Coding issues

[Lorangriel]

Let me preface this by saying I know nothing about XML or most any other programming language. I bought HL and now I'm trying desperately to learn enough to make it do what I want. I'm slogging through the wiki right now in hopes of learning more about what tags and things and fields are (yes, my knowledge is really THAT rudimentary... sorry )

I think I may have aimed a little high when trying to design my first skill and feat. Here is the deal: There is a skill in my game called "Ritual Magic" whose linked attribute is Intelligence. So I designed that skill. No problem. I think.

Second, there is a feat called "Natural Ritualist", which lets one use their Charisma modifier in place of the normal Intelligence one. This is where I am stuck. I don't know how to do that. I tried looking at weapon focus, but I couldn't figure out where the feat actually told HL to switch str for dex on attacks.

Please help a poor newbie understand a little more and get the most out of this program.

Thanks,

Lor

 

[Paris.Crenshaw]

Welcome to Hero Lab, Lorangriel! You'll find that once you get past the growing pains, knowing how to use the editor will make your Hero Lab experience very rich.

The kind of change that you're looking for is in the Eval Script.

There is an example of what the eval script should look like in the Editor help file. It's an example that replaces a strength bonus with a dex bonus.

Open "Help" in the Editor and scroll to the bottom of the page. There are three links to references. I think the help is under the "Useful Macros" link.

 

[ShadowChemosh]

The search feature on this forum is very good and there is a huge wealth of knowledge stored in its depths. The other thing to know is using the editor does NOT require any XML knowledge at all. Granted that is what the editor writes behind the scenes but you don't need to actually work with it anymore.

Here is a POST by Mathias that pretty much explains how to do this for someone else. Its a pretty common request actually.

Also what Paris.Crenshaw said is a great place to start also.

 

[Lorangriel]

Thank you guys so much! See I am so new, I didn't even know the editor had a help file. I was using the editor tutorials which show the pretty standard stuff (which is cool but not what I picked for my first foray into editing)

 

[enrious]

Let me let you in on the most important thing I learned early on (thanks to people like Shadow).

You can run two copies of HL and thus, open up two versions of the editor. You can then find something that does what you want in one editor, then copy/paste the text/formula/whatever into the other copy that contains the new item you're working on.

 

[Mathias]

Actually, ShadowChemosh, this doesn't need to be handled by altering the attribute values (the thread you found wanted to use both -WIS and +INT as the attribute bonus for the skill, so it needed some wierd handling). The SkillOver tag, if added to a skill, will override the attribute to be used by the skill.

A script on the feat:
Phase: Post-Levels, priority: 10000

perform hero.childfound[YourSkillsId].assign[SkillOver.aCHA]

You'll need to replace "YourSkillsId" with whatever the Id of your skill is.

There's an example of this on the Oracle of Lore's Lore Keeper ability - that ability makes all knowledge skills use Charsma instead of Intelligence.

 

[ShadowChemosh]

Actually, ShadowChemosh, ... The SkillOver tag, if added to a skill, will override the attribute to be used by the skill.

Thanks Mathias. I totally forgot about the SkillOver tag that got added. That makes it SO much easier.