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Colen
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Old April 11th, 2013, 10:08 AM
Quote:
Originally Posted by Globetrotter View Post
I had a similar AC issue with my paladin.

When I activate the smite evil class feature it increases my AC, however, this is a situational increase. Following how hero lab normally operations, situational increases should not show, but maybe an astrict appears.

This is the same level of frustration I have with the furious focus feat, I have to either make an adjustment and forget I have the adjustment and use it on AoO, or remove it and forget I have the + to hit.

6 of one, half dozen of another.
The intent behind having Smite Evil be an activated ability is that you turn it on, see what your stats are against the specific enemy, then turn it off again, rather than leaving it enabled for a long time. We could change it to add a situational modifier like the other abilities, but that doesn't really help - we've just changed it from being "you're less likely to forget the bonus" to "you're less likely to remember the bonus".

The only way I can see to make it significantly better would be to show the base score for a stat (or weapon damage, or whatever), then show the modified score for Smite Evil under it. Unfortunately this has two problems:

1) It uses a lot of space - if you have two or three different abilities that modify each stat, now everything takes twice as much height as it used to

2) If you have two or three different abilities that modify a stat, you can no longer turn them all on at once to see what the total value is - you'd have to add them up yourself.

If you have other ideas for how we can display this appropriately I'm interested in hearing them, but I couldn't think of anything that would work well.
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Colen
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Old April 11th, 2013, 10:12 AM
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Originally Posted by mirtos View Post
Another AC issue - if im in a condition that requires me to be in one of the three AC conditions, then it should make that very clear. For example, in the main hero lab, if i check the "Running" Condition, then flatfooted is the primary AC condition, and it greys out the other two. In the iPad, it still shows you your primary AC, but if you click on the AC, it shows you your three AC conditions and places a note that you are flatfooted. My point is the quick view is wrong, or confusing, and you have to know to click on the Armor Class text to see what your armor class is. This is confusing, and users will forget this.
I'll see how it looks to display touch and flat-footed AC in the space where the dice would be for armor class - that should make them more visible without having to hide them at the bottom of the table or something similar.
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Colen
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Old April 11th, 2013, 10:19 AM
Quote:
Originally Posted by Globetrotter View Post
The quick equip screen is helpful, but not easy to use. Let me try to illustrate, something I am terribly at... I click on quick equip, select the weapon I have equipped, select not equipped. Select the weapon I now want equipped, selected both hands. For me and my uncoordinated hands, that is about 6 seconds to change a weapon. This goes up longer if I am fighting Two-weapon because I have to either deselect two different weapons to select my bow, or god forbid I am changing to two other weapons for DR bypass. That goes up to 10-15 seconds of people at the table just watching me play a mini-game to find out what my bonuses are to hit.

Maybe a small time, but if I am doing it often, it gets irritating.
I see what you're saying. Are you usually changing from weapon 1 to weapon 2, or changing how you have a particular weapon equipped?

I.e. are you switching from using your bow to two swords, or are you switching from using a Longsword in both hands, to using that same longsword in one hand?


Quote:
Originally Posted by Globetrotter View Post
Right, so if I am using a long sword, under the weapon it would show 10' reach when enlarged. This is a nice reminder to new players who don't know or forget. I have a bunch at the table I play at.
I can add this to show the reach if it's not the same as the default for the hero; that way it'll stand out more that a specific weapon has a longer reach.


Quote:
Originally Posted by Globetrotter View Post
Wow, I didn't even see that. The font is small and kind of hidden, like you said. Can you add the spell adjustments to this?

They should be there already; the fact that they aren't is a bug. I've added this to our fix list, and I'll find somewhere better to put it as well.


I've added the other items to our to-do list.
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Unseelie
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Old April 11th, 2013, 10:31 AM
Any die rolling app that is allowed at my table needs to have a die roll log. I prefer an audible cue for die rolls as well.
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Colen
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Old April 11th, 2013, 11:33 AM
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Originally Posted by Unseelie View Post
Any die rolling app that is allowed at my table needs to have a die roll log. I prefer an audible cue for die rolls as well.
Ooh, that's a good idea! We may not be able to do a 3d animation of dice bouncing across the table, though.

A roll log is one of the items on our to-do list - I actually had one in a previous version of the dice roller I implemented, but it was way too clunky, so it got scrapped in favor of the simpler dice roller we have now. It should find its way back in at some point.
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Globetrotter
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Old April 11th, 2013, 12:16 PM
Quote:
Originally Posted by Colen View Post
The intent behind having Smite Evil be an activated ability is that you turn it on, see what your stats are against the specific enemy, then turn it off again, rather than leaving it enabled for a long time. We could change it to add a situational modifier like the other abilities, but that doesn't really help - we've just changed it from being "you're less likely to forget the bonus" to "you're less likely to remember the bonus".
Yes.. I can see that.

The only way I can see to make it significantly better would be to show the base score for a stat (or weapon damage, or whatever), then show the modified score for Smite Evil under it. Unfortunately this has two problems:

1) It uses a lot of space - if you have two or three different abilities that modify each stat, now everything takes twice as much height as it used to

2) If you have two or three different abilities that modify a stat, you can no longer turn them all on at once to see what the total value is - you'd have to add them up yourself.

If you have other ideas for how we can display this appropriately I'm interested in hearing them, but I couldn't think of anything that would work well. [/QUOTE]

This might sound silly, but what if you put a die roller next to these situational abilities? So next to my smite evil power, I can hit the die roller since I am smiting this this attack and hit the weapon when I am not smiting for my other attack. The smite, since it already knows how to calculate all the modifiers can roll the modified hit and damage roll.

From what I've seen the weapon description pop up has the calculated totals here as well, so you could add that to the smite evil. When you touch the words smite evil (just like touching +1 bastard sword) the smite description appears with the modified weapon damage based on what is equipped.

You could use this for other abilities as well, for example the lay on hands line. Then I could roll the xd6 since it's pre-calculated. Same with other abilities like bloodline powers or domain powers.
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Globetrotter
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Old April 11th, 2013, 12:26 PM
Quote:
Originally Posted by Colen View Post
I see what you're saying. Are you usually changing from weapon 1 to weapon 2, or changing how you have a particular weapon equipped?
This is what happened during our last session:

I use a bardiche for my primary weapon. I have power attack and furious focus to eliminate my attack penalty. This lets me hit hard.

I had to switch to my longbow to hit an enemy across the battlefield. If I was using the app, I quick equip, unequip bardiche and equip longbow both hands.

one round later I move forward and forgot to pick up my bardiche. So i drop the longbow and grab my backup flail. Quick equip, unequip longbow and select flail as both hands. Back into action.

What if I now needed to bump my ac and pull out my shield? quick equip, change flail from both hands to one hand, equip shield.

The pain in all of this is I cannot do it during another player's turn, because you cannot move unless it's your turn. If I do it preemptively, and my DM tells me no - could be a reason like an immediate action or something - I have to switch it back quickly. This takes time....

Oh my.. I just had a thought - Weapon presets.

Can you have saved configurations? I go to quick equip and hit preset 1 and it changes my weapon and shield config? Go back and hit preset 2 and not I am wielding my longbow... hit preset 1 again and I am back into action?

That would address my issues... but wouldn't address what Shadow was talking about regarding needing to know multiple weapons unless in one of the presets you could select "all equipped".

This wouldn't work with my smite evil die roller that I have above... but you guys are the experts
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wurzel
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Old April 11th, 2013, 12:32 PM
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Originally Posted by Colen View Post
A roll log is one of the items on our to-do list.
For me it would be absolutely sufficient to know something about the pseudo random number generating algorithm used. There are a few that generate equally distributed pseudo random numbers so it is almost the same as really rolling dice.
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Jamz
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Old April 11th, 2013, 12:48 PM
Quote:
Originally Posted by Colen View Post
The intent behind having Smite Evil be an activated ability is that you turn it on, see what your stats are against the specific enemy, then turn it off again, rather than leaving it enabled for a long time. We could change it to add a situational modifier like the other abilities, but that doesn't really help - we've just changed it from being "you're less likely to forget the bonus" to "you're less likely to remember the bonus".

The only way I can see to make it significantly better would be to show the base score for a stat (or weapon damage, or whatever), then show the modified score for Smite Evil under it. Unfortunately this has two problems:

1) It uses a lot of space - if you have two or three different abilities that modify each stat, now everything takes twice as much height as it used to

2) If you have two or three different abilities that modify a stat, you can no longer turn them all on at once to see what the total value is - you'd have to add them up yourself.

If you have other ideas for how we can display this appropriately I'm interested in hearing them, but I couldn't think of anything that would work well.
Real estate is always a problem. Would it be feasible or make sense to add a timer in? (This goes for the full version as well). Of course it would be optional, but something like either a popup "Smite is still on, would you like to turn off? [Off] [Snooze 5 mins]"

Or maybe a flag(s) that temporary abilities or conditions that are turned on? Maybe a icon just at the top with number of abilities on, or a flag next to what's changes, or a color/highlight of changed stats?

Actually, for Hero Labs, I'd love to see everything highlighted on the dashboard that was changed when I clicked on Rage/Smite/Rapid Shot/Pinned/Prone/Etc! That alone would make me say, "Why is my AC red? Oh ya, I left Prone clicked, durr!"

-Jamz

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ShadowChemosh
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Old April 11th, 2013, 12:57 PM
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Originally Posted by Jamz View Post
Actually, for Hero Labs, I'd love to see everything highlighted on the dashboard that was changed when I clicked on Rage/Smite/Rapid Shot/Pinned/Prone/Etc! That alone would make me say, "Why is my AC red? Oh ya, I left Prone clicked, durr!"
Oh I like this idea. Colors don't take up room and would be easy to spot. I am not sure I like red as that is too associated with errors. Maybe a nice blue or green.

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