Imagicka
Explorer
Excuse the Newbie But...
Greetings...
Now I am new here... so please forgive me if I mention something that has already been dealt with, or whatever... If I should be sending to my comments to Luke directly, email and let me know, and I shall...
I shall also include a copy of these comments in a text file attached to this message. Now, on to the knitty-gritty. . .
I assume that the Classes field in the Add Creatures - List Grid window will sooner or later have a drop down menu or generator to make a list of 'legal' level and class. Such as '2Ftr4,Clr5' to generate 2 fighters of level four, and one cleric of level five? Or say '3', so it would randomly generate classes which were all level three? So, what happens when you put in no class... Does it determine the classes randomly as well, or give me an error? Oh...hmm...generates them, but now I've crashed the programme and can't get it running again, just hangs after it opens. Let's reboot to see if that fixes the problem...Nope.
Had a problem where the Current Str and Con of a Hobgoblin I created had a Str of 11 and a Con of 13, however, their current ratings were at 31 and 33. Attempts to remove their current value and save them...or set their value to their base value, and save the record still reset the current stat back to 31 and 33 respectively. After deleting all the characters and starting over again, I wasn't able to duplicate the error.
Looking at the Creatures in Detail, and looking at their inventory... It would be nice if double clicking on the Item would go into the Item Details/Selected Item. Also, it would be nice if it went to the item you had selected with the arrow, and not just the first item on the list.
Perhaps a Right Click with not only Item Details and Magic Effects, but also Add Item and Delete Item would be a nice feature in here as well. Also, being able to use the DEL key to delete the highlighted Item/Record would be a good idea too. Perhaps Insert can be used to add an Item/Record. Also, maybe even a 'Regenerate Items' so if your aren't happy with the items first listed, you can have it regenerated.
Now, I'm not certain if you randomly determine inventory, giving the generated creatures armour and weapons, but I was thinking...What would be a nice feature is when you are generation creatures/encounters, that you can specify that each member of the group has all a particular weapon, or a particular armour.
Also, I don't know how you generate the inventory, and the percentage chance of obtainment. But I was also thinking that you might also want to be able to build 'availability tables'. So you can specify that this group would have only a 5% chance of having long swords, or only a 10% chance of studded leather, and 50% of having hide. Then you can save these availability tables, listed by say...race and location. Elves in this geographical area would have this table, where Elves in this region would have this table.
I know it would be a lot of work for determining random chances of possession of armour and weapons. But I think it would be very useful for DMs who can make up availability tables for all their various regions and races, so they don't have to edit and change each encounter creature by hand. I know from just looking at the random generated Hobgoblins I made to test out to the system...I wouldn't have them have access to what I consider weapons and armour that would be only available to what I consider to be civilized races in my gaming world, such as long swords and studded leather armour.
I keep running in bugs and flaws, but I never am able to duplicate the exact problem twice. However, this was wasn't so lucky... I noticed that once you click on Add to Players, and Add to Opponents that is removes all the previous members in either Player Group or Opponent Group, depending on whichever button you press. Add to Players removes all the existing members from the Opponent Group...and vice versa. I hope this level of detail is something you don't mind...because if it is, just let me know...and I'll keep my opinions and comments down to just the aesthetics and the feel of the workings and not include bug comments or wishful thoughts on improvements, upgrades and new features.
Another thing I wouldn't mind seeing, are hot-keys for such things as arrow-keys for moving around the list of creatures, or using Shift/Ctrl in conjunction with the arrow-keys for selecting creatures in the list for deletions or whatever. I noticed that the arrow-keys work in the list of races in the filter for when your adding creatures for the generator. But perhaps it would be nice to be able to say hit E when your looking at the list of Races, and it takes you down to E's... Alphabetic Index Jumping Hotkeys. Though I do like the idea of the Filter though...
Now, looking at the Execute Action form/window I amwondering why in the Targets field I have listed: "(4) Hobgoblin (3), Hobgoblin (4), Hobgob" I assume it gets cut off for a reason? Also, I'm wondering, does (4) Hobgoblin (3) mean anything? But I do love the Expression Tab. Are we going to be able to alter/change the code for Expressions later if need be?
I guess there isn't any method to remove Game Log entries/records right there and then, using say the Delete key, or a Right-Click delete eh? I think it would be useful, in case you've made a mistake, or there is something you don't want to save into the log permanently. Oh, a suggestion, on the Game Log, when you display Succeeded or Failed, you might want to make them into Bold, or perhaps even Green or Red text/font. Just so they stand out a little more for quick viewing. The same for damage, red for normal hitpoint damage, pink for subdual damage. Or underlined...whatever you think looks best. Also, I think I should mention here when you look back in the Game Log of the combat that you dind't include what type of attack it was be it slashing, piercing, blunt, whatever. Nor do you mention if the attack was critical or not. The only indication is the fact that you list two suffers damage amounts. I think, for people who are going to run thorugh the combat quickly, then describe the combat to the players they are probably going to use the Game Log for this. So, it would be good to mention what type of attack it was, and if the attack was critical or not. Perhaps a 'verbose' mode might be good for this. So you can configure the game log to list things like Criticals, Subdual/Normal Damage, and Highlighting of things like Success/Failure of attacks if wanted.
Now, when selecting the weapon, on the first round attack after targetting one of the opponents, I get a programme error: "Cannot focus a disabled or invisible window. To protect the integrity of the database, It's recommended to quit not!" This seems to only happen when I have the Execute Action window docked to the main form/window.
As for your comment about considering an "Auto" combat/action button. I think that would be an interesting thing to see, and useful, and most likely wanted by users.
I noticed when a character/creature misses on his attack you have to hit the Current Creature Done button twice.
Like people mentioned before, a 'snap to' feature wouldn't be a bad idea. Something you can turn off and on though. Also, perhaps a way to 'lock' it so that the grid lines always remain on a 5 foot increment, so they don't auto-adjust themselves. I found when I wanted to zoom in, and look at the combat between two creatures, it would adjust so that my X-axis was 5-foot, but the Y-axis went to a 2-foot. I found it a little hard to read.
Greetings...
Now I am new here... so please forgive me if I mention something that has already been dealt with, or whatever... If I should be sending to my comments to Luke directly, email and let me know, and I shall...
I shall also include a copy of these comments in a text file attached to this message. Now, on to the knitty-gritty. . .
I assume that the Classes field in the Add Creatures - List Grid window will sooner or later have a drop down menu or generator to make a list of 'legal' level and class. Such as '2Ftr4,Clr5' to generate 2 fighters of level four, and one cleric of level five? Or say '3', so it would randomly generate classes which were all level three? So, what happens when you put in no class... Does it determine the classes randomly as well, or give me an error? Oh...hmm...generates them, but now I've crashed the programme and can't get it running again, just hangs after it opens. Let's reboot to see if that fixes the problem...Nope.
Had a problem where the Current Str and Con of a Hobgoblin I created had a Str of 11 and a Con of 13, however, their current ratings were at 31 and 33. Attempts to remove their current value and save them...or set their value to their base value, and save the record still reset the current stat back to 31 and 33 respectively. After deleting all the characters and starting over again, I wasn't able to duplicate the error.
Looking at the Creatures in Detail, and looking at their inventory... It would be nice if double clicking on the Item would go into the Item Details/Selected Item. Also, it would be nice if it went to the item you had selected with the arrow, and not just the first item on the list.
Perhaps a Right Click with not only Item Details and Magic Effects, but also Add Item and Delete Item would be a nice feature in here as well. Also, being able to use the DEL key to delete the highlighted Item/Record would be a good idea too. Perhaps Insert can be used to add an Item/Record. Also, maybe even a 'Regenerate Items' so if your aren't happy with the items first listed, you can have it regenerated.
Now, I'm not certain if you randomly determine inventory, giving the generated creatures armour and weapons, but I was thinking...What would be a nice feature is when you are generation creatures/encounters, that you can specify that each member of the group has all a particular weapon, or a particular armour.
Also, I don't know how you generate the inventory, and the percentage chance of obtainment. But I was also thinking that you might also want to be able to build 'availability tables'. So you can specify that this group would have only a 5% chance of having long swords, or only a 10% chance of studded leather, and 50% of having hide. Then you can save these availability tables, listed by say...race and location. Elves in this geographical area would have this table, where Elves in this region would have this table.
I know it would be a lot of work for determining random chances of possession of armour and weapons. But I think it would be very useful for DMs who can make up availability tables for all their various regions and races, so they don't have to edit and change each encounter creature by hand. I know from just looking at the random generated Hobgoblins I made to test out to the system...I wouldn't have them have access to what I consider weapons and armour that would be only available to what I consider to be civilized races in my gaming world, such as long swords and studded leather armour.
I keep running in bugs and flaws, but I never am able to duplicate the exact problem twice. However, this was wasn't so lucky... I noticed that once you click on Add to Players, and Add to Opponents that is removes all the previous members in either Player Group or Opponent Group, depending on whichever button you press. Add to Players removes all the existing members from the Opponent Group...and vice versa. I hope this level of detail is something you don't mind...because if it is, just let me know...and I'll keep my opinions and comments down to just the aesthetics and the feel of the workings and not include bug comments or wishful thoughts on improvements, upgrades and new features.
Another thing I wouldn't mind seeing, are hot-keys for such things as arrow-keys for moving around the list of creatures, or using Shift/Ctrl in conjunction with the arrow-keys for selecting creatures in the list for deletions or whatever. I noticed that the arrow-keys work in the list of races in the filter for when your adding creatures for the generator. But perhaps it would be nice to be able to say hit E when your looking at the list of Races, and it takes you down to E's... Alphabetic Index Jumping Hotkeys. Though I do like the idea of the Filter though...
Now, looking at the Execute Action form/window I amwondering why in the Targets field I have listed: "(4) Hobgoblin (3), Hobgoblin (4), Hobgob" I assume it gets cut off for a reason? Also, I'm wondering, does (4) Hobgoblin (3) mean anything? But I do love the Expression Tab. Are we going to be able to alter/change the code for Expressions later if need be?
I guess there isn't any method to remove Game Log entries/records right there and then, using say the Delete key, or a Right-Click delete eh? I think it would be useful, in case you've made a mistake, or there is something you don't want to save into the log permanently. Oh, a suggestion, on the Game Log, when you display Succeeded or Failed, you might want to make them into Bold, or perhaps even Green or Red text/font. Just so they stand out a little more for quick viewing. The same for damage, red for normal hitpoint damage, pink for subdual damage. Or underlined...whatever you think looks best. Also, I think I should mention here when you look back in the Game Log of the combat that you dind't include what type of attack it was be it slashing, piercing, blunt, whatever. Nor do you mention if the attack was critical or not. The only indication is the fact that you list two suffers damage amounts. I think, for people who are going to run thorugh the combat quickly, then describe the combat to the players they are probably going to use the Game Log for this. So, it would be good to mention what type of attack it was, and if the attack was critical or not. Perhaps a 'verbose' mode might be good for this. So you can configure the game log to list things like Criticals, Subdual/Normal Damage, and Highlighting of things like Success/Failure of attacks if wanted.
Now, when selecting the weapon, on the first round attack after targetting one of the opponents, I get a programme error: "Cannot focus a disabled or invisible window. To protect the integrity of the database, It's recommended to quit not!" This seems to only happen when I have the Execute Action window docked to the main form/window.
As for your comment about considering an "Auto" combat/action button. I think that would be an interesting thing to see, and useful, and most likely wanted by users.
I noticed when a character/creature misses on his attack you have to hit the Current Creature Done button twice.
Like people mentioned before, a 'snap to' feature wouldn't be a bad idea. Something you can turn off and on though. Also, perhaps a way to 'lock' it so that the grid lines always remain on a 5 foot increment, so they don't auto-adjust themselves. I found when I wanted to zoom in, and look at the combat between two creatures, it would adjust so that my X-axis was 5-foot, but the Y-axis went to a 2-foot. I found it a little hard to read.
Like-wise for current item.
