The future of RolePlayingmaster (RPM)

[Luke]

Firstly, congrats Morrus! These new boards rock!!

I'm continuing a thread from the old board. This is primarily an answer for Cergorach. The original post is to announce that a new release of RPM is available at http://www.enworld.org/roleplayingmaster.
It contains a new "HitchHiker's Guide" feature to provide ease-of-use for RPM, simplifying use of it's rich offerings as an RPG tool.

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Response to Cergorach:
- Whilst the use of the "Game Explorer" is the fastest way to enter data for the experienced, some of the functions you were doing (entering magical item modifiers), are a bit advanced.

- Congrats to entering a new prestige class, along with qualifying expression. There is an issue with calculating the BAB under certain conditions. It's being fixed now. I've done a bunch of fixes lately, simply by editing a small script file, which you may wish to request I e-mail you, rather than wait till the next release.

- The strength modifier you created for the new magical item is probably correct now. You may have accidently created a "rogue" entry (CatId not equl to 4), when playing with the "Game Explorer). If you use that "Game Explorer" to clear out the "Modifiers" field of your new character, the next "Creature Update" will fully recalculated everything for your character, and it will be fine.

- You're right that your character had extra hit points due to his barbarian rage capability. I'm busy entering a way for classes to have their own create functions. That way, as an example, when a character takes on the first level of Barbarian, the created "IsEnraged" variable will initially be set to "false". If used in-game, the "Barbarian Rage" action will temporarily set it to "true".

- I know you had one other point, but I just can't remember it now

In summary, well done, on being able to do advanced stuff (and using the hardest methods), before the beta . At this stage I really only expect people to use classes, feats and magical items, etc, right out of the box... Expect full doco, examples, and polish, after the beta.

Regards,

 

[Cergorach]

Luke, thanks for the suggestions, and i would really appreciate the scriptfile (you can sent it to Cergorach@Cable.A2000.nl or R.van.Vliet@TheHelix.nl ).

I also used RPM in my gaming session (as a DM), i'll report more tommorow (i'm rather tired right now), let's just say it has potential, but (as you know) needs a lot of work.

 

[Luke]

let's just say it has potential, but (as you know) needs a lot of work.

Yep. To get all the features in and polished will take a lot of work. That's why I'm having this request for what people believe they need in release 1 (ie. in the beta). There's tons of features, and not everything can be done for the first full release. The plan is to discover what the most important features are, and polish them (to a professional level, with doco and exampples etc), so that it can be released, fully operational, and work can continue on the rest of the features.

Although I publish the download as an alpha release feedback program, the reality is that the majority of people use it, without providing feedback at all. The number of feedback responses is miniscule, compared to the number of website hits, downloads, and the size of the mailing list.

This makes is extremely difficult to know what the most needed features are, to be polished for release 1.

For example, I have half finished tilesets for the tilemapper, but I'm not sure how many people actually use that feature. I have some great in-game achievements (VERY thorough skill check automation), and unfinished work for things such as group checks (eg. Spot check for a group), but have no idea if most people are perhaps really focussed on game prepartion and printouts, rather than in-game features. I'm almost embarrassed by the presentation of the character sheet report, but only 1 person recently requested a spruced up one (and I'm not doing anything until I see at least some feedback requesting something).

I'm very grateful to those who do provide feedback, and have very many accolades from people excited about RPM, thanking me, and urging me on. The attitude of those who just do a personal download, without ever responding, leads to a self-defeating result. I have no way of knowing where to focus development, to the greater good of the majority of people downloading.

Perhaps another, more focussed survey could help ???

Regards,

 

[Ds Da Man]

Luke, just curious as to adding a defense bonus like Star Wars D20. Can you do something like that, or is something I could do? I have downloaded and installed RPM, and found changing or adding races, classes, prestige classes, new items, and monsters fairly simple, but since I'm going to be doing a Starcraft conversion for D&D, and will be adding armor values as damage reduction, and defense bonuses for levels. Any chance?
I do have to say that I'm very impressed by the program, and will be trying to use in-game shortly. Thanks for all the effort, and am looking forward to the latest release.

Dave

 

[Luke]

Luke, just curious as to adding a defense bonus like Star Wars D20. Can you do something like that, or is something I could do? I have downloaded and installed RPM, and found changing or adding races, classes, prestige classes, new items, and monsters fairly simple, but since I'm going to be doing a Starcraft conversion for D&D, and will be adding armor values as damage reduction, and defense bonuses for levels. Any chance?
I do have to say that I'm very impressed by the program, and will be trying to use in-game shortly. Thanks for all the effort, and am looking forward to the latest release.

Dave

Thanks Dave.

RPM is very definitely geared towards generic D20, rather than specific implementations of it (such as D&D).
RPM isn't tied down by the structure of the database, and it is very possible to add new variables (such as "Wounds"), and add new little bits of script code, for things such as damage reduction through armor. In fact, it actually carries a development system within it, whare you can modify the screen layouts, and even add brand new screens.

That said, however, I'm focussed on only the core rules, until I get the first release out. As an example, two thirds of the psionic stuff is currently "hidden away". The core is a heavy reflection of D&D though, as defined in the D20 SRD.

This may be annoying for some people, but it really makes no sense to continue expanding the various options, until the core stuff is there in a professionally finished state.

When the time comes for the expansions, you'll either be able to do it yourself, or I'll do it (certain things). Once you've entered your own material, you'll be able to preserve it between updates, or export to share with others.

There are limits to what I'll personally provide as a core RPM release. I know that many don't adhere to it, but there are copyright restrictions with most expansion material to the core rules, and I intend to respect those legal protections. If you obtain RPM expansion updates from other people, presumably you will have bought the books where that material is covered.
As an example, StarWars is not part of the non-copyright core. If somebody obtains the "RPM StarWars" import from somebody else, they'll presumably have purchased the StarWars book that goes with it.

Regards,

 

[Cergorach]

- Congrats to entering a new prestige class, along with qualifying expression. There is an issue with calculating the BAB under certain conditions. It's being fixed now. I've done a bunch of fixes lately, simply by editing a small script file, which you may wish to request I e-mail you, rather than wait till the next release.

Luke could you please send me this script file as soon as possible I have another gamesession tomorrow, and would like to be able to concentrate on other things than guessing which BABs are correct and which are not. Please send it to R.van.Vliet@TheHelix.nl

Many thanks in advance!

ps. i know i owe you a field report on RPM, i'll write one after tomorrows session (i've got a couple of days off then ;-)

 

[Luke]

Re: Script file request

please send me this script file as soon as possible I have another gamesession tomorrow

It's moved on since then. You'd need the current executable/database as well (smaller than a full release). Would you like that?

and would like to be able to concentrate on other things than guessing which BABs are correct and which are not.
[\B]

They're much better now, taking feats such as "Expertise" and "Power Attack" into account, with options to select how much you want to contribute to AC or damage.

Let me know. Can you accept large e-mails, or shall I make you a private download?

 

[Cergorach]

Yes please Luke, i would like that very much!
My mailserver get's rather upset when it receives large mails and becomes rather unpredictable. Thus if you could email me a link where i could download the update, i would appreciate it very much. The improvements are exactly what i'm looking for, no more headaches and long pauses in my gaming session ;-)

Thanks a lot!