Shadowrun 5 - importing Characters from Chummer 5a and framework expansion - A work in progress

[Felodin]

Hi,

first of all I want to thank a few people:
* Veggiesama for his great work at the SR4- and the resulting SR5 framework.
* Bengalelf for his expansion to this framework.
* Phergus for his great support, his patience and great code he provided me with. Without him this would still be a fantasy.
* A-r-c-h-o-n for his support at getting data from chummer. Without him I still would not know how to get anything from chummer.

When I started this I had the Idea of importing all my players characters from chummer5a files to my MapTool SR5 framework. I was naive to think that this would be something easy that someone else would have thought about and I just couldn't find it via google.

Placing my hope into some messages at the Chummer5a and MapTool discord I soon discovered that this is not the case. The people over there told me very kindly that this does not exist and if I wanted this to be a thing I would have to make it happen. I'm no coder and I have little experience in programming so I thought this is it. Just forget it. But A-r-c-h-o-n and Phergus both supported me so I kept going.

This is not done yet! But I reached a point where I think I might need some more help. As I said I have almost no experience in programming.

I will provide you with my goals, my data and my work so you can add some ideas.

First Steps:

The first step was to get the data out of chummer5a. This happens via an API A-r-c-h-o-n is working on. Questions about this can be answered seperately, so ask away if you want to put your own characters from chummer into MapTool tokens.

He provided me with the response_1559281833369.json files.

The content of this file was then placed in the notes of a Lib:Data token using the "Update Lib:Data"-macro or by hand.

To create a token for a player/npc you would then first use "Copy New-Character-Token"-macro to create a new copy of an existing template token.

Selecting the newly created token one could use "Load Chummer Data" to select a character from the Lib:Data and voila, you could have a lot of stuff put into the token. (Tanks again Phergus!)

Now what is missing:
* A way to insert pictures (the devs of MapTool are currently discussing options. A feature request has been placed.
* Processing the PQualities and NQualities correct so that you get a nice list in the token properties.
* Skill values should be imported into the token properties.
* Special Attributes like Essence are faulty to say at least.
* I need to find a place for gear and have to think about how I want this to be handled.

Side Steps:

While I was at this I realized that I'm not happy with the way spirits and sprites are handled. So I decided to add a summoning button for both of them. Using this macro would allow to "summon" (copy) a template ghost/spirit onto the current map. Using the "... Attribute-Input" macro you now can select the optional powers a spirit could have.

What is missing here is:
* To place the summoned spirit/sprite next to the summoner.


For anyone who wants to use this, participate in it or who is just curious: here you can find the campaign and the response file.

I hope you like what you find and maybe you can give me a hint about the missing feature.

Thank you for reading
Felodin

[Felodin]

HOW TO GET YOUR CHUMMER DATA INTO YOUR LIB:DATA!

Step 1: Install the latest Nightly.
Can be found here.

Step 2: Enable Plugins (experimental).

Spoiler

Step 4: Create Account.
Go to Options -> Plugins and create an account.
Enable SINners (Cloud).

Spoiler

Step 5: Load Character.

Step 6: Upload your Character.
Select SINners tab and upload.

Spoiler

Step 7: Add to Group.
Click "search Groups".
If this is your first upload I reccomend creating a new group.
If you allready have created a group you can search for it or select it under "My Data".
All Characters in this group will be available in MapTool later. So upload all the material you want into this group.
Use "Join Group" to add the character to the group.

Spoiler

Remenber your groups name, email-adress and language. You will need it later.
Don't set a password. It's not implemented yet.

Repeat with all your sources you want to have available in MapTool.

Step 8: Open MapTool and load my campaign file.
The link to the campaign file can be found in the first post.

Step 9: Load your content into Lib:Data.
Switch to map: "9999 - Base Framework".
Use the campaign macro "Update Lib:Data".
You will be asked for the name of your group, your language and your email.

Spoiler

Using passwords is not implemented yet. You could easily change the macro to contain all your information but I would not reccoment sharing a campaign containing this kind of data.

Step 10: Creating a new token.
At the moment this has to happen on the "9999 - Base Framework" map.
You can either drop a token onto the map, select it and run the "Load Chummer Data" macro or you can use the "Create New Chummer-Token" macro.
Using the later one will copy a template token and fill it with the selected characters data.