Import PCGen characters

Discussion of initiative tool.

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mosat
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Import PCGen characters

Post by mosat »

I would find it useful if it were possible to import my PCGen characters into InitTool to save the time of typing in all that info.

I know it is not possible to simply import the character file since that does not contain all the needed info (the character needs to be loaded in PCGen before all it's final bonuses are calculated) but I think I know a way the data can be exported. PCGen exports to PDF, html and text formats, since it does text you can pretty much do any text based file format (XML, etc..). It also has the ability to export a part file with info for multiple character.

So if you were to design an intermediet file format for the needed data it would be a relativly simple task to create an output sheet which would export this out of PCGen (In fact I know enough to write one).

The data InitTool currently uses is minimal (Name, Player and init score, any more?) and so I'd think this would be fairly easy. What do you think?
~ Eddy Anthony (MoSaT)
~ PCGen Data, Docs & Tracker Chimp
~ Outputsheet Tamarin & Mac build guru

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jay
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Post by jay »

For this next release, you will be able to save encounters & groups as XML. Then it should be easy to set up an output format in PCGen to create these files.

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mosat
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Post by mosat »

Excellent! Do you have an ETA?

Once I can play with that I'll let you know what I come up with. We have an outputsheet for OpenRPG so I'm sure we could add something like this to our releases if it were agreable to you.
~ Eddy Anthony (MoSaT)
~ PCGen Data, Docs & Tracker Chimp
~ Outputsheet Tamarin & Mac build guru

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jay
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Post by jay »

It might take awhile, I'm also redoing all the init tool menus. But I can get you the XML structure that you can use as a modle to create your output sheet. I'll work on that next and see if I can get it done in the next day or so.

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Post by Fobbo »

Jay can you send that to me as well. I want to see if I can get the DM Genie output in that format.

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jay
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Post by jay »

Here is the XML for a group file containing a single group with a single combatant in that group. The elements from 'name' to 'token' are required to appear in the order shown. If you need to set the value of one of those fields to null, you can just add an empty tag (i.e. <player/>). The token in the example is a URL, but it can also be inlined by setting the type attribute of the token element to be "inline" and the value for the element to be a base 64 encoding of the image file. Eventually the XML will be contained in a zip file and the images can be packaged with it, but that is not ready yet. The elements starting with 'armorClass' and going to 'baseAttack' are the custom properties that are defined in the init tool settings. You can add as many of these as you want as long as they each have a unique name.

Code: Select all

<group-set>
  <game-name>Dungeons & Dragons</game-name>
  <groups>
    <group>
      <name>New Group</name>
      <combatants>
        <combatant>
          <name>Aboleth</name>
          <count>1</count>
          <init-modifier>1</init-modifier>
          <player>Jay</player>
          <type>Jay</type>
          <token type="url">http://www.wizards.com/dnd/images/MM35_gallery/MM35_PG8.jpg</token>
          <hitDice>8d8+40 (76 hp)</hitDice>
          <speed>10 ft. (2 squares), swim 60 ft.</speed>
          <armorClass>16 (-2 size, +1 Dex, +7 natural), touch 9, flat-footed 15</armorClass>
          <grapple>+22</grapple>
          <space>15 ft.</space>
          <reach>10 ft.</reach>
          <saves>Fort +7, Ref +3, Will +11</saves>
          <baseAttack>+6</baseAttack>
        </combatant>
      </combatants>
    </group>
  </groups>
</group-set>
If you have any questions, don't hesitate to ask!

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mosat
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Post by mosat »

Thanks Jay. Hopefully I'll have the output worked out by the time you have the tool set to use the format.
~ Eddy Anthony (MoSaT)
~ PCGen Data, Docs & Tracker Chimp
~ Outputsheet Tamarin & Mac build guru

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Post by mosat »

Thanks for your help earlier today Jay.

I've created two outputsheets for PCGen which will output to InitTools group file format. I've placed them in my gallery and they can be downloaded from there:

http://gallery.rptools.net/v/contrib/mo ... ellaneous/

Both sheets include most of the properties in the standard default game setting in build 16, the party sheet does not include attacks and only lists Listen, Spon and Search on the skills where as the single sheet does list attacks and a full skill list.

Once you grab these they need to go into the outputsheet folder in PCGen and then you need to Export to Text to select the sheets.

Once exported you can either change the extension to .rpgrp or select see all files in the open dialog box to select it.

So, anyone here use PCGen?
~ Eddy Anthony (MoSaT)
~ PCGen Data, Docs & Tracker Chimp
~ Outputsheet Tamarin & Mac build guru

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jay
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Post by jay »

Not any more. I loved it at first, then WotC made them stop shipping some of the files. It took awhile for CMP to get them back into circulation. By the time that happened I had switched to DMGenie.

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Post by dorpond »

mosat wrote:So, anyone here use PCGen?
All my datasets are E-tools. I used E-tools because I was first in line the day Fluid released it. It was nothing but a hell hole since then but I was already commited to it.

I tried downloading PCGEN a few times when my frustration ran high but I was not happy with a couple things relating to inventory/items but I can't remember what it was for the life of me. I am sure you guys have taken the product much further than my last testing. I will probably give it a try again now that I have an inside connection to help through the learning curve ;)

The real problem I am facing today though is the bye-bye to official WoTC Datasets. I would have liked to have grabbed a few Eberron sets and some new ones that weren't developed yet. :(

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Post by mosat »

Yeah, WotC really has it head up it's collective donkey. :evil:

I might have tried either of those programs but as a Mac user I can't.

PCGen has indeed made some great strides forward, we still have a massive list of things to do and we still have a lot of usibility issues to address. The main complaint is that it's slow, which I have to admit is the case. Depending on the age of your machine it can be a dog, it's near unsable on older machines.

Speed is one of the reasons I like InitTool, PCGen has an initiative tracker in it with more features and can leverage the fact that it has access to the complete character (so it can do attack, damage and save rolls with the correct bonuses), but loading up an encounter at the table takes alot of time.
~ Eddy Anthony (MoSaT)
~ PCGen Data, Docs & Tracker Chimp
~ Outputsheet Tamarin & Mac build guru

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Post by mosat »

I've uploaded revised versions of the sheets I created. I've managed to solve all the issues I could not find easy solutions to in my first pass. Now the party sheet outputs all the same info as the single character sheet.

Additionally PCGen lets you set a picture as the character portrait, I've managed to get these sheets to output it so that the portrait is exported to InitTool as the token. Every property which has data PCGen handles is now populated. It's looking pretty sweet!
~ Eddy Anthony (MoSaT)
~ PCGen Data, Docs & Tracker Chimp
~ Outputsheet Tamarin & Mac build guru

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Post by mosat »

Just a note to let you know that I've added the sheets to PCGen's SVN repository, they will be in our next release. I'm make an annoouncement on our boards at that time and again when you guys get to your 1.0 release. We'll see if we can herd some of our users your way :D

I also added the latest versions of these to my gallery. BTW I found I didn't have to use the .txt extention for the files at all, they work fine with .rpgrp on the end so now the output is exactly in your format.
~ Eddy Anthony (MoSaT)
~ PCGen Data, Docs & Tracker Chimp
~ Outputsheet Tamarin & Mac build guru

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Post by mosat »

I've updated the export sheets for PCGen and wanted to let you guys know what I did. The PCGen project is about a week and a half from releasing the production version of 5.12.0. I've started running a new campaign and I'm using InitTool, MapTool and PCGen along with PDF's to keep things pretty much paperless. InitTool is fantastic, I've come to reference it first when I need to look at a characters stat rather than the PDF, book or PCGen (which is too slow to use during a game). My one complaint is that the default D&D game setting properties is long and you do a lot of scrolling to see stuff lower down.

Thankfully InitTool can be customized. I've created a custom gamesetting and added the new properties to the export sheets. I've put these up in my gallery (with a sample export) in case anyone else might find it useful. Here's what I did, I've condensed some of the properties into one line, so things like saving throws and ability scores each have there own line. For the order of things I've followed the stat block format presented in the DMGII as closely as can be done within InitTool. It ends up being much shorter but I can still easily find my data.

I do have one feature request: It would be nice if long text strings could wrap to a new line rather than go off the page.

The files are in my gallery here. Included are the two updated output sheets, the sample export in InitTool group format and the game setting file named PCGen stat block. These are the sheets which will be shipping with our production release and just to be clear they still support the default D&D properties as well as the new ones I added. Let me know what you think, I'd be quite pleased if the game setting was deemed worthy to include in the release.

When do you expect the production release for InitTool will be announced?
~ Eddy Anthony (MoSaT)
~ PCGen Data, Docs & Tracker Chimp
~ Outputsheet Tamarin & Mac build guru

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Post by jay »

mosat wrote:I do have one feature request: It would be nice if long text strings could wrap to a new line rather than go off the page.
This has been requested frequently by many IT users. The problem is that it is not possible to determine which fields need to be wrapped in this way and which fields do not. I can make them all be wrapped text but then the index card becomes very long if there are a lot of custom properties and it makes it hard to find anything.

The first 1.1 release IT will allow user defined index cards that can be created specifically for the Game Settings that the GM is running. I will then be able to create and index card that is specific to the D&D settings file included with IT.
mosat wrote:Let me know what you think, I'd be quite pleased if the game setting was deemed worthy to include in the release.

When do you expect the production release for InitTool will be announced?
I expect the current RC build 23 to be the production release. The last couple of builds have been just bug fixes so it's probably too late to add your game settings file. We can add your changes into the 1.1 release however. The first 1.1 release of IT will start supporting macros so there will be a brand new game settings file shipped with it. We can start incorporating your ideas into that file right away.

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