d20 solutions with PCGen/GMGen!?...

[Emryys]

PCGen, in combo with GMGen may solve the d20 issues with character sheets interaction and running combat...

Check these links...
PCGen Online Documentation
Look under GMGen Docs/ Network Tab

Direct Link

"The network plug-in allows GMGen to act as a Client-Server application connecting multiple computers running PCGen. Players load their characters on their computers and activate the network client. The GM, running the network server, can see all the PC information that is available inside of the Initiative plugin. Either side will be able to change hitpoints, status, initiative and that sort of thing for the PC. In the Experience plugin, it will allow the GM to assign experience, and it will send it to the PC over the network"

It has an Initiative Tab for running combat...
"The Initiative Tab is the heart of GMGens combat tracking system. The Initiative Tab aids in tracking initiative, hit point loss, spells in effect and more. Looking over the tab you will see a row of buttons across the top, these buttons relate to initiative control and manipulation. The pane in the middle of the tab is split in two. On the left side is a list of all characters involved in combat along with the status of certain vital statistics. On the right side is a collection of tabs which display character information in a stat block format as well as a tab displaying any events which may be in effect. Along the bottom of the tab is another set of buttons which perform functions related to the status of the characters"

-From link above

It's Java too... plugins, perhaps

Thoughts, comments...

[giliath]

I actually did some coding on PCGen a little while back (replaced the persistence layer with something more generic in preperation for a XML based dataset). The problem is that the application has grown from a pretty small code base into something that is absolutely huge. The basic design of the application is flawed in that it loads everything into first-class objects instead of leaving its data in a database or some other disk-stored device.

Last time I used it, it required a huge amount of memory and was dog slow. I am not sure of GMGen though, so that is definitely worth looking at, especially if their initiative tracking tool is decent.

Thanks for the info

[trevor]

It would be a very compelling story to integrate with these other tools. How cool would it be to give pcgen and others the ability to network across the internet by pickybacking on MapTool.

What we need to do in the not too distance future is create a network API for MapTool that we (or others) could start writing plugins for on the other tools.

[drswoboda]

I use PCGen at the table along with DM Genie at all my games. While I don't dispute anything giliath says about the programming of PCGen, I don't find it to be "dog slow" on my systems. It's no barn burner for sure, but if you have 500MB-1GB on at least a 14000MHz processor, it runs pretty well. Now in my case I only use the core books and one or two addons with a party of 6 and usually a few monsters, so mileage will very (though I really only use it for creation and the great character sheets and double up everything in DM Genie).

I think it is certainly worth investigating, and I hope it is There is a large user base for PCGen. Getting it to talk to DM Genie that would be pretty trick, but thats another discussion from elsewhere.

-David

[RPTroll]

I tried the latest version and it is pretty slow on my systems. I didn't care much for the UI but it is probably something you'd get used to after a while.

It does look like you could feed the characters from PCGen into maptool though.

[trevor]

It does look like you could feed the characters from PCGen into maptool though.

Which would be pretty nifty !

[Emryys]

I tried the latest version and it is pretty slow on my systems. I didn't care much for the UI but it is probably something you'd get used to after a while.

It does look like you could feed the characters from PCGen into maptool though.

I don't think you would want PCGen running at the same time, but the character file could be used by Maptool (or Chracter sheet tool ).
Gm Gen would be good to run with Maptool, but unfortunately it needs PCGen to run and is not a stand alone application

[trevor]

Hmmmm ....

[RPTroll]

PCGen and DMGen were both pretty clunky. Not 'clean' if you know what I mean. The reason I like http://www.roleplayershome.net/ and rptools is that the UI is easy to navigate and understand and they both run fast on my older hardware.

What I’m lacking now is a combat manager as discussed in other forum posts.

In my opinion, let others worry about coding D20 rules. Those rules change a lot from DM to DM and from version to version. If rptools can provide a framework for getting the data accessible from maptool I'll be happy.

Yes I'd like a character sheet tool but that tool doesn't need to do a lot other than share data with the DM and maptool. Allow the DMs to craft a character sheet to their liking. If you allow feeds from other tools like PCGen so much the better.

The RPTools suite is, in two words, elegant and powerful. They do exactly what needs doing without a lot of crap hanging off the sides. In every game I use almost all of the built in functionality of maptool. Do you know how rare that is in a tool set? Just look at all the crap Micro$oft piles into any application that I never use and never will.

So I like the fact that maptool doesn’t have built in character sheets since those sheets, by there nature, change a lot from game to game, version to version, and group to group. That’s one of the reasons I’m patiently waiting for scripting and custom fields on the tokens and why I hope that what ever character sheet tool looks like is simply an extension to that functionality. That way I, as either DM or Player, get to decide what I want to do with it.

‘Nuff said

[jay]

Yes I'd like a character sheet tool but that tool doesn't need to do a lot other than share data with the DM and maptool. Allow the DMs to craft a character sheet to their liking. If you allow feeds from other tools like PCGen so much the better.

If we allow the players to change state through the character sheet tool or macros to change the state would you want to be notified when that data changes? Would you need to know when a new token is created or a map is added?

I've been thinking about how the tools and macros will access the data created by others. I am thinking that it nees to be as generic as possible without making it too dificult to use. I know that we need to access the data from multiple tools and that the data has to be distributed to the GM and all the players. Are there any other requirements that you might want for this data repository? Do we need to restrict available data by role (GM vs. Player)? Should the data be restricted to simple values (String, integer, etc.) or do we need to include complex structures? I would think that simple data would be easier to access with macros, but maybe not.

I'm thinking that it can be something as simple as a Map that generates events when items are updated, added, or removed. We would allow simple types of data along with Map's and Lists of other simple values. This would provide a hierarchical structure to the data that we can access with the dotted method that was discussed elsewhere (i.e tokens.Yuridin.AC ). I'm worried about the complexities of providing internal data structures of one tool to the others since they change so frequently. It might also cause circular dependancies on the tools.

Thoughts?

[brisingre]

I don't much like pcgen. I think it is dog slow. I think you s=could do a quick job and do a customizable tool where you could upload image files and set various text boxes on them and save the result as a .bcs file or something. Then you could type things in these boxes and send it over maptool. It would be nice if it were even integrated in with maptool in a popup window and was saved with the campaign. Pcgen tried to be brutally clever and store all of the information from the books for you. All this does is slow you down. It is faster for me to roll up a charecter on paper, and this is one of the things, in addition to the bad programming you are talking about, that (I think) makes it so slow. ALso, I use a mixture of editions and a lot of books it doesn't support, which is a pain.

[jay]

I don't much like pcgen. I think it is dog slow. I think you s=could do a quick job and do a customizable tool where you could upload image files and set various text boxes on them and save the result as a .bcs file or something. Then you could type things in these boxes and send it over maptool. It would be nice if it were even integrated in with maptool in a popup window and was saved with the campaign. Pcgen tried to be brutally clever and store all of the information from the books for you. All this does is slow you down. It is faster for me to roll up a charecter on paper, and this is one of the things, in addition to the bad programming you are talking about, that (I think) makes it so slow. ALso, I use a mixture of editions and a lot of books it doesn't support, which is a pain.

Would you be willing to use a separate tool to create your forms? Map tool currently uses https://abeille.dev.java.net/ to generate its forms. This lets you generate a fairly complex form and then tie names to the you add fields. If the name of the field matches a field for the token then we would set the field with that value, which makes it almost perfect for our purposes. The tool is fairly easy to use once you get used to it, and it is the first visual design tool I've actually liked out of the box.

[trevor]

That's the plan, actually.

[brisingre]

yes, that would be fine.

[Emryys]

If we allow the players to change state through the character sheet tool or macros to change the state would you want to be notified when that data changes?

Maybe just a "Gorath CS Updated" appears in the chat area

Would you need to know when a new token is created or a map is added?

Not personally needed. I as the GM would want it set so only I could add these items

Do we need to restrict available data by role (GM vs. Player)?

I think this would be useful

Should the data be restricted to simple values (String, integer, etc.) or do we need to include complex structures?

I think it could start this way

Would you be willing to use a separate tool to create your forms?

The one you showed would be fine but for the uninclined it could hinder the use of the tools.
Either create "stock" sheets that could be tweaked or make a mini app to make them

Here is a link to the GRiP Character sheet design manual in pdf

Take a look at how GRiP's ICS tool designs sheets. It uses a kind of VB form creator. If you could incorporate this ability into the CSTool or as a stand alone, it may be more accessable to the "average" user...