• Please note: In an effort to ensure that all of our users feel welcome on our forums, we’ve updated our forum rules. You can review the updated rules here: http://forums.wolflair.com/showthread.php?t=5528.

    If a fellow Community member is not following the forum rules, please report the post by clicking the Report button (the red yield sign on the left) located on every post. This will notify the moderators directly. If you have any questions about these new rules, please contact support@wolflair.com.

    - The Lone Wolf Development Team

Enhancement request - Item notes

N

NeoEvaX

Well-known member
I am helping transfer all of my wife's characters over from her paper sheets into Hero Lab. One of the most common issues is the inability to add notes to each item.

She keeps track of where she got everything, and sometimes what they do. Say she got a large dragon scale (not an actual item), she adds it as a "custom valuable", but there might be something she has to remember about it, or where she got it. Or the fact it was owned by the great grandfather she never knew, but met when she went back in time because of the time dragon they encountered (I am running a very weird but fun game.. haha).

All I am asking for is the ability to add a small notes field to each item. Magic/Weapon/Armor/Gear.

I know this is an enhancement. But other than needing to tweak the UI, and attaching a VARCHAR to each table.. I don't imagine its the WORST enhancement ever..

She kept saying "I can't be the only one who wants this!" I tend to keep a separate document with stuff like that, but she really wants to have more plane notes fiends for things like that. I know the Realm Works system is a 100% different build, but i love that I can add an text row to anything. Adding additional text.

Anyway I told her I would at least throw it out to the community. Maybe there are others who would appreciate this. Or maybe its something I am missing. Is there a currently a way to attach some text to items? (other than the item name itself which has a character limit and its hard to read all of)
 
If you look in the community pack there are similar adjustments already.

PS I also find creating custom dummy items useful if there is a lot of information that needs to go with an item.
 
I know I can go into the editor and make items. Its a bit of a pain, but it goes a bit beyond what my wife wants to do. I know she is capable, but she tends to think "It should do it this way.. why would I have to come up with a work around".

How does the community Pack help that? I have it in my system. Is there a way to add notes to items?

I just image having a button next to the edit/?(detail) buttons that is just a tiny note field that opens up for each item. I know this can be overkill on how much data is in each file.. It just really helps with immersion. My players like to keep each small item to help complete the story. She refuses to keep a word doc with these items. Seems like a perfect chance have something added to Hero Lab.
 
That seems like it might be an ok workaround. 100 Characters is not a ton, but it might be good enough for this.

I think my enhancement request still stands. But this might be a decent work around for her. Thanks for bringing it to my attention. I just tested it out on my ipad, and it works great. It also looks like I can do it twice and it will stack. Going to make for a ton of adjustments, but it could be worse.
 
Unlike RealmWorks, HeroLab is not a RDBMS application.. so no adding VARCHAR fields to tables, since neither exists (it is all XML files).

However... HeroLab has Journals. You can add as many entries as you need, date-stamped for the real-world game date and the in-world date, in which you can make as many notes as you want, including such things as "Met great-grandpa. He had the dragon scale."

It is more tedious to have to enter multiple Journal entries, but that will accomplish what you want, I think... and maybe even look better in the end?
 
Ah yes, well that makes sense. A new entry in the XML instead of the VARCHAR. I hate telling programemrs "its that easy" because it NEVER is. And I get that, I just wanted to throw out the suggestion.

I told my wife about the Journals, but she just claimed she would lose track of the item iteself. I agree that the journals are great for all the events that happened during that session. But remembering to go back and look is tricky.

Its hard to separate using a paper notebook, an tablet, and a computer. We haven't even been playing a year so its still a learning process. Finding out what we all like doing. I tend to use Hero Lab on my ipad and a evernote/google doc for more specifics while I play. And RealmWorks and HeroLab while I DM. My wife is just... picky.. about how she plays.

The journal idea is great. Just wish it was easier to look at an item and know the history, rather than having to go back and look through the journals for everything. There are also instances of items that I give them that are not in Hero Lab now. Either because I made up something, or because its in a module that isn't in Hero Lab yet. I am getting more and more used to the Editor, and I have a HL file on my server with a combo on House Rules, custom abilities, and items. I might just have to put more of a burden on my end to keep up with items that way.
 
You could use the Adjustment that Minous suggested to "tag" items with specific notes that say which Journal entry to look in for details.

I think people sometimes get to fixated on the "how" they expect to achieve a goal than on the fact that the goal can be achieved with a different method. I know as an in-house programmer, we often had to ask our users NOT to tell us how to solve their problem.. just tell us what the problem is, and let us make suggestions for the "how".
 
I totally understand that. I am a developer myself. I regularly have to work with users who want things a certain way.

Lets say I have an easier time telling a customer how its going to work, than my wife. She wants it a certain way. Can't argue too much.

I think the biggest thing is the time it takes her to transfer everything over. She has somewhat complicated characters and she has never used Hero Lab. The online character sheet she has gotten used to (she never really used paper sheets) is having database issues and there is a chance they will go down. So she is trying to get all her characters off. I think her using Hero Lab would be great, but she is resistant to change.

Thanks a ton for the suggestion though. I hope its something she will be ok doing. I know I will be using this feature with my characters going forward. Little notes for items could really add to the "real" factor.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top