Ok so have the Trolls thought about linking up with Hero Lab to produce an official version of the ruleset for character creation?

I know that they have official products for Fantasy Grounds II, which has a Hero Lab importer and over on Google+ there is guy working on an unofficial version
using the Authoring Kit which allows you to create rulesets.

The thing is, right now, there is no "Old School" Characters gens that I'm aware of. I'm rather surprised that Swords & Wizardry hasn't gone the Hero Lab route yet, considering their partnership with
Paizo and Pathfinder, not to mention having Tome of Horrors in Hero Lab.

Personally, I'd love to see this, as it is an in-game resource as well as a means to play around with different options with a lot less work because of the menus, pop-ups and drop downs. THoughts?

I don't personally use Hero Lab (nor any other computerized character creators for my own Player Characters) but maybe the reason for the dearth of these options is because it's so quick and easy to create a character from scratch in a retroclone or OSR style game? This stands in stark contrast to games like D&D 3.x and/or Pathfinder where it's implicit that you will be deliberately "building" a character along an optimal path vs. leaving much of it up to random chance. The other issue might be financial; I assume there are licensing costs for companies like Paizo and others if they partner with the folks that make Hero Lab. Maybe the Trolls don't want to bear those costs?

That said, when I GM I'm a big fan of generators that can produce a stat-block for me when I'm trying to quickly create an NPC during session prep or on the fly.

Hero Lab is extraordinarily helpful, and for me, nearly essential at 20th level, in 3.5e. You can on the fly calculate the effects of several conditions, buffs, magic items, effects, abilities with a few clicks, and if that isn't enough you can delve into the scripting language to add new features.

It's not nearly as necessary for C&C, but I'd certainly buy it if it were available. It's available and popular for systems with even less to track (Spirit of the Century, Savage Worlds). I have the authoring kit and have several times thought about undertaking the task myself, if I could make the commitment. For it to be useful, however, it needs to have all of the materials the game has (spell descriptions, class descriptions, race descriptions, etc.) including those in any popular supplements. Much of that is OGL, but some is definitely TLG property. Also, even if it is OGL, goodwill would still require TLG's assent in using it.

Better than someone developing with the Authoring Kit (which is sort of the hobbyist approach; only those with Authoring Kit can use it then) is TLG making an official deal with Lone Wolf to do it quickly, properly, and with their full support.

One drawback is that most C&C games are heavily house-ruled, and the scripting language is hard to get into, leaving those games in a position where users would only be able to rely on some aspects of their sheet and not others. It's possible those house rules if popular enough would be offered as community downloads (you can grab stuff from third party sources), but only if someone developed them.

C&C doesn't tend to have the issue where lots of effects compete and cascade and stack, and as we've seen in other discussions, there aren't even necessarily enough rules for the computer to be able to enforce any of that anyway, but even as a place to store your character and kick out PDF sheets it's nice.

Aegraith,

Yeah I have the Authoring kit as well but don't have a clue as to where to start.

I'd buy it since I wouldn't have to buy a ton of additional modules in order to keep up with all the latest updates to the RPG in question.

Anyone following the progress on this?

Not sure there is any progress to follow.

I didn't know about this:

http://forums.wolflair.com/showthread.php?t=45590

Looks promising if you own the Authoring Kit. I'll try it out tomorrow.

EDIT:
Tried it, you can enter your class, race, alignment, and ability scores, plus personal info like name. Weapon list is there, but gear is not yet (though you can enter it as custom gear.) Tried a cleric, spell list was there but code to handle it was still wonky. Experience/advancement is unfinished. Has some basic validation checks. Didn't try the character sheet bit. Class and a half or multiclass aren't (yet?) supported. Once this is working, wouldn't it be cool to get all of the classes from the Companion entered?

A really good start, but so far probably only for someone who wants to help with the development. Maybe the author can keep us updated here.

Wow, didn't know this was here.

I'm actively working on the Hero Lab ruleset for C&C. As Aergraith mentioned, it is a work-in-progress.

My main drive is to be able to export characters for importing into Fantasy Grounds, but will do definitely try to get the PDF printable version to closely resemble the C&C character sheet.

I've spoken with TLG, and have received permission to continue.

The spells for Illusionist and Wizards are the furthest along, I'm working on Cleric right now, but ran into a problem with too many if/then statements. Going to have to refactor the code to determine # of spells based on level.

I update the LWD site usually after each release (which has been a couple times per month).

Thanks for the words of encouragement, and if anyone would care to help, all the code is freely available, provided you have the authoring kit.


BoomerET

Ok, I've got the cleric and druid spells done, may need more tweaking.
From the Equipment list the following are working (this term is used VERY loosely):
Helms (Armory tab, Armor & Shields)
Armors (Armory tab, Armor & Shields)
Shields (Armory tab, Armor & Shields)
Weapons (Armory tab, Melee Weapons)
Missile & Ranged (Armory tab, Ranged Weapons)
Equipment (Gear tab, Miscellaneous Gear - I haven't upped this version yet)
Clothing (Gear tab, Miscellaneous Gear - I haven't upped this version yet)
Provisions & Lodging (Nothing yet)

Anyone wanting to help? Do you have the Authoring Kit?

BoomerET is looking for data checkers, data enterers, data geeks, anyone willing to help and hasn't been listed in the Obit's in the past week and is still drawing breath.



Dave

I bought HL way back in the day for Mutants and Masterminds 2E, so I would guess I could use this with the base program, since the M&M stuff is an add on "module".

Just uploaded the latest version. (0.20)

Notes:
To increase the characters level, add the appropriate XP in the Journal tab.
Adding items to your inventory doesn't yet subtract from your total.

Hints/Input/Advice request: Right now I assign hitpoints and gold, but I really think this should be input by the player, so I'll probably change those boxes to input. What do you think?


BoomerET

I think that's a good instinct. I just know of so very few groups that don't house rule that the flexibility will be appreciated more than ensuring a legal character sheet.

I have the authoring kit, and I am a programmer. Not sure how much time I have though. When I was considering undertaking this, I also wondered how to collaborate on datasets; I prefer to use some kind of source control. Do you use anything like that (subversion, git, etc.)

I'm most familiar with SVN, but have used Google code, git, etc.

I found a free SVN site called Assembla. I'm playing around with it, but so far I'm not really liking what I see.

I was going to upload files, and it would only let me choose one file at a time, that surely can't be real.


Dave

EDIT: I hadn't actually added the SVN tool, jeesh.

Dave,

I have the authoring kit too, but am really kind of lost when comes to code entry.

Version 0.21 is LIVE.

I'm thinking buying things actually works, and you can now manipulate Hit Points.
(Rune Lore is a new selection, but it's not fleshed out as much as the other classes yet).

Anyone willing to take on creating the PDF character sheet???

If you have the authoring kit, you already have everything you need to help.


BoomerET

Version 0.25 is now available.

Hitpoints are working now, allowing you to use a typical incrementer to add the dice total.

It calculates your total HP adding (or subtracting) your CON modifier per level.

The in-play tab works for tracking HP as well.

The FGII converter has been updated to display Total HP and Wounds.

Thanks, BoomerET. I looked at doing a sheet, looks like there are a few options available. Layout isn't my forte, even if it was just Word I couldn't get a sheet together, but if I get time I'll look at it again.

Here's a nudge.

The PDF output is 2 sheets.
1st: sheet_standard1.dat
2nd: sheet_standard2.dat

Boomer, I do have it, but as mentioned above, would need some help navigating the authoring kit.

I just uploaded v.25, more accurately track HP and AC.
There's also a tab for languages!

The in-play tab now accurately keeps track of Hit Points.

I'm working on a Windows GUI application for converting the custom xml output for input into Fantasy Grounds.

The application as it currently stands is Ruby, so hopefully I'll get something working in the next week.

I've yet to put any more work into spell casters, once I'm happy with more basic things, I'll get onto it.

TheMetal1, give me a few days (weeks?) and I'll post some helpful info besides what files to glance at.


BoomerET

Glad you are working on this. I bought into the Realmworks kickstarter and Hero Lab plugs into that. So being able to have C&C part of Hero Lab would be fantastic.

Please post any requests, omissions, advice that you can think of.

I realized that I didn't have Senses displayed, even though I have them coded in, such as Darkvision.

I've fixed this, but not sure if it's in v.25.

I spent more time today with the output XML for import into Fantasy Grounds.


BoomerET

Something in today's changes is causing HeroLab to crash now with this module.

I just uploaded a new version. Please let me know if/where it's crashing.

Is there any messages?

Yes sir. Here are some screen shot snippets.

I made major changes to the way I was handling racial and class abilities as well as senses.

You can either remove each offending file
will start with tab_XXXX.dat (the tab_xxx files that refer to a specific class or race have been removed and made more generic)

Or, blow away the whole candc directory and import v.27 .
On my Win7 system, it's in:
C:\ProgramData\Hero Lab\data\candc


Sorry for such a major blunder on my part. I'll be my best to make sure it doesn't happen again.


BoomerET

Deleting the directory did repair it. Please keep us updated when you implement more of this.
Thanks.

and yet another update v.29

Most of the changes in this affect the Fantasy Grounds importer, like adding encumbrance values and weight, as well as a bunch of combat stuff.


BoomerET