Something Essentials won't solve (DDI rant) and proposals for new char. sheet format

@Saeviomagy

As far as power card design goes, I think it's actually pretty good when you consider that most people will be using them multiple times.
Which means that field description after the field is not nearly as bad thing as you make it sound.

It is. It's by far the worst piece of layout that I've ever seen anywhere, with the possible exclusion of timecube. There's no reason for it, there's no benefit from it, all it possibly does is make the important information for the power harder to find.
 

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Saeviomagy said:
It is. It's by far the worst piece of layout that I've ever seen anywhere, with the possible exclusion of timecube. There's no reason for it, there's no benefit from it, all it possibly does is make the important information for the power harder to find.

While I have my issues with the character builder, I think you are way overstating your case here. Which is a shame as the CB could use some real feedback. Ultimately, it shocked everyone so much by coming out and being moderately useable, that it got rave reviews, and it didn't deserve raves, though it was a really good start. It desperately needs an alternate power card sheet.
 



I use the CB print outs for rules text reference. A number of us like to use our own cheat sheets. I have a one page excel sheet I update at each level. When I need to look up the full text of a power I can look at the actual CB sheet, but most of the time, the cheat sheet has all the numbers I need, and I already know how my powers work, so other than a few words of text, I don't need much on the cheat sheet.

My experience, people flipping through their CB sheet take much longer to decide what they are doing, and to resolve it, than those people with one page cheat sheets.

I honestly don't expect CB to ever be as clean as a customized cheat sheet for any given character. But I do wish some of the mechanics were calculated a bit better. Half the time, I have to take a pencil to the player's character sheet fixing stuff, making notes, etc. especially when there are secondary effects or damage that the character builder doesn't calculate.
 

It is. It's by far the worst piece of layout that I've ever seen anywhere, with the possible exclusion of timecube.
Wait, you mean this Time Cube? That's only a possible exception? That's just low. If you wanted to insult it, you should have the decency to just swear at the designers and insult their mothers.*

There's no reason for it, there's no benefit from it, all it possibly does is make the important information for the power harder to find.
In all seriousness, I see your point. I've never had trouble finding information, but I see what your saying.



*Kids, do not swear at people or insult their mothers.
 

Let me add that I find the CB much easier to work with than doing things by hand. The interface doesn't thrill me, but it is solid and other than a few bugs and performance issues I've been very happy with it. Really happy.

I find it interesting to hear what works for various people. Those of you that make your own sheets could you post them? I'd really like to see what people use.
 

But the biggest problem is that it's just so busy with stuff you don't need and occasionally lacking important information. I'm including a single monk power card from my level 6 monk. It's something of a mess (I can't figure out how to inline it, sorry) in that it lists a whole bunch of attack options I'll likely never use but leaves out the target of the move power.

Absolutely. It seems like WotC came up with these "fill in your own" power cards and a traditional "fill in with a pencil" character sheet, and figured that the software should produce the same output.

That's insane.

When a player is filling in a form (using the character sheet with paper and pencil) it's useful to have a bunch of boxes so you can see which numbers you need to enter. When a computer is printing out a document that someone is supposed to read, all those boxes are extraneous and unhelpful. When I take notes, I prefer lined paper since it keeps my dubious handwriting in roughly a straight line. But why would you need lines on your paper when you're printing it out? It's not like all those unnecessary boxes are optional on CB. That's the only format it does!

The worst of it is that WotC already produced a great set of character sheets. Why can't the CB make these (see attached)?

-KS
 

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right click on the card, select customize, uncheck unarmed..and at least this one is fixed.

Perhaps I should have been more clear. Inspiring Word is a healing power that doesn't require an attack roll. Right-clicking it doesn't even give you the option to get rid of the unarmed attack entry.
 

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