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Seeker1728
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Old February 18th, 2021, 02:53 PM
I’m working on a user file to create a SW version of Scion 2E. If you’re unfamiliar with Scion, it’s basically modern myth themed “supers” where a character is (usually) the child or chosen of a diety from one of earth’s mythologies. Initially I was going to just slap the Superpowers Companion onto the base SW but there were too many things missing with that approach, requiring I dig into the editor.

I’m trying to figure out a strategy in constructing the user file to handle all the components that a Hero typically has as assets. The following are the components from Scion used to construct a character with a brief description of what each represents and I was hoping I could get some feedback on my strategy for laying out the data collections and relationships.

Calling
There are 11 of these arch-types that serve to present a role, for example Guardian, Trickster, etc. Each grants access to a restricted list of appropriate powers. A Hero inherits one of his parents Callings, and then can choose 2 additional ones to represent his own nature.

Knacks
These supernatural talents stem from a Scion's Calling, basically letting them have cool/unique abilities that are thematically tied to what the Calling's purpose serves.

Knacks come in tiers, Mortal, Heroic, Demi-God and (starting at level 16+) God as a rough correlation to SW’s Advancement Ranks. Some of these Knacks fit neatly into the Edge category, but others are more appropriate for Powers. I.E. a Trickster could pick up the Edge Thief without having to meet the normal pre-reqs or he could pick Darksight, and as he progresses in rank he can acquire more choices from this list. Mortal tier Knacks seem served best by Edges and/or certain low-level powers/spells. Heroic Knacks are noticeably more potent and tend to be represented by Superpowers better than edges

Purviews
Thematic genuinely supernatural powers that mythological entities have. A Hero inherits one of his parents Purviews, then gets to choose 2 more to represent their natural affinity from a list that all gods/mythological entities draw from. As Scions advance in rank, they can either develop these further, or pick up new Purviews to be more versatile.

Mana
I know SW uses the term “power points” but this is IMO highly confusing since it uses the same term to refer to fuel for powers or the ability to choose powers. So, I’m going to use the term “mana” when I mean fuel, and not "Power Points".
Scion has a trait called Legend that serves several purposes, most of which can be summed up as SW’s Advancement system. However, it also acts as an energy reservoir that a Hero can use in one of two ways, he can “Imbue” or he can “Spend”.
• Imbue is when the hero commits a point to fuel a knack or power, but when he “turns it off” the point returns to him ready to be reused for something else.
• Spend is much like it sounds and represents a more significant effort on the part of the Hero. Spending this energy diminishes the Hero’s reserves until they do something specific to replenish it, merely resting doesn’t return the energy. They must do things like make sacrifices, offerings, pilgrimages, services, etc that ae thematically representative of their parent and/or pantheon.
As a result, I’m wanting to use Mana to represent in SW the same sort of energy allocation that exists in Scion.


So a Hero construction runs basically like this:

• Decide what Pantheon one wants to belong to.
• Decide which Diety from that pantheon is yo Daddy/Mama/Patron
• Decide on 3 Callings, 1 of which must be inherited from the Diety.
• Decide on what Knacks your Calling grants.
• Decide on what Purviews the Hero gets. He gets a pantheon specific Purview for free, plus 1 he inherits from his divine parent, and then can choose 2 more to represent his natural talents/inclinations.
• Allot points in Stats and Skills.


There are quite a bit more options a player can pursue, but the above is a typical/basic character building process. One can be a magical creation, critter, chosen champion, bound demon, etc. But I figured I’d want to start with the various pantheons, and once I get that running smoothly, I can add more options building upon that foundation later.

From looking at the tutorials and reading a bunch of threads as well as the HLwiki, I’m thinking I should make use of Race, Factions, Groups and of course, Edges/Powers from the SPC and perhaps the Fantasy Companion, for the building blocks.


I’m going to put this into the form of a example so that it’s easier to convey/follow my strategy on this. Lets say I want to create Mera, she’s the daughter of Loki who has her father’s talent for trickery, but also a natural born fighter with a keen sense of justice.


Asgardian gives her access to a pantheon specific power of using rune magic (something else I’ll have to figure out), a +1 on Toughness, and 1d4 in Fighting and Survival for free, and a list of Norse gods to choose from as her parent from within the Faction menu.

For her Callings she chooses Trickster (inheriting her father’s talent for cleverness), adding Judge and Warrior as her other two choices.

Knacks, she gets one Mortal level Knack from each Calling, plus 1 more of her choice.

Purviews, she chooses to inherit Loki’s talent for Deception, and then choose two more he has nothing to do with.

Then she chooses Hinderances, Edges, Stats, and skills and is ready to build her myth in the modern era.


So I’m thinking the way to construct the userfile is to:
1) Make Race stand in for Pantheon. This allows one to bootstrap innate benefits/hinderances and grants access to a restricted Faction.
2) Faction = The god one is the child of. This lets me restrict what the Callings and Purviews a Scion may claim.
3) Group = Callings, one can choose 3 initially, but at each tier of advancement, one can choose an additional Calling. The Callings Group has all Callings that a character choose from, but one must be the same as one’s parent. Choosing a Calling allows one to access a restricted list of Edges/Powers that represent Knacks.
4) Purviews = custom list of powers, so if one choose Deception as a Purview, fireball ain’t on the list of available choices.
5) Knacks = custom list of Edges and Powers that fit the theme of a calling, these will largely be custom but if there’s one that’s already present in the rules, I’ll save myself the effort and use it’s ID.

Does that seem like a good strategy going forward?
Are there any elements of the editor I should make a point to use or avoid like say, gizmos or domain?

Thank you for taking the time to read and share your input.
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CapedCrusader
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Old February 18th, 2021, 03:42 PM
Callings sound they would work as separate Arcane Backgrounds....

_
Currently In Development: Savage Pathfinder
Future Development: SWADE Super Powers Companion, SWADE Fantasy Companion
_
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
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Seeker1728
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Old February 18th, 2021, 04:34 PM
Quote:
Originally Posted by CapedCrusader View Post
Callings sound they would work as separate Arcane Backgrounds....
Glad I checked in, I'll approach them this way. Thanks CC
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zarlor
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Old February 18th, 2021, 05:06 PM
FWIW, Power Points (PPs) are used, as you noted, like "mana" might be in other systems, but the points used for Super Powers are differentiated as "Super Power Points" (SPPs), essentially the emphasis there being on "Super Power" points, if you will. So they share nomenclature but they are not both "Power Points", in that sense, so I think that's how most of us would distinguish the difference. Obviously whatever nomenclature you prefer for your game is what you should go with, though, I just thought I'd point that out is all.

Lenny Zimmermann
Metairie, LA, USA

Data files authored (please let me know if you see any issues with any of these if you have/use them):
Official (In the downloader)
50 Fathoms, Deadlands: Hell On Earth, Deadlands: Noir, East Texas University, Necessary Evil (requires Super Powers Companion), Pirates of the Spanish Main, Space 1889 (original file by Erich), Tour of Darkness, Weird War II, Weird Wars: Rome
Coming Eventually
Evernight (LWD has completed their review but I have some fixes to make first... although Pinnacle mentioned this might get an overhaul to SWADE so I may just wait for that first. If you just HAVE to have this now, though, just PM me)
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Seeker1728
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Old February 18th, 2021, 07:31 PM
Quote:
Originally Posted by zarlor View Post
FWIW, Power Points (PPs) are used, as you noted, like "mana" might be in other systems, but the points used for Super Powers are differentiated as "Super Power Points" (SPPs), essentially the emphasis there being on "Super Power" points, if you will. So they share nomenclature but they are not both "Power Points", in that sense, so I think that's how most of us would distinguish the difference. Obviously whatever nomenclature you prefer for your game is what you should go with, though, I just thought I'd point that out is all.
Thanks for the distinction Zarlor, it was just hella confusing reading that book after reading the Core rules, where they didn't use the S for SPPs, I kept flipping back and forth trying to find out how Supers fueled their powers a till I finally had to resort to searching Reddit on the matter.

Out of curiosity, would you happen to have a way off hand to be able to make that distinction evident in HL? Or is that just something that's way more bother than it's worth?
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CapedCrusader
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Old February 18th, 2021, 08:54 PM
Yeah, the Super Powers Companion works differently. the Power Points are used to purchase the powers, and there is no cost to use them. So, no Endurance tracking or anything like that.

Note that the Super Powers Companion Arcane Background is not compatible with the multiple Arcane Backgrounds from SWADE. The Super Powers Companion has rules about that, and it operates in a totally different fashion.

_
Currently In Development: Savage Pathfinder
Future Development: SWADE Super Powers Companion, SWADE Fantasy Companion
_
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
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zarlor
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Old February 19th, 2021, 10:32 AM
True, in most setting you probably wouldn't use SPPs and PPs together, but if you are making a settings file where you wanted to use both... I want to say there is a way to change the name from "Power Points" to say "Mana"... maybe? I haven't touched a data file in YEARS at this point, and CC would definitely know the answer to that better than I would anyway.

Lenny Zimmermann
Metairie, LA, USA

Data files authored (please let me know if you see any issues with any of these if you have/use them):
Official (In the downloader)
50 Fathoms, Deadlands: Hell On Earth, Deadlands: Noir, East Texas University, Necessary Evil (requires Super Powers Companion), Pirates of the Spanish Main, Space 1889 (original file by Erich), Tour of Darkness, Weird War II, Weird Wars: Rome
Coming Eventually
Evernight (LWD has completed their review but I have some fixes to make first... although Pinnacle mentioned this might get an overhaul to SWADE so I may just wait for that first. If you just HAVE to have this now, though, just PM me)
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Seeker1728
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Old February 25th, 2021, 08:56 PM
Sorry to bother again, but even with the assistance of a buddy who's a software developer, we've been running into a number of walls that I need some help with. Though I found some posts that would address some of my issues, the unfortunate tendency was this was chatter between people who know way more about the editor and where to stick things than I do, and within the flow of their posts, omitted to make mention of where their scripts were to be placed leaving me befuddled as to what goes where, even if the example was otherwise a good find to solve some settings I want to make use of..

Some examples I would appreciate some more direction on are:

Quote:
Originally Posted by SeeleyOne View Post
Some settings or house rules have a Skill Rating maximum that is dependent upon the character's Rank. This can be done by making a mechanic that has a Source that has the given setting/house rule set checked.

The example below makes it so that a Novice can only get d8 in a skill rating. It increases to d10 at Seasoned. It increases to d12 at Veteran.

Pre-Traits 5000
Code:
    var xp as number
    var skillMax as number
    xp = hero.child[resXP].field[resMax].value
    skillMax = 4

~Determine the skillMax bonus by XP value.

    if (xp >= 20) then
      skillMax +=1
    endif

    if (xp >= 40) then
      skillMax +=1
    endif

~Apply the skillMax to each skill.
foreach pick in hero from Skill
    eachpick.field[trtMaximum].value = skillMax
nexteach
So where specifically does the above code go? My assumption is that in the editor it's making use of the "Settings" tab, but no matter which area I plugged it into that script failed (i.e. eval, pre-req, etc).

Next one is:

Quote:
Originally Posted by Paragon View Post
From Caped Crusader, a note about how to make sure someone can take a normal amount of Hindrances if their racial template already gives them one:

Code:
#resmax[resHinder] += 1 (or 2 if it's Major)
Don't even have a clue where the above quoted one goes, is it the "Race", "Racial Property" or "Racial Ability" tab? And it would solve a major headache I'm running into as PCs inherit a hindrance from their parent (designated as a faction) and one from their Pantheon (designated as a Race), which is blocking the PCs from being able to select more than a single Minor Hindrance of their own choosing.



For the one below, am I correct in assuming this gets made use of on the Races tab? Is it possible to make use of the same code on the Factions tab?

Quote:
Originally Posted by SeeleyOne View Post
You can do all of the following with an eval script that is Pre-Traits 5000. It is before Calc trtFinal (in the Timing button at the bottom).

To alter the number of Hindrance points that you have is as follows, with X being the value that you want to place there.
Code:
hero.child[resHinder].field[resMax].value += X
I use that because I give so many points in a campaign where I want different races to have varied costs. I then have that racial cost apply against the Hindrance points. This helps to allow races to be their "correct" values and keeps things fair.

For edges, again with the X
Code:
hero.child[resEdge].field[resMax].value += X
For skills, again with X
Code:
perform #resspent[resSkill,-,X,"Free Skill"]
Note that I do not think that the "Free Skill" shows up anywhere, but it helps to recall why it is there when looking at the code.



Also, I'm at a loss at how to solve the following two problems:

1) We decided to use the SPC to render the abilities Scion's have access to, unfortunately upon check marking the SPC-2nd Ed as a source in the configurator, there is a race showing up from it that I don't want included (Atlantean to be exact). How would one go about removing this race for my .user file only? As in, I don't mind it being available for other games if we make use of the SPC-2, but for this setting, we don't want it available.

2) Got to put a disclaimer here first, really really sorry for being so dense in trying to figure this one out and needing my hand held I ran across Seely's post here, I had wanted to do something similar to what Seely accomplished, but I noticed it was posted in 2015 and was wondering:
  • are the files he uploaded still required? Or has HL evolved since then to include those features?
  • If I don't need those files, does that change the instructions he posted?
  • On the section with the attribute advancement per rank, how would I go about changing that to every 4 ranks and not every rank?

Finally, I'd like to do grant a extra Edge every X ranks, if this could be dumbed down for me I'd really really appreciate it. I know I'm being asked to be spoonfed here and annoying as hell, but my brain has been beaten to tapioca over the week with the many failed attempts at trying to get something like this to shape up. I got so much stuff floating around in my head and piles of notes to where at the moment, I don't know which way is up.
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Seeker1728
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Old February 25th, 2021, 11:46 PM
Sorry for loading up another question, but I figured while I was waiting on someone to get back to me with the last one I'd go ahead and work on the powers. I decided that it was more in keeping to make use of the SPC and needed to make a few custom powers.

(edited after discovery, posting in case anyone else runs into a similar problem)

Last night I kept hitting a slew of error messages as I was trying to design a super-power in the editor. The messages read

Attempt to access non-existent containing entity from script
Location: 'eval' script for Component 'SPCPower' (Eval Script #2) near line 3


This error was repeated multiple times in a pop-up on various lines and I couldn't for the life of me figure out why. I must've spent a couple of hours comparing powers from the SPC-2's code to my own, digging through the author kit and wiki wasn't yielding any answers and when I posted my original message last night I was frustrated/salty on the matter and was a little terse in my post.

This morning coming back at it with fresh eyes I noticed something that I missed last night in comparing my power to the SPC's. All the powers from the SPC2 had a gizmo! Looking at it, I saw:

C9.JPG

Surely it couldn't be that I thought. I copied the gizmo as pictured above, plugged it into my custom power and viola, no error messages

Then I hit the board and edited my message with my discovery. It does leave me with a couple of questions though as I had never mucked about with the gizmo before
  1. why is the gizmo a necessary component for the SPC?
  2. are there any particular things I should be on the lookout with the bootstraps/tags?

Last edited by Seeker1728; February 26th, 2021 at 10:23 AM. Reason: Discovered reason for error message
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CapedCrusader
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Old March 1st, 2021, 12:38 AM
message #1 -
To prevent the Atlantean race from appearing, use something called a Preclude. You use the ID of the object you want to block plus the Setting ID of the one you want to block it in.

A lot of what Seeley did there won't be applicable anymore. Partly since everything runs on Advances now and not Ranks. Plus some things are already there now, like new Skills costing less to pick up. Seeley also based some of what they did on their own House Rule set so that they were the only one that could use it.

In the trtMaximum example (Eval Script, BTW) I think it'd be easier to run a validation based on Rank rather than messing with trtMaximum.

For the resMax, put that in an Eval Script on PreTraits/5000 on what ever object gives them that ability.

For the rest of these, we have values for all of that in the Settings tab in the Editor now. That's where you adjust those at a campaign level. I think that post was written before we added more detail to the Settings editor.

Am I reading that right? One Attribute Advance every FOUR Ranks? Wow, that's really rough. Are you sure you want to do that? I could probably come up with a way for you, you just have to replace the validation step that checks for that. It just sounds way harsh. You're talking about only getting 1 or 2 changes in Attributes over an entire campaign.

You can set up bonus Edges at each Rank, either by granting an extra Advance point or by adding a creation point and have the player unlock the Hero on the Advance tab to add the Edge.
OK message #2 -
1. There are some things assigned to it later that need the gizmo to be there. It's like a place to hang things from.

2. Bootstraps and Tags are really different. Yes, they both get attached to an item, but where a bootstrap is another pre-existing thing being connected to the target, a tag is just that - a standard text tag that can be read by other processes very quickly. You can use a simple tagis test to see if a given tag is present, plus do things like count them and manipulate them. Tags are really flexible, and should be used whenever possible. Bootstrapping has some limitations, things like bootstrapped gear cannot be removed.

_
Currently In Development: Savage Pathfinder
Future Development: SWADE Super Powers Companion, SWADE Fantasy Companion
_
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
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