Will Paizo/Lone Wolf provide Hero Lab portfolios for NPCs in PFRPG Adventures and APs
 

Originally posted on the Paizo forums and cross-posted here to see if the lads at Lone Wolf have any 'inside information'.

I recently purchased Hero Lab to use for two PFRPG APs and as an aid when I GM PFS events in Grand Rapids. As I also have a current subscription to the PFRPG adventures and APs, I was wondering if the fine folks at Paizo had any plans of providing the HL portfolios for the major NPCs in either of these product lines as a download on their site? As HL is the official character generator tool for PFRPG, I would assume that at least one developer in-house is using this tool on some level.

All of the pregens from the back of adventure paths 25+ are available, along with most of the statblocks from the companion line. (The pre-gens from adventure paths 1-24 are available in the d20 game system in HL, since they were written with 3.5 rules).

Please try Hero Lab out in demo mode - you won't be restricted from opening up the adventure path pre-gens while you're in demo mode, and you can see what's available. You can download the demo at http://wolflair.com/index.php?context=hero_lab.

OK, so where do I find them? I tried looking in import stock hero, but all I saw there was critters and NPCs (Player Companion), which had 14 folks only, none of which looked like NPCs I'd encountered in recent AP adventuring. Is there some setting I need to check to get them to appear?

The pre-generated PCs are available as normal portfolios - you'll find them in the portfolios/pathfinder folder - just open them as you would any other saved portfolio.

I think he is more interested in the NPC encounters in the AP and modules.

The encounters haven't been added. They would be great to have, but that's a very large chunk of effort, and we haven't been able to fit that into the schedule.

But will you?... It is one thing to say No, never going to happen, and another to say, once we have the time, yes it will be added.

They haven't made it onto the firm part of the schedule, so I can't promise, but they are something we would like to add to Hero Lab, so we'll do our best to make that happen, but there are so many competing priorities that I can't say when that might happen.

We do our best to provide those things that would be of the most use to the most users (and admittedly, we can't always judge that perfectly), and over the years, this project has gotten fewer requests than many other things, so it hasn't risen to the top of the priority list yet.

For this project specifically, a required step before adding many of the encounters is adding at least some content from the Tome of Horrors series by Necromancer games - Paizo seems to like making use of those books for their adventure path encounters.

You may be aware of this, But the APs are the best selling products for Paizo *Though the RPG products are quickly gaining*, so that should give you an idea of the potential there.

I have done some of these for 2nd Darkness but I made changes to make them toughfer

All I'm going to say on this is that if GM's were to use the Hero Lab as intended, say, to enter these various stats from NPCs

1. It will give said GM lots of experience with the program, how it runs, and its potential
2. It will allow said GM to modify those PCs as they see fit.

Hero Lab is a tool for us to use, not to stare at. I would rather seen the Hero Lab designers/programers spend time adding the feats/traits/items/monsters/etc which, if one were to read the forum, would understand can be quite difficult. Entering NPC information is easy. That is what Hero Lab was designed to allow the user to do (easily).

Just saying...

And well said, in my opinion. It takes what, twenty minutes to plug in these NPCs? I think that is much better a community task than a developer task.

Sounds good, anyone want to do the work?

I am actually working on some for The "Shackled City" Adventure Path. I will tell you though that it is NOT a 20 minute job to enter their stats. At least not all of em. There are Demondands and Beholders and the like. Not to mention some other creatures not listed in the Paizo Pathfinder Bestiary. So no it is not as easy would see hehe. I am going from chapter 8 Which is the "Secret of the Soul Pillars". I can upload the stats I have for the NPC encounters as they are if one wants me to. I am working chapter by chapter after chapter 8, Working on chapter 9 now though :)

Any takers?
-jon

I agree with this and think that AP 1-6 of each path... it would not take to long especially from the Council of Thieves and on since they are strictly Pathfinder and NOT 3.5 :)

The 3.5 conversions are a little more difficult if you are trying to keep them on the up and up and stick to the same flavor of the text as written. For a Demodand I am actually TRYING to do a Demodand and it is not easy for me at least to do.

Any ideas?? I need a Shator Demodand. And could use the Demodand qualities too :)

Go ahead and make a new thread for this.

Please write out what it is you're trying to accomplish, and tell me what you know how to achieve, and where you're stuck.