RPM: Beta features update

[Luke]

Re: DazKaz feedback

This is a copy of an E Mail I sent you a while back.

Thanks DazKaz. Haven't forgotten it.

A list of pre-generated monsters as per the Summon Monsters Spell, I had a lot of trouble trying to create a celestial dog. Have you addressed the issue of Monster Templates yet?

Spells, like skills now do, could have their own code to do things - like create new creatures. It just so happens I (hot of the press) have templates working, but the form of it isn't yet finalised.

I would like to see the Forgotten Realms feats etc. as I am playing a Forgotten Realms campaign at present.

No can do. They are copyright, and providing them is illegal. You need to enter them yourself, or perhaps get an export from somebody else (down the track). I'll be hoping that those using other people's exports actually have the books themselves.

In the character creation wizard there doesn't appear to be a way to remove feats / skills once you have chosen them to swap them for another. This is especially annoying, and I feel is a priority for change.

You can do this in the "Feats" tab on the creature window, and I'll look into something for the "Level Up" window.

Feats and skills that come with class i.e. Rangers Track, should be greyed out when selecting feats in the wizard so as not to select them twice.

RPM knows which feats can be taken multiply, and will throw up a warning message anyway. In "Level Up" (where you should do this sort of thing), a feat is already colour coded green, If you have it.

The tile mapper is excellent, it obviously needs more tile sets but the concept is superb. I would like to see a layer of dark tiles that can be placed over the whole map, and then with the click of the mouse reveal the map you created underneath as the PC's explore areas. i.e If they can only see 30ft just click on the tiles immediately surrounding them until 30ft radius is revealed.

Thanks. A couple of volenteers are looking into providing more tilesets. Your "fog of war" idea is what I actually have in mind eventually for network play. The current BattleMap is really for the DM, but it would be nice if he could "flick the switch" for player view, and show them. My idea for networking is that each character would have movements and sight tiles recorded, so they could refer to their map etc. TileMappers are excellent for being able to record that sort of detail.

I would still like to see a way of handling the weight, and cost of equipment carried in the Backpack or other removable storage items. Perhaps it can be dun by adding tabs to the Items/Active bar i.e C carried, E equipped, S stored you could also have B backpack, PL pouch left, PR pouch right, BA bandolear etc.

And I want to do that. It's pretty low priority compared to things that must be done for the beta release though. My thought are that it would be nice if certain items (such as bags of holding, or portable holes) actually "absorbed" weight. I think that very few are going to want to get down to a pouch left/pouch right level. If you think it all through, it's a lot of laborious work - for any kind of user interface - for very little return.

I think people are not Informing you about things like Templates, and Standard character sheet layouts when printing, because like me they assumed it was a necessity and sure to be implemented, just that you hadn't got round to incorporating it yet.

Understand, but it's too much assumption. The game rules are huge, and I'd like to eventually get everything done, but I need to get a release 1 out (ie. the beta), and it can't have everything (see "crashes" below).

I'm really looking forward to the finnished product, but like some of the others I'm having trouble creating stuff due to frequent crashes.

Sorry to hear that. Some seem to have problems, and others report that they think it's stable. That's the nature of alpha version software, and why I must get a release 1 out, that does "guarantee" stability in the "must have" features (whatever they are). Whilst this is an alpha-feedback program, I do try hard to make sure that the "early adopters" get something useful out of playing with it.

The most important thing is that everyone has an opportunity to get a pretty decent glimpse of what RPM will be when "finished", and has every opportunity to have a say in how it turns out...

Thanks!

 

[CRGreathouse]

First, Luke, I'll say that you've come a long way with RPM. Now I'll continue with my analysis:

*Why Kytess got 6 feats, rather than 1: This is because your Kytess character is a 4th level human fighter. The automatic class feats don't count. RPM gave Kytess 6 (human = +1, level4 = +2, 4th level Ftr Bonus = +3). So, when you spent 1, RPM reported "6 earned", "1 Assigned".

* Weapon Costs and weights: You may have been looking at the total, rather than the individual items??? Individual item details are obtained via the "Details" button under creature items.

The feats Kytess had: Armor Prof (all), Weapons (Simple, Martial), Power Attack, Cleave, WFinesse (chain), WProf (chain), Combat Reflexes, and one or two more. I choose 5 feats on character creation, and 6 *more* were offered upon leveling up.

Weapon cost/weight: the total was off, as was the individual listing to the side of each item.

I didn't have any trouble equipping mw items - it took me a full 5 seconds to figure it out the first time, and it was easy after that. (Standard action to figure out a typical RPM feature? )

I'll look over the skills again and tell you if I can figure it out.

 

[CRGreathouse]

I just started RPM again to test another tricky character - most of my characters take the rules as far as they can go. Unfortuntly, there was a major problem testing this one: as soon as I finished the "Add Creature" wizard, the characer disapeared, never to be seen again. I could see the stat block being built below the wizard, but when I clicked the "Add creature" button, it was gone. It wasn't in any of the records...

Naldak, the dwarven barbarian, was gone. Any ideas?

 

[Luke]

First, Luke, I'll say that you've come a long way with RPM.

Thanks, but don't buckle on me now. I'm thinking you'll set the highest standards before being happy, and will keep me honest Theres a long way to go before the vision is realized. Until then, I'll try to make version 1 the best option out there anyway. The grail is generic in-game mechanics automation, but the amount of foundation you need to lay for that is staggering.

I choose 5 feats on character creation, and 6 *more* were offered upon leveling up.

Perhaps you used the skill and feat lists available in the "Lists" tab of "Add Creature", or in the "Creatures" window. These carry the warning "Use 'Level Up' for proper..." and are really meant for DMs to quickly knock up creatures, not caring for rules. "Level Up" is the way to go for adding classes, skills, feats and ability points, and I should make it more obvious.

Weapon cost/weight: the total was off, as was the individual listing to the side of each item.

Hmmm. Don't know what happened, except that magical items cost is off on your version.

 

[CRGreathouse]

Perhaps you used the skill and feat lists available in the "Lists" tab of "Add Creature", or in the "Creatures" window. These carry the warning "Use 'Level Up' for proper..." and are really meant for DMs to quickly knock up creatures, not caring for rules. "Level Up" is the way to go for adding classes, skills, feats and ability points, and I should make it more obvious.

Yes, I did. I haven't had much luck with the "level up" button, though, and I'm not sure how it would be used for 1st level characters - you can't level up, right?

When I made Naldak, I didn't put in any feats or skills, intending to level him up. As posted above, it didn't work...

 

[Luke]

Yes, I did. I haven't had much luck with the "level up" button, though, and I'm not sure how it would be used for 1st level characters - you can't level up, right?

When I made Naldak, I didn't put in any feats or skills, intending to level him up. As posted above, it didn't work...

You should use "Level Up" to make a first level character. Effectively you start off "0-level", with no classes, and then go level-up to 1. If you don't check "Player Character" at the start, you could have some Race levels, and still use "Level Up" to add a class level.

Naldak is there. Go back into RPM and you'll find him. If you assigned him to an adventure, map, or group not in the current "Creature List" view, then you won't find him in the creature list. You could have hundreds of creatures tucked away in different adventures (using adventure "None" for your character collection?). Most likely, I have a problem and you needed to click on the "Creature List" window, and re-select "Current Adventure" to refresh the list

This is all very useful. Good info to indicate what "little things" I can make clearer on screen, which will make a lot of difference to understandability. Also what extra info to put in the "Guide".

Thanks again!

 

[CRGreathouse]

"Level up" to a first level character? Yes, I think you'll need to explain that - it's counterintuitive. Fortunatly, most of RPM is clearly laid out, or seems that way to me.

OK, I admit, Naldak was there. I understand now, but that wasn't too clear to me. I doubt it'll be a real problem, though, unlike the above.

Well, I suppose I'll continue with Naldak. His HD are properly calculated as 1d12+2d10+12, but his hit points (oddly enough) are 2. Mistake on my part? Likely, but I don't know.

I'm now going back to re-create Naldak as a level 0 dwarf.

I'm having trouble with items... after selecting a heavy pick, +1 chain shirt, and +1 large wooden shield, I removed the default items (scale mail, shortbow, etc.) and refreshed the screen. All good, until I click "Next" - it puts the default items back. Try as I might, it won't let me keep them off... "post edit" is equally useless here. Ditto for the attacks. Perhaps these are functions of level 0 characters?

Continuing to the Level Up screen...
Feats: Earned 1, Assigned __. Good so fsr. I select a feat, and look! Earned 1, Assigned 1. I'm happy.

On the skills screen, I see a fairly large (and likely unfixable) error - uncapped skill ranks. I can put all of my ranks into Ride...

Going to the stat block, I noticed that the default items are still all there, so I tab over to "items" and fix it. Despite having to move the cursor from the item I want to delete to the delete button and then to the alert box, it didn't take too long - and it stayed fixed this time. I quickly equipped the heavy pick in my primary hand and the +1 wooden shield in the other.

Back to the stat block, my total weight and gold are 10/7 - still not nearly accurate. The skills list my ranks instead of my modifiers: "Climb 4, Handle Animal 4, Jump 4, Ride 4, Tumble 2" instead of "Climb +8, Handle Animal +3, Jump +8, Ride +8, Tumble +6" (or "Climb +7, Handle Animal +3, Jump +7, Ride +8, Tumble +5", if it knew about my armor check penalty for the +1 chain shirt).

This brings up an important issue: what are you going to do with armor check penalties? The obvious answer is to incluide them on the stat block and let them change for in-game calculations, but it's not that easy. For example, take a character with a large wooden shield and scale mail, with the skills Tumble, Swim, Climb, Jump, and Listen. Tumble is impossible in scale mail, Swim has a special armor check penalty, Climb is impossible with a shield, Jump just uses the basic armor, and Listen ignores them all. Granted, this is a contrived example, but it shows the complexity of the skill system.

A related issue is items: climbing kit, ring of swimming, and mw artisan's tools. Also, what about Alertness and Skill Focus? What about familiars granting Alertness and +2 to Move Silently checks?

Back to Naldak, let's look at his atatcks (after refreshing):

[Attack1]:Melee null null (1d10+4/crit x3); [Attack2]:; Ranged null null (1d6/crit x3);

Remember, the "items" tab lists the pick in his primary hand and the shield in the off-hand.

Continuing, the (non-Dodge) AC is 16, correct if the enhancement bonuses are discarded - I assume this will be added in later. The dodge is 8, for some reason. No relevant feats and Dex 18 - what's up?

OK, that's enough for now. I hope my devil's advocate position on skills didn't discourage you...

 

[Luke]

Re:Naldek

His HD are properly calculated as 1d12+2d10+12, but his hit points (oddly enough) are 2.

You probably edited in the level number (no dice are rolled). If you "Level Up" a class at a time, you do the right dice rolls - with manual override, if you want it.

...it puts the default items back

Something I need to change. These are as defined for the race type, and works well for DMs quickly knocking up masses of creatures. At the least, I need to reproduce natural attacks, and perhaps ignore weapons, after the first time. In my version, I also support items based on class, rather than just race. Problem was I followed the monster manual (excuse me - the SRD!), which tends to assign default weapons to many races that actually can have classes for which the weapons are inappropriate.
My long term plan is be able to configure certain items (weapons/attacks..) as "mandatory" (eg. natural attacks), and possibly a randomly selected list after that. This all ties in with my earlier questions on the new "generators" and what people thought. In the blink of an eye, the scripting engine could be calling the generators to pick weapons, equipment, visual traits etc etc. All the infrastructure is there - just need the time.

On the skills screen, I see a fairly large (and likely unfixable) error - uncapped skill ranks. I can put all of my ranks into Ride...

Ahh... You're a rules man. How do you determine a cap on a skill which is a class skill for some class levels you have, and a cross-skill for other class skills??? Don't be tempted to answer too quickly now

my total weight and gold are 10/7

Now I recall. On the version you have, the totals are set to the last item, rather than the true sum. It's fixed now.

The skills list my ranks instead of my modifiers...what are you going to do with armor check penalties?

I really should make my current version available to you. I think you'd love it (see my very early post in this thread on skills). The handling is very, very nice in-game, but scant in the statblock. I've raised issues before (that you may have read) with regard to pretending that you're showing all the modifiers in a statblock.

In general response to "armor check" penalties, RPM knows which skills are afected by armor check, and it automatically keeps track of your total check penalty, based on equipped shield and armor (or any other item modifier that the DM decides needs an armor check penalty - house rules). There's also always the full description, just a mouse click away.

A related issue is items: climbing kit, ring of swimming, and mw artisan's tools. Also, what about Alertness and Skill Focus? What about familiars granting Alertness and +2 to Move Silently checks?

Yeah, all taken care of (partly in your version as well). I've played with equipping magical items with climbing and swimming bonuses, and with Alertness. "Skill Focus" is unfortunately, at the moment, in the same bag a "Weapon Focus" (earlier post).

Just bring up the creature "Modifiers" window. You can check out modifiers all over the place (creatures, feats, racial abilities, items, etc). It'll show you how feats like Alertness effect skills, and how a ring of swimming effects the swim skill. Using "Modifiers" is the RPM front-line to avoiding scripting. The "rank" makes sure you process everything in the right order (for example you must apply all modifers that affect Strength, before you apply other modifiers that utilise the strength modifier.

The dodge is 8, for some reason.

Again, go check out the "Modifiers". There are various sort methods for listing them all, and you should find the things that affect "Dodge" in there.

OK, that's enough for now. I hope my devil's advocate position on skills didn't discourage you...

Not at all. When you get the next version and check it out in-game, I think you'll be impressed. Just re-read that earlier post of mine on skills.

 

[CRGreathouse]

Re: Re:Naldek

Ahh... You're a rules man. How do you determine a cap on a skill which is a class skill for some class levels you have, and a cross-skill for other class skills??? Don't be tempted to answer too quickly now

JScript:

function maxRanks(c,cc) {
 if(c+cc==0) return 0;
 if(c==0) return (cc+3)/2;
 return c+cc+3;
}

BASIC:

Function maxRanks (c,cc)
If c+cc=0 Then
 maxRanks=0
Elseif c=0 Then
 maxRanks=(cc+3)/2
Else
 maxRanks=c+cc+3
End If
End Function

In either case, call maxRanks in the format MaxRanks(sum of levels for which the skill is a class skill, sum of levels for which the skill is a cross-class skill). Example (BASIC):
? "Read Lips: "; maxRanks(Rog,0)
? "Bluff: "; maxRanks(Brd+Rog,cLevel-Brd-Rog)

Obviosuly, this will become more complicated when you automate it instead of hard-coding the class skills, but you get the idea. You'll want to toy with these functions so it fits your data moel most efficiently, I'm sure.

 

[Luke]

Re: Skill maximums

In either case, call maxRanks in the format MaxRanks(sum of levels for which the skill is a class skill, sum of levels for which the skill is a cross-class skill). Example (BASIC):
? "Read Lips: "; maxRanks(Rog,0)
? "Bluff: "; maxRanks(Brd+Rog,cLevel-Brd-Rog)

Obviosuly, this will become more complicated when you automate it instead of hard-coding the class skills, but you get the idea. You'll want to toy with these functions so it fits your data moel most efficiently, I'm sure.

Doh! I missed an easy one. In the PHB p.56 - "For the purpose of calculating maximum ranks, a skill is a class skill if at least one of the characters classes has it as a class skill.

How easy is that?