Trying init tool out

Discussion of initiative tool.

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voodoo
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Trying init tool out

Post by voodoo »

I've spent some time with this tool and found it easier to use than I remembered (or I just had more time, finding how to create groups is not that user-friendly).
It looks like a useful tool but two things were a little bothersome to me

1) when you add a combatant from init tool to maptool (my principal interst in the app), the combatant disappears from its group, so I have to create it all over again in init tool if I want to reuse it (and let's face it, I just can't kill off all the PCs every time I open a new session in maptool). I'm sure there must be a way around it but I just can't figure out why by default the combatants disappears from init tool when I put it in maptool...

2) more minor but still a pain: every time I want to add a new face to my combatant, the app opens "my documents". Having been burnt a few too many time by impromptu OS crash (guess which one I'm using), I got used to putting everything that I need everywhere but in "my document" (and more specifically anywhere but on my OS partition). And since my tokens are hidden far in my directory tree, it is a pain to click again and again to get there every time. I know I could just move my token file, but I'd like the app to just open the last opened directory...

Still, I've not been using it for real combat (still) but it looks like an elegant alternative to DM genie (which has its few bugs). I'm really looking forward to total maptool-init tool communication

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jay
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Re: Trying init tool out

Post by jay »

voodoo wrote:I've spent some time with this tool and found it easier to use than I remembered (or I just had more time, finding how to create groups is not that user-friendly).
I agree that it is hard to find. Could we put an icon on a toolbar or something like that to make it a little more obvious and easier to get to?
voodoo wrote:1) when you add a combatant from init tool to maptool (my principal interst in the app), the combatant disappears from its group, so I have to create it all over again in init tool if I want to reuse it (and let's face it, I just can't kill off all the PCs every time I open a new session in maptool). I'm sure there must be a way around it but I just can't figure out why by default the combatants disappears from init tool when I put it in maptool...
This is a windows thing (did I guess right?). The default operation is a move operation. If you press the ctrl key before you drop the item it will do a copy instead. There is another thread 'Dragging combatant removes entry' that talks about how I was going to fix that problem. It boils down to only doing move actions inside of IT. Going from one tool to another (MT, IT, or Group Tool) will be a copy action.
voodoo wrote:2) more minor but still a pain: every time I want to add a new face to my combatant, the app opens "my documents". Having been burnt a few too many time by impromptu OS crash (guess which one I'm using), I got used to putting everything that I need everywhere but in "my document" (and more specifically anywhere but on my OS partition). And since my tokens are hidden far in my directory tree, it is a pain to click again and again to get there every time. I know I could just move my token file, but I'd like the app to just open the last opened directory...
I think I've fixed that bug, but I will check and make sure. It should return to the last directory that you used to open or save anything in IT or GT.
voodoo wrote:Still, I've not been using it for real combat (still) but it looks like an elegant alternative to DM genie (which has its few bugs). I'm really looking forward to total maptool-init tool communication
Intertool communication is going to make it into the next versions of the tools(v1.3 of MT and v1.1 of IT). It is too close to a release date for each to make a big change in the functionality.

Thank you for the feedback! I really appreciate it.

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Re: Trying init tool out

Post by Phergus »

voodoo wrote:2) more minor but still a pain: every time I want to add a new face to my combatant, the app opens "my documents". Having been burnt a few too many time by impromptu OS crash (guess which one I'm using), I got used to putting everything that I need everywhere but in "my document" (and more specifically anywhere but on my OS partition).
Brief off-topic excursion:

A little know trick to make that less painful is to relocate your "My Documents" directory to where you want it to be.

So if you want to keep all your docs on different partition or just in a different easier-to-locate directory. Right click on the My Documents folder on your desktop or in a an Explorer window and select Properties. It should open up a dialog on the Target tab. Here you can pick exactly where your My Docs should be placed.

WARNING! Do not pick a folder that has existing files! Windows will happily, and without warning, delete everything in that location when it relocates your My Documents folder.

Instead, if you have existing files that you want in My Docs after the move, rename the existing folder with your files. Then do the relocate of My Docs to the location with the directory name you want. Then do a quicky and easy move by dragging the files from the renamed directory to the new, easy to find, My Documents directory.

Now all those many, many annoying programs that default to My Documents will go exactly where you want them to.

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voodoo
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Post by voodoo »

Thanks for the tip!
I thought that even if I moved the "my documents" directory to someplace else, windows would still go to the original place to look for it.
It will make me less defiant toward "my documents".
Thanks again!

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voodoo
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Re: Trying init tool out

Post by voodoo »

jay wrote:
voodoo wrote:I've spent some time with this tool and found it easier to use than I remembered (or I just had more time, finding how to create groups is not that user-friendly).
I agree that it is hard to find. Could we put an icon on a toolbar or something like that to make it a little more obvious and easier to get to?/quote]
I think that would be a great idea. Looking around in menus is not that difficult but an icon would be easier.
On a more general level, I think what would make init tool much more user-friendly (and dumb user-friendly) would be to have a window on the left (à la maptool) where you could see all your groups, that you could drag and drop to the main encounter window.
jay wrote:
voodoo wrote:1) when you add a combatant from init tool to maptool (my principal interst in the app), the combatant disappears from its group, so I have to create it all over again in init tool if I want to reuse it (and let's face it, I just can't kill off all the PCs every time I open a new session in maptool). I'm sure there must be a way around it but I just can't figure out why by default the combatants disappears from init tool when I put it in maptool...
This is a windows thing (did I guess right?). The default operation is a move operation. If you press the ctrl key before you drop the item it will do a copy instead. There is another thread 'Dragging combatant removes entry' that talks about how I was going to fix that problem. It boils down to only doing move actions inside of IT. Going from one tool to another (MT, IT, or Group Tool) will be a copy action.
I just saw this this morning.
I should have guessed it.
So that means that you can multiple copy a combatant into maptool, right?
It will be great for my combats.
BTW, can you copy a combatant inside a group or encounter? I mean, you make one orc, so that you can just copy it to get orc #1, orc #2...
jay wrote:Thank you for the feedback! I really appreciate it.
Like all RPtools, the more I use it, the more I like it!
And once again, I am impressed by the quality and the rapidity of the level of support you can get in this community (even solved my "my documents" problems).
Thanks everybody.

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Re: Trying init tool out

Post by Phergus »

voodoo wrote:BTW, can you copy a combatant inside a group or encounter? I mean, you make one orc, so that you can just copy it to get orc #1, orc #2...
Yes, you can. You can also enter a number into the count field when you add the combatant to get more than one of them.

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jay
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Re: Trying init tool out

Post by jay »

voodoo wrote:So that means that you can multiple copy a combatant into maptool, right?
It will be great for my combats.
BTW, can you copy a combatant inside a group or encounter? I mean, you make one orc, so that you can just copy it to get orc #1, orc #2...
You can drag from either an encounter or from a group to MT or to each other. And as Pherguse pointed out when you drag from a group, IT or MT will create the number of combatants in the count column of the table. It will number the new combatants for you so that there are no duplicate names.

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jay
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Re: Trying init tool out

Post by jay »

voodoo wrote:1) when you add a combatant from init tool to maptool (my principal interst in the app), the combatant disappears from its group, so I have to create it all over again in init tool if I want to reuse it (and let's face it, I just can't kill off all the PCs every time I open a new session in maptool). I'm sure there must be a way around it but I just can't figure out why by default the combatants disappears from init tool when I put it in maptool...

2) more minor but still a pain: every time I want to add a new face to my combatant, the app opens "my documents". Having been burnt a few too many time by impromptu OS crash (guess which one I'm using), I got used to putting everything that I need everywhere but in "my document" (and more specifically anywhere but on my OS partition). And since my tokens are hidden far in my directory tree, it is a pain to click again and again to get there every time. I know I could just move my token file, but I'd like the app to just open the last opened directory...
Both of these are fixed in build 14.
voodoo wrote:I think that would be a great idea. Looking around in menus is not that difficult but an icon would be easier.
On a more general level, I think what would make init tool much more user-friendly (and dumb user-friendly) would be to have a window on the left (à la maptool) where you could see all your groups, that you could drag and drop to the main encounter window.
I've opened a tracker for this.

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jay
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Re: Trying init tool out

Post by jay »

voodoo wrote:
jay wrote:
voodoo wrote:I've spent some time with this tool and found it easier to use than I remembered (or I just had more time, finding how to create groups is not that user-friendly).
I agree that it is hard to find. Could we put an icon on a toolbar or something like that to make it a little more obvious and easier to get to
I think that would be a great idea. Looking around in menus is not that difficult but an icon would be easier.
I added the icon to the main toolbar, it will be in build 18.
voodoo wrote:On a more general level, I think what would make init tool much more user-friendly (and dumb user-friendly) would be to have a window on the left (à la maptool) where you could see all your groups, that you could drag and drop to the main encounter window.
I've added a tracke for this. I'm a little worried about how complicated the menu might get, but it might not be too bad.

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