Hero Lab: Incomplete

[Thazar]

I would like to give my two bits as well. I will say I love Hero Lab and it makes our game MUCH easier. (Especially at higher level.) Many of the above comments are personal preference and DO play into a product review, but they are also subject to opinion and taste. And the adjustments tab is there to allow you to implement the spells you want. Hero Lab is an AID to the game and not a GM. The players and the DM need to know how to use their characters and when to check and un-check the boxes for conditions and spells.

On the other hand many of the points have a small amount of validity. I say small amount because the program includes an editor to allow you to custom tailor the product to how you want it. An RPG like pathfinder is VERY complex. No program will cover all of the material that is out there and you will always need to add or tweak things for your game to some extent. The free add on material such as the AP's are just that... free add-ons so they do not need to be 100% complete. Anything you get is bonus. (But I would REALLY like it if they added the monsters... I would even pay for it.)

If you pay for the extra add-on material it would be nice if that add on included everything at release. But patience is a virtue or so I have been told. And eventually they do get it all included. So while I would say faster is obviously better everyone will have their own opinion on how fast is fast enough. This should go into your decision on if you want to pay the extra money. (I will because I am lazy and they WILL get it done faster them me.)

Finally, I would like to stress as a paying customer. Please consider adding the monsters from the AP's in the future. Either as a free check mark like you do now, or as a supplemental bestiary that you pay for.

Other then the the program is great. It is powerful and does a lot of the heavy lifting for you and allows on the fly adjustments to your character in the middle of combat when you get hit by Dispel Magic, or three different kinds of poison and a curse. Thanks for making it a great product and please see this as encouragement to keep up the good work with some suggestions on how to make the program even better.

[tatteredking]

considering I started to game 32 years ago, and we used paper and pencil, what we have today is awesome. Yes, not complete, but it's pretty dang awesome. I've taken it on myself to help the guys at Wolf Lair fill in the blanks bu writing files for some of the stuff that they have on the back burner. Perhaps you should try your hand at it. I'm sure they would love to have another volunteer.

[ShadowChemosh]

Originally Posted by tatteredking

I've taken it on myself to help the guys at Wolf Lair fill in the blanks bu writing files for some of the stuff that they have on the back burner.

Yep its what I do myself. If anyone goes back and re-reads the updates you will find most, not all, of the spell adjustments where actually added by myself.

Of course I don't find it work I find it fun as it combines my two favorite things. Programming and D&D. Mmmm its like chocolate and peanut butter.

Anyways is the software perfect. No, but is it always getting better with each release of the software YES. That is the most anyone can ever expect of software.

Also I recently spoke to Mathias about the "not implemented" stuff and really their is not allot of them compared to what what IS in the system. Plus some that are not done look really easy on paper, but are a nightmare from a programming stand point. On top of this don't forget its GenCon in what 12 days or something.

Give them some time after GenCon and I expect you will start to see things finish out.

[Paris.Crenshaw]

There are good points on both sides of this discussion. For me, it boils down to this: There are some things that I think Hero Lab should be able to support for my Pathfinder games that it doesn't yet do. It does many things very well, though; and it is surprisingly easy to add your own material, once you get comfortable with the Editor. However, not everything can be added by users, so LW needs to focus their efforts on those things, first.

For example, implementation of a few of the feats from Advanced Player's Guide and Ultimate Magic still remain, if I recall; and the Bladebound archetype still needs to be added to Ultimate Magic. Official rules material that should be part of a paid-for data package needs to be implemented, but LW fully acknowledges that and is working hard to make that a reality.

While I'd love for the monsters from the Adventure Path bestiaries to be included, I personally consider the AP stuff to be "bonus" material. It's free content that gets added as it comes out, allowing folks to build their characters for a campaign. That's pretty cool, if you ask me.

Like the Pathfinder RPG, itself, I think much of Hero Lab's strength is in its community. With the help of a few very active folks on the boards, not to mention Mathias's frequent and patient advice, I've found that I can add many of the things I need.

In fact, I will have the entire Darkmoon Vale campaign arc of modules entered into HL by the end of the week. I got Chava's files from ShadowChemosh's page on d20pfsrd.com for most of them, but I was able to build all the creatures, items, and NPCs from both "Carnival of Tears" and "Hungry Are the Dead," myself. (Okay...I did get some tips on a few things in Carnival, but I have yet to ask for help on "Hungry Are the Dead." ) I'll be sending those files to ShadowChemosh very soon, so he can post them on his page.

While I initially would have preferred to have someone else do all of that work for me, I'm glad I'm doing it because (1) it helps me learn how to do things for when I want to enter a completely new creature, item, class, etc. of my own and (2) it allows me to give back to the community.

Anyway, that's my 2 cents.

[chava]

The main thing that I can't add that I'm waiting (mostly patiently for) is the implementation of multiple minions. (Broodmaster Summoner, or the Ranger variant that I like).

But that's because I likes those.

[Lawful_g]

Just my two cents, but I think the Pathfinder support has been marvellous. Lone wolf has really focused on supporting the new system, keeping up with books as they are released.

As for the rest, the community can do a lot to fill in the blanks. 3.5 support has been largely abandoned for the last year, and I've been looking with jealousy at all the goodies you guys get over here. To rectify that I pulled up my sleeves and added all the monsters from the Monster Manual, replicated the types and subtypes mechanics you have in pathfinder, and now have added mechanics for advancing the HD of monsters (in the next release). I'm sure with the number of people who enoy pathfinder you guys can add the monsters from the AP beastiaries with little trouble.

[Dgrm44]

Originally Posted by Lawful_g

Just my two cents, but I think the Pathfinder support has been marvellous. Lone wolf has really focused on supporting the new system, keeping up with books as they are released.

As for the rest, the community can do a lot to fill in the blanks. 3.5 support has been largely abandoned for the last year, and I've been looking with jealousy at all the goodies you guys get over here. To rectify that I pulled up my sleeves and added all the monsters from the Monster Manual, replicated the types and subtypes mechanics you have in pathfinder, and now have added mechanics for advancing the HD of monsters (in the next release). I'm sure with the number of people who enoy pathfinder you guys can add the monsters from the AP beastiaries with little trouble.

How do I add the monsters myself?

[Paris.Crenshaw]

On the menu bar, go to the Tools menu and click "Launch Editor". Once you open the Editor, you can click "Help" and "Help on using the Editor" to get the basics.

Inputting your own data can be a bit intimidating at first, but you aren't likely to "break" the program and if you run into trouble you can post questions to this forum, and folks like Lawful_g, ShadowChemosh, chava, and even Mathias, can point you in the right direction.

[Random]

I think they are doing awesome getting as much done as they go...small company that they are. What I'd really like is beyond their control...and that's for 3rd party developers to do HL files for their supplements...like Super Genius did for their revised Dragon Rider...because I like to allow more in my games...but I pretty much only allow what's in HL to be used at my table. Though my players are welcome to program stuff that's not in if they want me to allow it

[ShadowChemosh]

Originally Posted by Lawful_g

I'm sure with the number of people who enjoy pathfinder you guys can add the monsters from the AP bestiaries with little trouble.

This is a great idea Lawful_g. As this is more complete type of add-on I could also setup a type of auto-download feature like we use for the d20 project.

If nothing else we can make a .hl import file instead so that the .por and .user files would get loaded easily. Though thinking about it a little more we could also probably get these to maybe be added officially which would make it even easier for everyone to get to.

I am already stretched too thin to really help with this but it would be great community thing to do. Made by the community for the community...