") to a gizmo, then scripts run through all picks bootstrapped to that race and mark which are allowed when polymorphed using this particular spell (based on those tags I mentioned above), and limits them based on some variables set in the procedures also based on the spell.

All the "new form" racial abilities are shadowed from the gizmo to the hero. The ones that are not allowed get disabled and hidden in the first pass. A second pass happens if the ability or adjustment is not active and disables/hides even the ones which are allowed. If there is a polymorph effect active then a helper on the hero goes through racial and class abilities that aren't part of the "new form" and disables them based on whether the user checks the box for an ability to be active when polymorphed.

We didn't want to have to make the call ourselves on whether an ability should be lost on polymorph beyond the core rulebook races.

There are far too many races in the bestiaries for us to review each in turn but on looking over a representative sampling it seems like most racial abilities are tied to form (are lost when polymorphed) and most class abilities are not (are retained when polymorphed). Thus racial abilities of an original form default to not-active, and class abilities default to active. Consult with your DM if you think a particular ability should be flipped from the default.

Fly speed and maneuverability are set based on the new form, but can be limited by setting certain variables in the adjustment when you call the procedure.

[Aaron]

Oh, and flipping the switch for a particular ability is on a per character basis, so it will be retained across multiple spell adjustments, or even if you delete all polymorph spell adjustments. It's not "global" in the sense that it applies to other heroes in the same portfolio or made in the future. If you decide that you want to make such a global change (for example, you decide that the dwarf's Hatred ability should be lost on polymorph), then you can do a replaces thing ID of the ability in question and set the appropriate user field to a non-default value.

[ShadowChemosh]

Originally Posted by Aaron

Congrats on being the first person I know to spot a bug before we've even released a new system. It looks like the example race is getting Low-light vision from the type rather than from bootstrapping it directly to the race. That's a complication, thanks for pointing it out.

Thanks! Its why I make the "big" bucks!

Over all it sounds totally awesome! I saw some of the new "boostrap" foreach logic that was added to HL and I assumed that was added to support this.

This should be VERY cool. So my only last question is does it work on the iPad? If so my players are going to go "nuts"!

[Aaron]

Yeah, Colen was kind enough to add the ability to detect bootstraps in a tag expression so that I could handle the candidate expressions for Giant Form (requireing a bootstrapped giant subtype), Undead Anatomy (forbidding a bootstrapped incorporeal subtype), and in general (excluding mythic subtyped races).

As for the Ipad, I haven't tested it on that just yet. If iPad functionality is not in the initial release, it should be soon. That'd likely fall to Colen or one of my peers, since I am on Vacation for the entire month of March.

[Aaron]

Also, let me express my appreciation for your work providing a community solution to polymorph issues in the years leading up to this.

[MadCat75]

This is really cool

[frumple]

Wow. Can't wait to get under the hood of this to see how it works. Might be a better way to implement some of the templates I have implemented for clients.