Exactly. Maybe he missed that...?
Thanks, SC! Now we just need to get LW to add something similar to the base product. Your Community Pack will work for me, but no one else at my table has it installed.
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- The Lone Wolf Development Team
A single Arrow
- Thread starter Globetrotter
- Start date
Thanks, SC! Now we just need to get LW to add something similar to the base product. Your Community Pack will work for me, but no one else at my table has it installed.
exactly. Maybe he missed that...?
Thanks, sc! Now we just need to get lw to add something similar to the base product. Your community pack will work for me, but no one else at my table has it installed.
ah-choo!
CorzatTheGray
Well-known member
gesundheit
I'm glad Shadow has a work about, to increase the flexibility of the program.
Lonewolf has provided the means to add 50 of an arrow (or other type of ammunition), or 1 of a weapon, in exactly the same manner as the Core Rulebook allows you to create them.
Just because you cannot create 4 arrows at once, and always (at least according to RAW) create them in bunches of 50, doesn't mean that the vendor wouldn't be willing to sell smaller quantities of arrows, assuming you have a magic weapon vendor in town...
Arbitrate is an easy way to make money; if it costs you 500 to make 50, or 10 per piece, then you can sell them for 12 or 15 each, and make a large amount...
Having that added to the community package increases the flexibility which is great.
Lonewolf has provided the means to add 50 of an arrow (or other type of ammunition), or 1 of a weapon, in exactly the same manner as the Core Rulebook allows you to create them.
Just because you cannot create 4 arrows at once, and always (at least according to RAW) create them in bunches of 50, doesn't mean that the vendor wouldn't be willing to sell smaller quantities of arrows, assuming you have a magic weapon vendor in town...
Arbitrate is an easy way to make money; if it costs you 500 to make 50, or 10 per piece, then you can sell them for 12 or 15 each, and make a large amount...
Having that added to the community package increases the flexibility which is great.
I also think that ultimately, the 'best' use of Hero Lab is during the game as a live character sheet - in which case, it's great to have encounters preset with their loot, so that loot can be 'given' to the characters, which all reside in the same portfolio. It's not all that easy in actual use, because it means only one 'user' is maintaining the profile, but it does streamline things like this (in which case, the adding/selling to have a certain number of arrows on a given NPC allows that all to be done ahead of time).
I do wish it was better suited to this actual use - but I guess they are hoping HLO will be more in line with that use case - only time will tell I suppose.
I do wish it was better suited to this actual use - but I guess they are hoping HLO will be more in line with that use case - only time will tell I suppose.
I essentially use it like that, as far as loot goes.
I have a portfolio for the party.
And a portfolio for each encounter.
I import the adversary into the party folder, and run the combat.
At the end of the combat, the lootable treasure has also been placed on a placeholder monster within the adversary's portfolio (marked as a Party Ally, to not change the CR value of the enemies).
Anything the party wants to loot, I use the "give to hero" option.
And then delete the adversary from the player's portfolio.
My copy of the character sheets, is the official version.
I print the top two-three sheets, for each character, every session.
I print the more in depth abilities and powers, at character creation and when we hit 5th, 10th, 15th and 20th.
I have a portfolio for the party.
And a portfolio for each encounter.
I import the adversary into the party folder, and run the combat.
At the end of the combat, the lootable treasure has also been placed on a placeholder monster within the adversary's portfolio (marked as a Party Ally, to not change the CR value of the enemies).
Anything the party wants to loot, I use the "give to hero" option.
And then delete the adversary from the player's portfolio.
My copy of the character sheets, is the official version.
I print the top two-three sheets, for each character, every session.
I print the more in depth abilities and powers, at character creation and when we hit 5th, 10th, 15th and 20th.
That breaks down when the GM isn't the one tracking the loot for each PC, though.
Our GM uses HL for his NPCs and summoned creatures, but only has the PCs loaded for the purposes of rolling initiative and tracking combat.
It also doesn't help when a PC wants to buy an arrow that isn't a specific item (since specific items have their own entries).
Honestly -- how tough can it be...?
Our GM uses HL for his NPCs and summoned creatures, but only has the PCs loaded for the purposes of rolling initiative and tracking combat.
It also doesn't help when a PC wants to buy an arrow that isn't a specific item (since specific items have their own entries).
Honestly -- how tough can it be...?
This biggest hurdle to the single hero lab portfolio for the whole party is when a player would prefer to actually use hero lab as a live character sheet, so that conditions and such are tracked and calculated cleanly.
I also genuinely thought about making 'encounter' files for specialty shops in a campaign before, but that would only really be convenient if the 'give to' could also work as a 'sell to' by offering the price boxes, and having money transferred the opposite direction.
I also genuinely thought about making 'encounter' files for specialty shops in a campaign before, but that would only really be convenient if the 'give to' could also work as a 'sell to' by offering the price boxes, and having money transferred the opposite direction.
This is how we do our gaming; each player has their laptop or iPad with them and all sheets are "live", as you say. On evenings when my PC is likely to level up, I have already done the leveling in a copy of the PC and when it's time, I just move any newly acquired gear from the old PC to the new one. I also need to do any long-lasting conditions (STR drain, for example) but our GM has us level up "between missions", so to speak, so we assume we're fully healed when we level up.
This works reasonably well, although the ideal situation would be to find some way to take the changes in the "leveled up" PC and apply them backwards to the original PC, creating a new hero in the process. That way I wouldn't need to move equipment, I wouldn't need to copy conditions or adjustments, and I wouldn't need to change equipped weapons or change prepared spells... I've thought about this a little bit and I don't see any practical way to do it.
For example, when I go from L4 to L5, I've considered running diff on the two XML documents and taking any new stuff from the L5 character to apply to the L4. That should catch skill points spent, stat increases, and so on. The conditions and adjustments wouldn't be in the L5 PC, but if I only add things to the L4 and don't subtract them, this would catch most of it. (Hm, I just had an idea about how to do this. I'll have to try it out when I get a chance.
)
This works reasonably well, although the ideal situation would be to find some way to take the changes in the "leveled up" PC and apply them backwards to the original PC, creating a new hero in the process. That way I wouldn't need to move equipment, I wouldn't need to copy conditions or adjustments, and I wouldn't need to change equipped weapons or change prepared spells... I've thought about this a little bit and I don't see any practical way to do it.
For example, when I go from L4 to L5, I've considered running diff on the two XML documents and taking any new stuff from the L5 character to apply to the L4. That should catch skill points spent, stat increases, and so on. The conditions and adjustments wouldn't be in the L5 PC, but if I only add things to the L4 and don't subtract them, this would catch most of it. (Hm, I just had an idea about how to do this. I'll have to try it out when I get a chance.
)I save the portfolio, of the characters prior to leveling up.
So I have their "old" version.
But I just apply the leveling up, to the current characters.
That way, the newly leveled up guy has all the conditions preserved, including buffs/debuffs, magic items equipped, conditions checked etc.
If for some reason you wanted a copy of the pre-level up, you can create a copy of the current hero, and then export it to a save location.
Am I missing something, that you're trying to accomplish?
So I have their "old" version.
But I just apply the leveling up, to the current characters.
That way, the newly leveled up guy has all the conditions preserved, including buffs/debuffs, magic items equipped, conditions checked etc.
If for some reason you wanted a copy of the pre-level up, you can create a copy of the current hero, and then export it to a save location.
Am I missing something, that you're trying to accomplish?
Well, we’re currently playing through an Adventure Path. The PCs will level up at known times during the campaign. The GM usually gives us one session’s notice before it happens so that we can be planning how we’ll be leveling up (skill points spent, feats, that kind of thing).
I typically copy my existing PC and level up the new guy, playing with options until I get it the way I want it. (This is one of the main strengths of HL for me: the ability to “try stuff out” and have HL tell me when I’ve gone to far — or not far enough.)
When we get to the point of actually leveling up, what do I do? Should I try to recreate every change made to the new copy back to the original PC? That can be time consuming and tedious when you consider spellbook editing and so forth (and what is tedious, is error prone).
But I can’t use the new PC either, since then I have to move any newly acquired gear, loot, and journal entries to the new PC, also copying adjustments, conditions, and so on.
Moving PCs between portfolios isn’t too big a deal on the desktop version, but the iPad app doesn’t manage portfolio content beyond creating new PCs or deleting existing ones; there’s no way to move a PC from one portfolio to another. Which means there’s no way to move gear from one PC to another. (I’m told it’s a memory issue. Since I started using an iPad Pro, I haven’t had any memory-related problems; I presume because of the larger RAM size on the Pro.)
I prefer to use the iPad app at the game table, but if I need to bring my laptop along in order to do some XML juggling, I’m willing to do that.
I typically copy my existing PC and level up the new guy, playing with options until I get it the way I want it. (This is one of the main strengths of HL for me: the ability to “try stuff out” and have HL tell me when I’ve gone to far — or not far enough.)
When we get to the point of actually leveling up, what do I do? Should I try to recreate every change made to the new copy back to the original PC? That can be time consuming and tedious when you consider spellbook editing and so forth (and what is tedious, is error prone).
But I can’t use the new PC either, since then I have to move any newly acquired gear, loot, and journal entries to the new PC, also copying adjustments, conditions, and so on.
Moving PCs between portfolios isn’t too big a deal on the desktop version, but the iPad app doesn’t manage portfolio content beyond creating new PCs or deleting existing ones; there’s no way to move a PC from one portfolio to another. Which means there’s no way to move gear from one PC to another. (I’m told it’s a memory issue. Since I started using an iPad Pro, I haven’t had any memory-related problems; I presume because of the larger RAM size on the Pro.)
I prefer to use the iPad app at the game table, but if I need to bring my laptop along in order to do some XML juggling, I’m willing to do that.
Isn't a new level mostly a feat, some skill points and only 2 spells?
With maybe some class choice.
I found the Android app "Pathbuilder" that allows you to plan changes between levels. It does quite well at listing only the changes each level.
You make it sound simple. I just know from experience that it hasn’t been.
We typically do our new spell stuff at level up time (not just the free ones, but purchasing spells as well). That includes editing spellbooks now, as well as changing prepared spell lists. The latter is mostly because I may purchase a lower level wand of something and decide I don’t need the spell prepared anymore...
Feats would be easy. Skill points would be easier if there was a way to tell which skills had points spent on them for a given level, bit AFAIK there isn’t such a history mechanism.
Maybe it’s just trickier for me because I test out a bunch of different builds every time my PC levels up, so I’m constantly trying out different configurations until I find one I like, but that means I can’t remember the specifics of what I’ve changed for a particular build...
I’ll look into that Pathbuilder thing; sounds kinda neat. Thanks.
We typically do our new spell stuff at level up time (not just the free ones, but purchasing spells as well). That includes editing spellbooks now, as well as changing prepared spell lists. The latter is mostly because I may purchase a lower level wand of something and decide I don’t need the spell prepared anymore...
Feats would be easy. Skill points would be easier if there was a way to tell which skills had points spent on them for a given level, bit AFAIK there isn’t such a history mechanism.
Maybe it’s just trickier for me because I test out a bunch of different builds every time my PC levels up, so I’m constantly trying out different configurations until I find one I like, but that means I can’t remember the specifics of what I’ve changed for a particular build...
I’ll look into that Pathbuilder thing; sounds kinda neat. Thanks.
Something I thought about doing was making a program that could unpack a portfolio, and split it into it's individual characters, and another that could do the reverse. The idea was that the GM could have open an entire party, including encounters and such, and each user could have the individual portfolios opened. The issue then becomes one of triggering the program to run when changes are made on each end, and each user reloads (CTRL-R) to get the changes. Would need to all be accessing the files from a common place, and other such complications - but it's possible in theory.
Yeah, it wouldn't bee too tough. I've looked at the XML and I have a couple of Python scripts that manipulate it already. Using the same script to upload to a particular URL or to copy the resulting files to a public DropBox location wouldn't be difficult at all.
It's an interesting idea...
It's an interesting idea...