• 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

M&M wish list for Hero Lab

J

jrclarkiii

Member
I have spent virtually no time on the forums, but I've been using Hero Lab for a year or so (since last Gen Con, as a matter of fact.) I'm running two demo games for beginners at Gen Con again this year and have been putting together 15 or so characters in the past few days, so these are a couple of things that have been on my mind.

Take these for the two cents or so they are worth.

1) Print format: I would give my right arm for the ability to format a character sheet that looks exactly or almost like the official M&M stat blocks from the books, with all the appropriate commas and semi-colons, etc. The one-page format is similar but just different enough...

2) Movement: For some reason, when I do a one-page, movement is frequently split up into two fields over two pages. The text would clearly fit in one box, but for some reason, it spills over, creating two pages.

3) Complications: I saw the answer on another thread that says to enter these as a Personalization. Unfortunately, Personalizations don't seem to show up on the one-page sheet format. Unlike fruitbats or favorite color, this is an official part of the M&M character that most every character will have. I really wish there was an actual space for them.

4) Output format: I wish there was a way to output all the information that is on the one-page or normal character sheet into an RTF or HTML format that I could then reshape into whatever format I wanted. Is this to keep people from publishing Feat descriptions or Power costs to the Web? (And yes, I know that the various output formats give you the information minus point costs and descriptions.)
 
Last edited:
jrclarkiii said:
1) Print format: I would give my right arm for the ability to format a character sheet that looks exactly or almost like the official M&M stat blocks from the books, with all the appropriate commas and semi-colons, etc. The one-page format is similar but just different enough...
Click to expand...

Since I'm *not* the M&M guy, but Colen will be offline for a couple days, I'm going to take my best guess on this. Forgive me if I'm misunderstanding something.

HL *will* generate statblocks for M&M. The format *is* very similar to the statblocks used in the books - I thought it was actually the same. To access, go to the File menu and select Output Active Hero Summary.

jrclarkiii said:
2) Movement: For some reason, when I do a one-page, movement is frequently split up into two fields over two pages. The text would clearly fit in one box, but for some reason, it spills over, creating two pages.
Click to expand...

This sounds like a bug that we can probably fix.

jrclarkiii said:
3) Complications: I saw the answer on another thread that says to enter these as a Personalization. Unfortunately, Personalizations don't seem to show up on the one-page sheet format. Unlike fruitbats or favorite color, this is an official part of the M&M character that most every character will have. I really wish there was an actual space for them.
Click to expand...

I don't know enough about this. However, if complications are a fundamental part of every character, it could make sense to track them separately and list them on the character sheet. We'll be meeting with GR at GenCon, so we can ask them for an official opinion.

jrclarkiii said:
4) Output format: I wish there was a way to output all the information that is on the one-page or normal character sheet into an RTF or HTML format that I could then reshape into whatever format I wanted. Is this to keep people from publishing Feat descriptions or Power costs to the Web? (And yes, I know that the various output formats give you the information minus point costs and descriptions.)
Click to expand...

How about the statblock output that I mentioned in #1? There is an HTML format option, as well.
 
The stat block export does seem to contain all of the information from Green Ronin's book format, and with some work I can import that into a QuarkXpress or InDesign layout format of my own design that mimics the official layout. But I was hoping HeroLab could output it into a character sheet format that mimics the format in the books, without having to go through the manual layout outside of the program.

As for the Complications, they don't cost any points, but they are a pretty integral part of the game. It would be nice to have them hard-coded into the character sheet.
 
Thanks for your post, jrclarkiii. Addressing your points:

1) That would indeed be really cool. At this point we could generate it all pretty simply, except for the ability score and saving throw blocks across the top.... I'll see if this can be resolved in some way.

2) I'll look into the movement issue. If you could email me a sample portfolio where this occurs to colen@wolflair.com, that would be a big help. :)

3) Someone made a good case to me at Gen Con for allowing this, so I'm going to go ahead and add it to the files.

4) As Rob mentioned, you can use the built-in statblock output to get all the data you need.
 
Could well have been - sorry for not remembering you by name. The entire show turns into a huge blur for me shortly after the doors close on Sunday. :)
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top