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- The Lone Wolf Development Team
How long, Really?
- Thread starter Madmaxneo
- Start date
100%. most if the things I find people in this thread are hanging for I have never even considered needing in my campaigns. There are always going to be things that people want though that is not yet available.
Personally I think there are two things that absolutely must be delivered first and must be delivered correctly in order to achieve the desired outcome...
The content Market. Bet your bottom dollar that requirements have been added by 3rd parties during discussions which have caused delays here. Get this right though and LWs profit is going to increase.
Web based view... The market has shifted since realm Works was invisioned. Cloud services now means something completely different to people than it did 5 years ago and expectations have changed. They need to deliver this to come in line with other cloud based solutions to ensure the usability by both dm and player will improve. Again this needs to happen as will attract more users and therefore more money.
Both of these things are core improvements that demand significant planning and infrastructure to ensure they are done right. Get it right and the money will come enabling Lone Wolf to invest more heavily in the features that small yet vocal groups of DMs are in need of.
Personally I think there are two things that absolutely must be delivered first and must be delivered correctly in order to achieve the desired outcome...
The content Market. Bet your bottom dollar that requirements have been added by 3rd parties during discussions which have caused delays here. Get this right though and LWs profit is going to increase.
Web based view... The market has shifted since realm Works was invisioned. Cloud services now means something completely different to people than it did 5 years ago and expectations have changed. They need to deliver this to come in line with other cloud based solutions to ensure the usability by both dm and player will improve. Again this needs to happen as will attract more users and therefore more money.
Both of these things are core improvements that demand significant planning and infrastructure to ensure they are done right. Get it right and the money will come enabling Lone Wolf to invest more heavily in the features that small yet vocal groups of DMs are in need of.
I've been working with Realm Works since December when I started planning my Shadowrun campaign. There have been a few minor issues I've run in to but most of it has been user error.
I sat in on Rob's session at GenCon talking about the content market and spent probably 30 minutes talking to him at the booth on Saturday.
To me the content market is "hey, this is a really cool thing we will be able to do". Yes I want to run the Grande Temple of Jing for my players without having to key the the entire thing in myself. But I'm lazy and will wait for the content market. In the mean time I will continue copying and running Shadowrun missions (which won't be in the market) in my campaign with Realm Works.
The market and realm syncing takes an amount of planning to avoid all kinds of issues most of us never think about. And remember, all of this is being done by three people!
I sat in on Rob's session at GenCon talking about the content market and spent probably 30 minutes talking to him at the booth on Saturday.
To me the content market is "hey, this is a really cool thing we will be able to do". Yes I want to run the Grande Temple of Jing for my players without having to key the the entire thing in myself. But I'm lazy and will wait for the content market. In the mean time I will continue copying and running Shadowrun missions (which won't be in the market) in my campaign with Realm Works.
The market and realm syncing takes an amount of planning to avoid all kinds of issues most of us never think about. And remember, all of this is being done by three people!
chaoscowboy
Well-known member
Alright well I bought this software because I wanted something like masterplan only pathfinder compatible. If it can manage xp, gear, and help me organize my plots I guess its worth the price.
You can certainly find ways to do all of that however:
Hero Labs integration really shines, especially for management of player XP and gear. (and monsters, and npcs)
Personally I have my players loading into a Hero Labs *.por file. XP, gear, spells, level ups are all handled through Hero Labs. Combat is also managed through Hero Labs using the Encounter Manager.
You will certainly be able to manage your plots via Realm Works though and you can certainly load it up with all the gear you like and XP tracking should be simple if you do plan on doing it within the tool.
Have a play within Story Board mode. And don't forget you can load up a Smart Image and add pins. You can connect those pins to other content. When you load a smart image up these a little button on the top right that splits the screen into two halfs, image or flow chart on the left, selected content on the right. This is great for running games as you can have the picture of the dungeon on the left, click pins as player enter rooms and the content for that room loads on the right.
Awesome feature yet something I did not truly understand until 6 months into my RWs use.
Hero Labs integration really shines, especially for management of player XP and gear. (and monsters, and npcs)
Personally I have my players loading into a Hero Labs *.por file. XP, gear, spells, level ups are all handled through Hero Labs. Combat is also managed through Hero Labs using the Encounter Manager.
You will certainly be able to manage your plots via Realm Works though and you can certainly load it up with all the gear you like and XP tracking should be simple if you do plan on doing it within the tool.
Have a play within Story Board mode. And don't forget you can load up a Smart Image and add pins. You can connect those pins to other content. When you load a smart image up these a little button on the top right that splits the screen into two halfs, image or flow chart on the left, selected content on the right. This is great for running games as you can have the picture of the dungeon on the left, click pins as player enter rooms and the content for that room loads on the right.
Awesome feature yet something I did not truly understand until 6 months into my RWs use.
chaoscowboy
Well-known member
I've got the fan-made encounter library for reign of winter set up, and don't quite find the hero lab encounter manager up to snuff, especially given that I run stuff on roll20 with plenty of macros (and import scripts), I think I can handle that. I just need the stuff you said it can do well. I wish there was some helper for making sure loot levels are as they should be for their level and encounters aren't too hard but that seems like a wish that will never be.
I'm one of the whiny people ShadowChemosh is talking about. I want printing. But I also agree that you should try it out and make an informed decision. Maybe what's important to me isn't important to you. Maybe what's important to others isn't important to you.
You've already made the purchase. You have the 60 days. Won't hurt anything to kick in the tires and drive it around the block.
ShadowChemosh
Well-known member
Absolutely no disagreement from me on this statement.
Just for that, I'm gonna nitpick.
The second comment in this thread offers bad, or at least, very unclear advice:
http://forums.wolflair.com/showthread.php?t=51966
I generally consider the use of "Replaces Thing ID" bad practice, because the replaced thing becomes completely unavailable, regardless of which sources are checked or unchecked. And this can cause much confusion.
Rather, create your own thing, give it a source, then preclude the thing you want to replace, and give the preclusion the same source. This way, your changes are only effective if your own source is checked. If your source is unchecked, it defaults back to the original thing.
Unless, you really, absolutely, 100% want to exclude something, preclude it instead of replacing it, and define a source for that preclusion.
Dark Lord Galen
Well-known member
SOAPBOX "whine"
@EightBitz> Not sure what a reference to a herolab Posting has to do with this, other than, as seems the " chosen vernacular" "Nit-pick" against Shadow, so it really has no value here....
@Shadow> I have always had (and still have) the greatest of respect for your efforts here on the forum and in support of HL... but to classify others as "whiny" (interpreted as a yammerer from my perspective) is not accurate, (well in most cases
). Being the left brained engineer type, I like the black n white of things..... and to point out challenges, failures and successes are not whiny but simply stating facts in the light of day.
I don't think (IMHO) that it is unreasonable to expect LW and more specifically Realm Works to do some of the things that was advertised YEARS ago. Nor do I think its Whining to complain on their lack of making those deliverables in what any supplier/consumer relationship would consider "reasonable amount of time", especially since the sad but true comparative here is now labeled as "Soon".
I think it is the collective public opinion that the poll was a failure, miss leading and served no real purpose other than to help RW staff know what added features were popular, but they missed badly on grouping those responses together when each group (DMs vs Players)had very different ideas, needs, and expectations.
They compounded this with a lack of good forecast planning on how long things would take (both from an internal company perspective and and outward reporting mechanism) to the public. This was further impacted by Developer losses early into the project.
Frustration on both sides set in, and the trenches were "dug" each defending their ground.
Is it reasonable to expect some things?
Possibly
I for one have no real need for being able to print since 95% of my tabling is now electronic, but not everyone games as my table does. So I think this was a reasonable expectation EARLY on.. yet still is not here...
Is it reasonable to at least export all the data self installed if one chose to no longer use RW?
Yes, but with the caveat that this was not offered as an option early on so it is not reasonable to expect it to be placed above other deliverable or overstatements that should be addressed first.
Is it a reasonable expectation to have custom calendars?
Yep, especially since this was "presumably near complete" YEARS ago. But still remains unavailable. (see below for references)
I have LONG been a vocal sound of the lack of action on this topic (see other threads)HOWEVER, while I desire, want and even need it for my RW to be a better DM tool, I went back to my old tried and true methods as I cannot wait for LW and "soon". I would even backseat this to exporting or player journals as this seems to better fit the need of the many, my own players included, who feel their money was a waste for the Player version.
Is it reasonable to expect VTT Features, Live sync, etc etc etc...NOW?
No
As these were things discussed that "could happen in the future". Just like Player's version, (which is virtually DOA till more features support it)
The Kickstarter was intended to supply capital to LW to hire developers to "push it thru to the finish line".
One goal of the KS was to share your creations with other GMs. All these years later the finish line has crept closer, but what was supposed to be a sprint to finish has turned into a marathon in the Rockies with the unfortunate result of leaving all parties on both sides exhausted.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RSbgEOYcUhU
In Feb 2013 we were told
@EightBitz> Not sure what a reference to a herolab Posting has to do with this, other than, as seems the " chosen vernacular" "Nit-pick" against Shadow, so it really has no value here....
@Shadow> I have always had (and still have) the greatest of respect for your efforts here on the forum and in support of HL... but to classify others as "whiny" (interpreted as a yammerer from my perspective) is not accurate, (well in most cases
). Being the left brained engineer type, I like the black n white of things..... and to point out challenges, failures and successes are not whiny but simply stating facts in the light of day.I don't think (IMHO) that it is unreasonable to expect LW and more specifically Realm Works to do some of the things that was advertised YEARS ago. Nor do I think its Whining to complain on their lack of making those deliverables in what any supplier/consumer relationship would consider "reasonable amount of time", especially since the sad but true comparative here is now labeled as "Soon".
I think it is the collective public opinion that the poll was a failure, miss leading and served no real purpose other than to help RW staff know what added features were popular, but they missed badly on grouping those responses together when each group (DMs vs Players)had very different ideas, needs, and expectations.
They compounded this with a lack of good forecast planning on how long things would take (both from an internal company perspective and and outward reporting mechanism) to the public. This was further impacted by Developer losses early into the project.
Frustration on both sides set in, and the trenches were "dug" each defending their ground.
Is it reasonable to expect some things?
Possibly
I for one have no real need for being able to print since 95% of my tabling is now electronic, but not everyone games as my table does. So I think this was a reasonable expectation EARLY on.. yet still is not here...
Is it reasonable to at least export all the data self installed if one chose to no longer use RW?
Yes, but with the caveat that this was not offered as an option early on so it is not reasonable to expect it to be placed above other deliverable or overstatements that should be addressed first.
Is it a reasonable expectation to have custom calendars?
Yep, especially since this was "presumably near complete" YEARS ago. But still remains unavailable. (see below for references)
I have LONG been a vocal sound of the lack of action on this topic (see other threads)HOWEVER, while I desire, want and even need it for my RW to be a better DM tool, I went back to my old tried and true methods as I cannot wait for LW and "soon". I would even backseat this to exporting or player journals as this seems to better fit the need of the many, my own players included, who feel their money was a waste for the Player version.
Is it reasonable to expect VTT Features, Live sync, etc etc etc...NOW?
No
As these were things discussed that "could happen in the future". Just like Player's version, (which is virtually DOA till more features support it)
The Kickstarter was intended to supply capital to LW to hire developers to "push it thru to the finish line".
One goal of the KS was to share your creations with other GMs. All these years later the finish line has crept closer, but what was supposed to be a sprint to finish has turned into a marathon in the Rockies with the unfortunate result of leaving all parties on both sides exhausted.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RSbgEOYcUhU
In Feb 2013 we were told
- :37 "Three years of development and a year of refinement" Counting that number we are on year 7
- :40 Rob says" We are now in the home stretch"
- :50 "Kickstarter to enable more features sooner" Bullet mark
- 1:00-1:18 Features available now> Custom Calendars and Dates"
- 1:44 "RW Starts with all the features you would expect from a word processor"
Well I think some expected printing. - 6:46 RW Supports (implies at the time of video), video shows custom calendars "Imperial and Lunar" 6:58 Even automatically transferring dates from one calendar to another.
- 8:18 Why a Kickstarter if RW is done?" Rob's words.. hope to hire more dev to support the cloud server and the "community repository" 8:41"letting us accomplish more and do it faster"
And last but not least, the one that provides probably the most "unrest among the natives" - 8:53 Rob says>"as you have seen here, we are already close to completion"
SOAPBOX "whine"
@EightBitz> Not sure what a reference to a herolab Posting has to do with this, other than, as seems the " chosen vernacular" "Nit-pick" against Shadow, so it really has no value here....
Shadow was teasing. I was teasing back. That's the alpha and omega. Why so serious?
Dark Lord Galen
Well-known member
Ah, pointtaken.... though some may be unfamiliar with your shared bandy....
And the HL reference left me abit lost to the grey of it.... aka the left brain engaged.
And the HL reference left me abit lost to the grey of it.... aka the left brain engaged.
One product cant be all things to all people.
For me, RW has now replaced HeroLab as the one product I will not play RPGs with out in the future, followed by Hero Lab in close second. RW is the GM tool of my dreams, HL the Player tool of my dreams.
I have now two campaign worlds in development, and I have tried oh so many products to do such an under taking, and none hold a candle to RW. Gone is my duffle bag 4 binders, second duffle bag of books, all replaced by my Surface Pro 3, connected to three larger screens.
Gone are the reams of hand outs, player maps, character sheets, encounter records. All replaced by my Surface Pro 3.
Gone are the days of players begging me to tell them the name of the NPC they spoke to 4 weeks ago about the coin thingy. Or the lost maps, the hand out with the player working over time. Gone are the piles of ink cartridges spent printing mountains of paper. My printer sits oh so lonely, never used.
All of this is now on my Surface Pro 3:
Hero Lab for all players sheets and encounters
RW for the campaign, adventure, handouts, management, back player historical notes.
D20 Ultimate for interactive maps.
Campaign Cartographer 3+ for map making
Pathfinder book PDF speak for them selves
Instead of carrying back breaking 50lbs+ or books and binders and crappola, I carry one Tablet and dice.
Realm Works is a campaign creators dream. So far the only feature I want is calendars. It will come, for now that the one thing still done by hand on paper.
I am now going and entering my favorite old modules into RW, T1-4 Tempe of Elemental Evil just completed (yes complete, every little tidbit is in RW), next up, U1-3 Saltmarsh series. Each for now is done as its own realm, but with content market they will be sharable entities for my campaign worlds.
Realm Works is not with out its faults, but its like comparing a kite to an F35. On top of that, it has been improved significantly along the way, updates, features, bug fixes, UI enhancements. Not all to my liking, but I am but one person, and RW is for everyone.
The more you use it, the more you can't believe you ever played, created or enjoyed a campaign with out it.
For me, RW has now replaced HeroLab as the one product I will not play RPGs with out in the future, followed by Hero Lab in close second. RW is the GM tool of my dreams, HL the Player tool of my dreams.
I have now two campaign worlds in development, and I have tried oh so many products to do such an under taking, and none hold a candle to RW. Gone is my duffle bag 4 binders, second duffle bag of books, all replaced by my Surface Pro 3, connected to three larger screens.
Gone are the reams of hand outs, player maps, character sheets, encounter records. All replaced by my Surface Pro 3.
Gone are the days of players begging me to tell them the name of the NPC they spoke to 4 weeks ago about the coin thingy. Or the lost maps, the hand out with the player working over time. Gone are the piles of ink cartridges spent printing mountains of paper. My printer sits oh so lonely, never used.
All of this is now on my Surface Pro 3:
Hero Lab for all players sheets and encounters
RW for the campaign, adventure, handouts, management, back player historical notes.
D20 Ultimate for interactive maps.
Campaign Cartographer 3+ for map making
Pathfinder book PDF speak for them selves
Instead of carrying back breaking 50lbs+ or books and binders and crappola, I carry one Tablet and dice.
Realm Works is a campaign creators dream. So far the only feature I want is calendars. It will come, for now that the one thing still done by hand on paper.
I am now going and entering my favorite old modules into RW, T1-4 Tempe of Elemental Evil just completed (yes complete, every little tidbit is in RW), next up, U1-3 Saltmarsh series. Each for now is done as its own realm, but with content market they will be sharable entities for my campaign worlds.
Realm Works is not with out its faults, but its like comparing a kite to an F35. On top of that, it has been improved significantly along the way, updates, features, bug fixes, UI enhancements. Not all to my liking, but I am but one person, and RW is for everyone.
The more you use it, the more you can't believe you ever played, created or enjoyed a campaign with out it.
chaoscowboy
Well-known member
Given that I play online, have access to masterplan I can still use for plot stuff, I usually run adventure paths, and don't run monsters or the like from herolab itself, this software as it is right now is just not worth the 50 american I paid for it, which is a pretty penny in canuk coins up here. I've gone through this thing with a fine toothed comb and there is legitimately nothing in here that I can't do in obsidian portal, masterplan, and roll20. If it had pathfinder GM specific tools that I've been waiting for for ages, hoping someone would make incorporated into a plot system like masterplan does, maybe, but it's just not worth it. I'm getting my money back.
MNBlockHead
Well-known member
Who advertises what a product is NOT ?
If the feature is not listed, don't assume it is there. If you are not sure, you have the forum to post to, you can e-mail the developers, and you have a 60-day money-back period.
There is nothing misleading about LWD's current advertising.
chaoscowboy
Well-known member
Oh and to top it all off, I tried to launch an imported portfolio from hero lab and somehow it managed to reset my hero lab back to demo mode. So I had to re-initialize my license and now I have to re-download all my content, much of which is third party. YAY! ~sarcasm.
Goodbye realmworks, at least herolab is pretty good (albeit pricey).
Goodbye realmworks, at least herolab is pretty good (albeit pricey).
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Vendors of professional business software do that. That way they can avoid costly lawsuits.
Of course advertising is completely needless. You can always contact the developers to find out what they have in their queue. And you can always spend some of your precious time to find out what the product can do and what the shortcomings are.
Unfortunately all competitors inform their customers, and if you don't follow you will be out of business faster than you can imagine.
It is physically impossible for Realm Works to reset Hero Lab in any way. So that reset occurred due to something completely isolated within Hero Lab. It would have happened when you next launched Hero Lab, regardless of whether it was via Realm Works. The only exception is if you have TWO separate copies of Hero Lab installed on your computer, one activated and the other not, and Realm Works managed to find a different one from the one you normally use.
Beyond that, it sounds like your GMing preferences don't match where Realm Works currently shines, and that's fine. Thanks for taking the time to give the product a try!
You mean companies that sell software with many more zeroes after the price tag than Realm Works?
I don't believe that we advertise Realm Works as having any features that it lacks. And we don't preclude users from discussing what it lacks here on the forums, as witnessed by this very thread. So it's easy for someone to find out those answers. And with the 60-day money-back guarantee, nobody is out of their money if they give Realm Works a try and find it doesn't do what they want.
For a $50 product, that's about as big of a safety net as can be reasonably expected. And I believe that it's a lot more than many other software products offer. That's my opinion, at least.
I have to admit. If Realm Works, Hero Labs, Roll20 and Obsidian Portal had a baby I'd probably just quit my job and become a full-time DM. Maybe throw TableSmith in there also.
Our group had a rather unique situation this week where we had to end on tense moment due to time. Instead of waiting for the next session we picked up the next day over Facebook. It was messy and hectic but it worked. The group excitement was amazing in that we basically had 3 full days of gaming and the focus of the group shifted from being Dungeon Bashers to actual role play.
That in turn led me to search for solutions that would cater to that situation better. Obsidian Portal, City of Brass, Epic Words. They all had what I was looking for. The ability to share the world I had build with my players. What they have that I've yet to see in Realm Worlds however is the ability for my players to interact and react to that world as I share it.
Web portal, group chat, private chat, instant online access to the content from where ever we all were. The ability to roll dice over the internet and most importantly the non-requirement for me to sort it all afterwards and copy and paste the content back and forth between Realm Works and facebook. Online XP logs and loot tracking has also been a popular request this week.
I stumbled across the Web Viewer that was demo'd earlier in the year. It was a truly exciting experience and god I hope it comes soon so I can go back to using a single tool. But they highlighted the weakness of the tool there themselves, it currently has no ability for the players to respond and I feel that is absolutely necessary in today's RPG market.
Overall all of the tools I tried were inferior in comparison to Realm Works. But as my player's can't interact with Realm Works that doesn't matter and we have been forced to adopt a new tool to manage the sharing of information in-between sessions.
Honestly, what Realm Works really needs IMO is the Web Viewer with a forum board style system that interacts with the Realm Works database taking advantage of linking and all the other content we have created. That would get my players into the tool on a regular basis and make it an interactive two-way experience.
Keep at it Rob. You have created a wonderful tool. We're just all visualizing the end product and wishing we could have it right now
Our group had a rather unique situation this week where we had to end on tense moment due to time. Instead of waiting for the next session we picked up the next day over Facebook. It was messy and hectic but it worked. The group excitement was amazing in that we basically had 3 full days of gaming and the focus of the group shifted from being Dungeon Bashers to actual role play.
That in turn led me to search for solutions that would cater to that situation better. Obsidian Portal, City of Brass, Epic Words. They all had what I was looking for. The ability to share the world I had build with my players. What they have that I've yet to see in Realm Worlds however is the ability for my players to interact and react to that world as I share it.
Web portal, group chat, private chat, instant online access to the content from where ever we all were. The ability to roll dice over the internet and most importantly the non-requirement for me to sort it all afterwards and copy and paste the content back and forth between Realm Works and facebook. Online XP logs and loot tracking has also been a popular request this week.
I stumbled across the Web Viewer that was demo'd earlier in the year. It was a truly exciting experience and god I hope it comes soon so I can go back to using a single tool. But they highlighted the weakness of the tool there themselves, it currently has no ability for the players to respond and I feel that is absolutely necessary in today's RPG market.
Overall all of the tools I tried were inferior in comparison to Realm Works. But as my player's can't interact with Realm Works that doesn't matter and we have been forced to adopt a new tool to manage the sharing of information in-between sessions.
Honestly, what Realm Works really needs IMO is the Web Viewer with a forum board style system that interacts with the Realm Works database taking advantage of linking and all the other content we have created. That would get my players into the tool on a regular basis and make it an interactive two-way experience.
Keep at it Rob. You have created a wonderful tool. We're just all visualizing the end product and wishing we could have it right now