• 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

Pre-Order Rise of the Runelords for Hero Lab

L

liz

Ex-Staff
We’re thrilled to announce our first Pathfinder Adventure Path for Hero Lab: Rise of the Runelords Anniversary Edition! Below is the same news we shared on our website (minus the awesome screenshots).

---------

Pre-Order ‘Rise of the Runelords Anniversary Edition’ for Hero Lab Today!
“Rise of the Runelords”, “Iron Gods”, “Giantslayer”, and the other Pathfinder Adventure Paths are great pre-built campaigns that thousands of Pathfinder players have come to know and love. These six-part, monthly adventures take a party of fresh-faced PCs up to level 15 and beyond, and can be easily adapted to a GM’s home-brew campaign world. In addition to dozens of pages of setting information, each 96-page chapter includes maps of areas to be explored, flavor text that helps bring your adventures to life, and dozens of encounters to challenge your players in combat.

In the past, we’ve been unable to provide these Adventure Path encounters for use in Hero Lab. Well, that’s about to change…

Rise of the Runelords Anniversary Edition for Hero Lab
Today, you can pre-order the first of our Adventure Path packages for Hero Lab: Rise of the Runelords Anniversary Edition! With Rise of the Runelords for Hero Lab, you can access all of the encounters from this AP, pre-built and ready for battle. Every encounter is available with just a click of the mouse, including spells, weapons, and special abilities already selected for NPCs. When you use Hero Lab’s integrated Tactical Console to manage your combats, you’ll be able to import each encounter for immediate use at the game table!

Unlike the published Adventure Path, Hero Lab also provides GMs with all of the monster stats, such as Goblins and Zombies, without the hassle of flipping through your Bestiary book or PDF. Best of all, for any encounter using material from a Pathfinder supplement (like the Advanced Players Guide or the Bestiary), that material will automatically be available for you to use within the Adventure Path! For example, if you don’t own the Bestiary package for Hero Lab – don’t worry! You can still use the Skinsaw Man, a deadly Ghast, in an encounter, view all of his Ghast-specific attacks and abilities, or even print out a character sheet to reference at the game table.

Pre-Order Today!
Rise of the Runelords Anniversary Edition is available to pre-order now for only $24.99! With 200 encounters across the 434-page adventure included in your purchase, that’s just 12¢ each – a bargain for any busy GM. So what are you waiting for? Head over to our website for more information, or to pre-order your copy today!

Future Adventure Paths
Rise of the Runelords will be releasing in late-April, and we’re already planning to release another Adventure Path for Hero Lab in May! We’ll have more updates in the coming weeks, so keep an eye on our Facebook page for more updates, or “follow” us on Twitter or Google+ to be the first to see them!
 
Stupid Question Liz:

How is this different from the community packs that are available now? Other than not needing other source books?

I'm just confused by this product.
 
I had the exact question Pollution.

Will the community packs for these APs will still be available on the community site?

Will the product versions include the Paizo art?
 
Pollution said:
Stupid Question Liz:

How is this different from the community packs that are available now? Other than not needing other source books?
Click to expand...

The big plus is that you aren't required to have all of add-on packages (like the Advanced Players Guide or Bestiary) to use the NPCs and monsters. We know that not needing all of the supplemental packages is going to be a huge boon for many users.

We also talked with ShadowChemosh, the community member that maintains the community files before moving forward, and he supported our decision for official support.
 
Last edited:
Last edited:
liz said:
No they will not. The author of the original files indicated that he wanted to take them down once ours were available.
Click to expand...

I am disappointed by this. I am the author of one of those community packs. And while Shadow (thanks) has maintained them and reorganized them and authored many of them, a large number of people contributed to that content. For those of us who have the required content those community files are great. Paying for them is less great.

Is there a legal reason why these community files is not longer allowed or simply a mater of maintenance?

liz said:
Can you clarify what you mean by this? The monsters and NPCs will have the official Paizo art, if that's what you're referring to.
Click to expand...

Yes this is what I meant. Paizo expressly forbid the NPC and Monster art from appearing in the community packs as a violation of their intellectual property. I specifically requested permission to include them in Curse of the Crimson throne pack, and was denied.

This is actually a very nice advantage to the product files.
 
liz said:
No they will not. The author of the original files indicated that he wanted to take them down once ours were available.
Click to expand...

I hope you're joking. I paid a lot of money, several hundreds of euros, in a short period of time to get access to every single first party pathfinder source you offer.

Now you're telling me that, to get access to what boils down to pre-made portfolios with the advantage of not having to own all the sources I'm going to have to pay 25$, even though I own all the sources?

And don't tell me that it's "only 12 cent per encounter". The fact is that the big majority of encounters boil down to 3 of x monster, and those are not the encounters I want to buy. The only reason I would want pre-made portfolios is for the dozen or so hard encounter to rebuild, you know the few monster where you need to wrestle with hero lab because Paizo made a typo etc..

With that in mind it's closer to 2$ per REAL encounter. And that's simply too much.

That said, if you're also planning for a 4.99$ version that DOES require you to own all the packages needed, I will retract whatever I said above. Because 24.99$ is an attractive price for not having to buy 100$ worth of sources, just not when you already own them.
 
liz said:
We also talked with ShadowChemosh, the community member that maintains the community files before moving forward, and he supported our decision for official support.
Click to expand...

I am also curious if you are using the community packs as a starting point for the work on products or if you started from scratch on them?
 
Villadelfia said:
I hope you're joking. I paid a lot of money, several hundreds of euros, in a short period of time to get access to every single first party pathfinder source you offer.

Now you're telling me that, to get access to what boils down to pre-made portfolios with the advantage of not having to own all the sources I'm going to have to pay 25$, even though I own all the sources?

And don't tell me that it's "only 12 cent per encounter". The fact is that the big majority of encounters boil down to 3 of x monster, and those are not the encounters I want to buy. The only reason I would want pre-made portfolios is for the dozen or so hard encounter to rebuild, you know the few monster where you need to wrestle with hero lab because Paizo made a typo etc..

With that in mind it's closer to 2$ per REAL encounter. And that's simply too much.

That said, if you're also planning for a 4.99$ version that DOES require you to own all the packages needed, I will retract whatever I said above. Because 24.99$ is an attractive price for not having to buy 100$ worth of sources, just not when you already own them.
Click to expand...

Liz means you do not need those sources for the "encounters" in this product only, but you will still need them for "characters" you or your players created in Herolab.

Ask anyone who hgelped make those community downloads and they will tell you the amount of hours required. $25 is a decent fair price I should think. I am now doing every encounter in my campaign in HL and I can atest the sheer volume of work required.
 
liz said:
We’re thrilled to announce our first Pathfinder Adventure Path for Hero Lab: Rise of the Runelords Anniversary Edition! Below is the same news we shared on our website (minus the awesome screenshots).

---------

Pre-Order ‘Rise of the Runelords Anniversary Edition’ for Hero Lab Today!
“Rise of the Runelords”, “Iron Gods”, “Giantslayer”, and the other Pathfinder Adventure Paths are great pre-built campaigns that thousands of Pathfinder players have come to know and love. These six-part, monthly adventures take a party of fresh-faced PCs up to level 15 and beyond, and can be easily adapted to a GM’s home-brew campaign world. In addition to dozens of pages of setting information, each 96-page chapter includes maps of areas to be explored, flavor text that helps bring your adventures to life, and dozens of encounters to challenge your players in combat.

In the past, we’ve been unable to provide these Adventure Path encounters for use in Hero Lab. Well, that’s about to change…

Rise of the Runelords Anniversary Edition for Hero Lab
Today, you can pre-order the first of our Adventure Path packages for Hero Lab: Rise of the Runelords Anniversary Edition! With Rise of the Runelords for Hero Lab, you can access all of the encounters from this AP, pre-built and ready for battle. Every encounter is available with just a click of the mouse, including spells, weapons, and special abilities already selected for NPCs. When you use Hero Lab’s integrated Tactical Console to manage your combats, you’ll be able to import each encounter for immediate use at the game table!

Unlike the published Adventure Path, Hero Lab also provides GMs with all of the monster stats, such as Goblins and Zombies, without the hassle of flipping through your Bestiary book or PDF. Best of all, for any encounter using material from a Pathfinder supplement (like the Advanced Players Guide or the Bestiary), that material will automatically be available for you to use within the Adventure Path! For example, if you don’t own the Bestiary package for Hero Lab – don’t worry! You can still use the Skinsaw Man, a deadly Ghast, in an encounter, view all of his Ghast-specific attacks and abilities, or even print out a character sheet to reference at the game table.

Pre-Order Today!
Rise of the Runelords Anniversary Edition is available to pre-order now for only $24.99! With 200 encounters across the 434-page adventure included in your purchase, that’s just 12¢ each – a bargain for any busy GM. So what are you waiting for? Head over to our website for more information, or to pre-order your copy today!

Future Adventure Paths
Rise of the Runelords will be releasing in late-April, and we’re already planning to release another Adventure Path for Hero Lab in May! We’ll have more updates in the coming weeks, so keep an eye on our Facebook page for more updates, or “follow” us on Twitter or Google+ to be the first to see them!
Click to expand...

About time! I welcome this addition to HL and Pathfinder play using HL.
 
As ShadowChemosh mentioned in the thread he posted, we reached out to him prior to moving forward with this new package, and he’s aware of our plans. Unfortunately, he’s currently ill, and so it may take some time for him to post his thoughts. :( (Get well soon, SC!)

Given that ShadowChemosh plays a key part in distributing community content, we ask that you hold your questions on the subject until he has a chance to share his thoughts. Thanks for working with us on this!
 
Exmortis said:
Liz means you do not need those sources for the "encounters" in this product only, but you will still need them for "characters" you or your players created in Herolab.

Ask anyone who hgelped make those community downloads and they will tell you the amount of hours required. $25 is a decent fair price I should think. I am now doing every encounter in my campaign in HL and I can atest the sheer volume of work required.
Click to expand...

I know what she meant. Still, not getting a discount when you already own all the sources that you do not need to own for these encounters is a slap in the face.

And I don't need to ask anyone, I've created the entirety of the rise of the runelords encounters myself because the community ones were seriously oudated. I spent about 3 hours for all of the easy encounters. And then another 5 hours on the monsters with character classes and custom monsters.

My opinion on this is completely dependent on what will be removed from the community pack. If it's only the pre-made encounters, I honestly do not care, it's not that hard to open the encounter builder and create it yourself.

I'm more worried that the custom monsters will be removed from the community pack. Let's use rise of the runelords as an example: It contains 8 monsters that are not in any other bestiary and are not just monsters with class levels or some small adjustments. These 8 are the only 8 monsters for which I would need to open up the hero lab editor, which I will admit is a hassle to work with. These 8 monsters can be found starting page 406 in the AP.

So, in my particular case I already own the 4 bestiaries and all of the sources needed to add class levels and the like to the monsters. I do not think that any reasonable person could argue that 24.99 is a good price for what comes down (i repeat, for me) to access to 8 monsters. Especially since Bestiary 1, with 300-ish monsters costs the same. (And yes, I know that the price is in fact ok if you do not already own all of the packs needed to build the encounters.)

If these 8 monsters are going to be removed from the community pack, I will fork it and keep that content maintained myself.

EDIT:
liz said:
As ShadowChemosh mentioned in the thread he posted, we reached out to him prior to moving forward with this new package, and he’s aware of our plans. Unfortunately, he’s currently ill, and so it may take some time for him to post his thoughts. :( (Get well soon, SC!)

Given that ShadowChemosh plays a key part in distributing community content, we ask that you hold your questions on the subject until he has a chance to share his thoughts. Thanks for working with us on this!
Click to expand...

Sorry, I was writing this post while you posted that.
 
The funny thing about all this, to me, is that I was going into the store to buy the last 2 data packs I needed to finish Paizo PF content. I was scrolling down to make sure I hadn't missed anything and saw this. I said, "WTH is that???" I figured it was OLD and just never noticed it before. Then I got the email. Then I saw this post. I've been confused.

My feelings on this: Okay, cool, whatever. I don't need these, I grabbed the Community packs a while back, so I'm cool. I even put clips from my personal files for images. I'm good.

BUT, going forward, and as someone thinking about running the new Giants one.... This could be cool. Especially if LW can get these out AS books come out, instead of months behind. It's a lot of work, I know, but timing is key in my opinion. Like a month or so behind at most would be gravy.

Then the question comes, are you going to do this for EVERY AP and EVERY Module? For instance Emerald Spire? Or Bitter Manner? Or any other stories we can get for any supported game?

Then my mind brings up RW, and says, "OHHHHH Maybe this is so they can put out RotRL in RW!!!!" If that's the case....I'm in like Flynn!

All in all, I'm ambivalent about this so far. It's the same as someone putting out the data files for Gun H(3)aven for SR before the official dataset comes out. Once the LW set comes out, I stop using my own custom stuff and go to that wherever possible.

Seriously though, I could see a future where an AP comes out from Paizo, LW releases the HL and RW tools for it, and updates as needed. That could mean some serious money for both Paizo and for LW (which I'm all for).
 
This HL Encounter Content was one of the topics in this survey that was send out earlier this year and back at that time I was like:
Why would I buy this? Just for the pictures that aren't included in the Community Files? Nah not doing that.

So I really wonder and wait for the information about what happens the the community files.
If this however is any indication that the AP content would be available in Realm Works it would be fine, as I would buy the APs in RW without any hesitation.
 
Pollution said:
Then my mind brings up RW, and says, "OHHHHH Maybe this is so they can put out RotRL in RW!!!!" If that's the case....I'm in like Flynn!
Click to expand...

I know it's looking a gift horse in the mouth a bit, but I would pay a great sum of money for a RW version of this too.
 
ive never used these files so sorry if this seems a silly question....
are these ap files only used by the gm's? what would a player need them for?
 
ThatOneMike said:
I know it's looking a gift horse in the mouth a bit, but I would pay a great sum of money for a RW version of this too.
Click to expand...

Rise of the Runelords is the AP that LW used as part of demonstrating what an AP would look like in RealmWorks. The outcome of the negotiations for publishing the APs in RealmWorks (or any products from other publishers) have not been made that I know of, but such negotiations were "in progress" at the last word I do know of.

The question becomes, would this HeroLab pack be included with an eventual RW treatment? Or would they be sold separately? If they would be combined, there would be little reason for RW users to purchase this one now, and probably some "buyer's remorse" if that proved to the case after the fact.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top