D&D 5E ForgedAnvil D&D 5E Character Generator

Conandar said:

The generator doesn't really do that for you. If you got some new +1 armor or a +1 weapon, for example, it will need to be added to the Start page as a base item and then change the bonus to the appropriate place, and also added to your inventory sheet (for weight cauculations). Other items will need to be added to the inventory sheet, and any stat changes will have to be manually changed, like is necessary for the Ioun Stone of Strength. A Ring of Protection would need to be added as armor (other), and add a +1 to all 6 saves, as well as adding it to your inventory. To do all of this with just one action would require using macros, and those are actively being avoided (for compatibility reasons, I believe).

Also, if you loose your magic item (say a green slime eats your Ring of Protection, or perhaps you were at ground zero when a meteor swarm hit and your ioun stone was destroyed!), you will need to undo any changes made regarding that item, just as you did when you added it to your character sheet. The generator does most of the math for you, but it does not automate the details of magic items.

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Automating magic items can be done with or without macros. The real problem is the volume of items. The CS has over 1000 items built in and many of them have unique properties. The manhours to put all these in are beyond my commitment to this. Also, without using macros, the number of formulas required would be immense and would lag excel with frequent recalculations.
The problem with using macros is (besides mobile/tablet compatibility) they have to be written very precisely to account for shifts in cell locations as the tool matures. A formula in a cell will automatically update if columns/row are added/moved where as a macro can't update explicit cell references. Compounding the issue.. magic items can be removed which means we'd have to set up change events in the macros and these would fire every time users made changes to specific areas of the workbook (inventory sheets, weapon/armor slots, gear slots) and have to check ALL of the magic items to figure out what to update (and we'd have to write all that scripting and update it with every major revision/publication.

TL;DR version - Implementing magic items is a messy proposition regardless of method.

Thanks all, not trying to press for changes, just curious what's already in there.

Darrell Rodgers said:

Thanks all, not trying to press for changes, just curious what's already in there.

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No problem. I just wanted to provide a better answer then "Because we say so"

While I have programmed in the past (mostly various flavors of Basic, C and Java), I am a neophyte with Excel, so whatever solutions or information I provide are likely to be pretty basic (and possibly incomplete).

In Beta version 6 I noticed that for the Kensei monk, the detail correctly shows that for the Way of the Brush trait you get your choice of proficiency in either calligrapher's supplies or painter's supplies. On the Start page, however, it indicates that you get proficiency in both tools rather than your choice of one.

Also, it does not show Warding Wind as an available 2nd-level spell on the dropdown for the Wizard spell list when it should be.

Thanks for all of the hard work keeping up with this project!

blackprince said:

In Beta version 6 I noticed that for the Kensei monk, the detail correctly shows that for the Way of the Brush trait you get your choice of proficiency in either calligrapher's supplies or painter's supplies. On the Start page, however, it indicates that you get proficiency in both tools rather than your choice of one.

Also, it does not show Warding Wind as an available 2nd-level spell on the dropdown for the Wizard spell list when it should be.

Thanks for all of the hard work keeping up with this project!

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Both Fixed. Thanks for the feedback!

beta 6. Warlock with Devil's sight. On character sheet 1 it says darkvision 150ft. it should be 120.

Hmm, old problem, just noticed it. Still an issue in Beta 6.

Protection from Evil and Good is effective against "aberrations, celestiais, elementals, fey, fiends, and undead" according to PHB p270.
But the short spell description on CS3 leaves out aberrations: "(cel,fey,fnd,ele,und)".

This was rather important to us last game, since we were being attacked by aberrations and had this spell up.

Regarding this character generator and magic items:

If you receive a non-numeric modifying item, you will at least need to record it on CSII (Inventory). An item like a Potion of Healing comes to mind for this category.
If you receive a numeric modifying item, there are often multiple steps required. Besides recording it on CSII (Inventory), you may need to do one or more of the following:
* adjust your saving throw(s)
* adjust your ability score(s) {strength, dexterity, constitution, intelligence, wisdom, charisma}
* adjust your resistance(s)
* adjust your AC
* adjust your attack &/or damage bonus
* adjust your proficiency bonus
* adjust your hit points
* add a new proficiency or skill
(and the list goes on...)

The generator does not do these things automatically, and I recommend noting what changes you make on CSV so that you can reverse these changes if necessary.

My rogue recently received some Bracers of Archery. I needed to override the weapon damage to add the +2 damage bonus, and I needed to add proficiency with a Long Bow, since she did not have proficiency in that weapon already.
Another character received a Belt of Dwarvenkind. For this I needed to adjust his constitution by 2 (maximum of 20), note that I had advantage on Charisma (Persuasion) with dwarves, note that I now grow a full beard every day, and (since I was not a dwarf already) I had to give myself advantage on saving throws against poison, resistance against poison damage, darkvision (60 feet) and speak/read/write the Dwarven language. Yes, all that from one magic item! If I ever loose or otherwise stop using this item, all of those adjustments need to be removed from the character sheet, too!

I missed something here. All this work being done. Did we get past the issues with the content?


Bob