I have a (somewhat lengthy) confession to make

[maddman75]

Yes, please provide links to character generators that include every option in the company's game line. No other company in the industry does this.

The Adobe problem I'd blame on Adobe personally. Probably their firefox plugin mucking things up. Are you trying to open them in the browser? If so, try saving them to your computer and opening them in Acrobat.

 

[pedr]

You can get Firefox to download a pdf from Dungeon and Dragon using the following (slightly clunky) process.

1) Right-click the link
2) Click 'Save Link As'
3) Click 'Cancel' or press 'Esc'
4) Right-click the link again
5) Click 'Save Link As' again
6) Note that you now have a .pdf filename, not a download.asp
7) Choose the location you want and save your file.
8) Profit!

 

[Obryn]

For Firefox, the PDF Downloader extension might help, too.

Regardless, I just use Chrome when I'm snagging Dragon and Dungeon. It's not really a problem for me, just an annoyance. I keep Chrome, Firefox, and IE on all my PCs because you never know when something will render in one but not another.

-O

 

[Cadfan]

Can't you just open the pdf, then save as?

Give me a moment...

Yes. You can. You can use either "save page as" or click the "save" button on the top of the banner.

 

[Obryn]

You can, if you can get the PDF to load into Firefox. It's spotty, at times. I can sometimes make it work great, and sometimes it just freezes on the loading page. Which is why I snag them with Chrome.

-O

 

[ExploderWizard]

Really?

Which RPGs have free software for developing characters that is updated on a monthly basis with the latest mechanics from all new books?

World of Darkness?
Exalted?
Pathfinder?
Mutants & Masterminds?
True 20?
Any of the Palladium stuff?
GURPS?
Savage World?
Any of Mongoose's licensed games?
Star Wars RPG?

Um... what are these "most other roleplaying games"? Is there software for most all of those listed above that I haven't heard of? (Possible since I'm pretty D&D/Pathfinder centric in my habits.)

I own the GURPS character building software. It was not free. It cost 20 bucks or so, but it can be updated with additional material from GURPS books as they are released. There is no recurring/ongoing charges for this support. The updates are not always monthly because GURPS doesn't have the release schedule that WOTC does.

 

[Badwe]

Without veering too far from the topic at hand: I have to say one problem I have with going from compendium -> google docs is that google docs doesn't do columns in a satisfying way. Yes, you can create a table with 1 row and 2 columns but this is inconvenient and static, which is bad when you really need a monster to wrap around to the next line. This wouldn't be a huge issue were it not for the fact that my newest computer somehow came without microsoft word.

 

[maddman75]

Without veering too far from the topic at hand: I have to say one problem I have with going from compendium -> google docs is that google docs doesn't do columns in a satisfying way. Yes, you can create a table with 1 row and 2 columns but this is inconvenient and static, which is bad when you really need a monster to wrap around to the next line. This wouldn't be a huge issue were it not for the fact that my newest computer somehow came without microsoft word.

OpenOffice.org - The Free and Open Productivity Suite

 

[Rechan]

I loves me my DDI.

Also, a computer is necessary at the game table if you play online.
​

 

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

Interesting... Maybe I should look into GURPS sometime? A fully fledged character creator could help learn the system... at least the character creation parts.