Updates to Game Settings File Editor

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jay
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Updates to Game Settings File Editor

Post by jay »

I've got the game settings file editor working again after a long time. I'm not ready to publish it, but you can get it from SVN and run it in dev mode. The following things are currently working:
  • Open any existing settings file
  • Create a new settings file
  • Save As the settings file that is being edited. No Save right now, don't want to overwrite any files that may have been working :)
  • The main set of custom properties for a combatant can be edited. Missing some things here:
    • Non-cacheable scripts
    • Default value for a property
    • List type data descriptor can't be set
    • Setting the slot data type
    • Can't create or edit the property sets that can be extended by MAP (Folder) properties. If the a settings file that has them is loaded, they are available to use only
  • Char tool settings & scripts
  • Init tool settings & scripts
  • Init tool phases & phase scripts
  • Init tool combatant categories
  • Init tool timer types
  • Init tool wait states
  • Image files that are used by the scripts or forms can be added
  • Form files for character sheets and scripts can be added
  • Java classes providing more complicated support can be added
  • Named script files that contain functions available to other scripts can be added, but only JavaScript files are supported by the editor
  • Data Type editor allows the database records to be created/edited/deleted, but it doesn't support creating a new data type or updating the structure of an existing one. The only way to get data types in there is to import a .rpdat file or for it to be included in the loaded settings file.
If anybody is set up to download the source and would like to try it out, it has enough functionality to be somewhat useful. Post bugs, missing things, ideas for improvements and anything else you want to talk about here.

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jfrazierjr
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Re: Updates to Game Settings File Editor

Post by jfrazierjr »

Ok... my first thought here is that the interface is WAY to much going on. This either needs some very detailed documentation for step by step or more of a wizard type interface.

I would not mind seeing applications, if you think that might help alleviate some of the complexity issue. Say one for the "common" elements to both CT/IT such as properties and form files. And then a second/third one for tool specific additions. Or as noted, more of a wizard style interface. The issue is that the way the layout is presented, you have no idea what to do "first". Add to that the lack of docs and tons of widgets and it just seems overwhelming. Also, I would leave the Class Files out totally except for perhaps as a menu item that launches a new window or even some other means. It's just going to confuse most people unless they are developers and hopefully won't be needed "that" much...

I have not really had a chance to dive into doing any modifications yet, so these are just initial thoughts.
I save all my Campaign Files to DropBox. Not only can I access a campaign file from pretty much any OS that will run Maptool(Win,OSX, linux), but each file is versioned, so if something goes crazy wild, I can always roll back to a previous version of the same file.

Get your Dropbox 2GB via my referral link, and as a bonus, I get an extra 250 MB of space. Even if you don't don't use my link, I still enthusiastically recommend Dropbox..

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Re: Updates to Game Settings File Editor

Post by jay »

That's easy enough to fix, I'll add a view menu to turn the tabs on and off.

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Re: Updates to Game Settings File Editor

Post by jay »

OK, added a view menu so that you can turn on/off all of the tabs one at a time or in sets. By default it is only showing the CT related tabs.

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Re: Updates to Game Settings File Editor

Post by jay »

Checked another set of updates to the editor:
  • Advance/Simple mode for custom properties
  • Advanced mode now allows property sets for extension to be created.
  • Creation and editing of RPData types.
  • Validated entered scripts
  • Support for script languages in the UI instead of in the text.
  • Added slot data type support
  • Added script cacheable support
  • Help for custom data types editor, both for simple and advanced mode.
  • Support for editing change event scripts
  • Added accelerators to many of the fields on the property editor in both, simple, advanced and for editing the RPData properties.
  • Added default value for properties
  • Font file support
Coming along nicely now. Most of it should be useable. Biggest thing that needs to be done is testing. Lots of testing. We're off of our D&D break, so I'll not get to work much on it for awhile, but I'll try to get some more testing done. If anybody gives it a try, tell me how it is coming along and what is missing.

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Re: Updates to Game Settings File Editor

Post by jay »

Note to reviewers: I'm especially interested in making this editor easier to use. There is just so much stuff in the game settings file that looking at all of it at once is a little overwhelming. If you have any suggestions, post them here.

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Re: Updates to Game Settings File Editor

Post by jfrazierjr »

jay wrote:Note to reviewers: I'm especially interested in making this editor easier to use. There is just so much stuff in the game settings file that looking at all of it at once is a little overwhelming. If you have any suggestions, post them here.
I am going on vacation over the weekend with little internet access, so I "HOPE" to be able to spend some time looking at this. I know we have already discussed the whole "to many tabs thing", but what I would like to see(assuming you have not already done this) is to have the "default" set up have no specific mention of CT/IT and have the user enter all the common data. Then choose the tool specific areas to edit. One possible approach is to have a "wizard" interface:
  • Open Game file(or create new)
  • Tabbed interface with tabs for each "common" item(as in common to both tools)
  • Click "Next"(or possibly one button at the bottom for each tool such as "Edit CT configuration" and "Edit IT configuration" as individual buttons) This would SAVE the existing changes(or prompt to save if a new game settings file)
  • Now show and edit the game specific Tool's configuration tabs
As we discussed previously, advanced options should be in a menu that is tool specific AND that menu item should be greyed out until you have gotten far enough into the process to make it useful. So, no need to have the Custom UI classes thing for CT available if the settings file does not have the basic CT data.

Another thing that would be REALLY nice in the long run for the CT section would be something like a "workflow" editor that can to some degree abstract the creation of a CT character builder wizard. Just a quick way to set up say 5 "screens" in a wizard tied to a kind of transient value that is set to indicate it's time to move to the next "screen". A long term option might also allow for branching logic within the wizard and perhaps even multiple wizards(one wizard if you are creating a New Character vs a different if you are updating an existing Character)

Anyway... lots of food for thought.
I save all my Campaign Files to DropBox. Not only can I access a campaign file from pretty much any OS that will run Maptool(Win,OSX, linux), but each file is versioned, so if something goes crazy wild, I can always roll back to a previous version of the same file.

Get your Dropbox 2GB via my referral link, and as a bonus, I get an extra 250 MB of space. Even if you don't don't use my link, I still enthusiastically recommend Dropbox..

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Re: Updates to Game Settings File Editor

Post by jay »

jfrazierjr wrote:I know we have already discussed the whole "to many tabs thing", but what I would like to see(assuming you have not already done this) is to have the "default" set up have no specific mention of CT/IT and have the user enter all the common data. Then choose the tool specific areas to edit.
Right now you get to choose which tabs are available on an individual basis, and there are a couple of predefined sets of tabs (All, CT, IT, Files & Database). CT is the default set (Props, CT Misc, image files and form files) of tabs. Choosing the default set, or reconfiguring existing sets, adding more sets, or changing tab orders is all very easy to do. Check the view menu, tell me what you would like to see there and we'll figure it out.
jfrazierjr wrote:One possible approach is to have a "wizard" interface:
  • Open Game file(or create new)
  • Tabbed interface with tabs for each "common" item(as in common to both tools)
  • Click "Next"(or possibly one button at the bottom for each tool such as "Edit CT configuration" and "Edit IT configuration" as individual buttons) This would SAVE the existing changes(or prompt to save if a new game settings file)
  • Now show and edit the game specific Tool's configuration tabs
...

Another thing that would be REALLY nice in the long run for the CT section would be something like a "workflow" editor that can to some degree abstract the creation of a CT character builder wizard. Just a quick way to set up say 5 "screens" in a wizard tied to a kind of transient value that is set to indicate it's time to move to the next "screen". A long term option might also allow for branching logic within the wizard and perhaps even multiple wizards(one wizard if you are creating a New Character vs a different if you are updating an existing Character)
Here is where I think the big advances in useability can be found. But, I don't think we can use existing tabs in the wizards. The tabs provide too many options for anybody not familiar with what's going on. They will need to be designed specifically for the wizard. Maybe start with an option screen asking what you need to do. Questions like
  • Do you need the default properties? (stuff included in a base character like name, token, initiative modifier, etc)
  • Do you need to roll initiative?
  • Do you need to handle ties in initiative? (as a sub question)
  • Do you have specific Abeille forms to use?
  • Do you have images in your forms?
This isn't a complete list, but its a good place to start. Then pages associated with each question answered yes are displayed. I think this is what that second paragraph is talking about, and it is a good idea. The hard part is figuring out a good set of questions.
jfrazierjr wrote:As we discussed previously, advanced options should be in a menu that is tool specific AND that menu item should be greyed out until you have gotten far enough into the process to make it useful. So, no need to have the Custom UI classes thing for CT available if the settings file does not have the basic CT data.
The thing is, there isn't anything technically required for CT, but it doesn't make a lot of sense to not have custom properties for it. However, nothing else is really needed as there are defaults for all of them. There are a couple more things required for IT, but not much. The ones I can remember off the top of my head are scripts for rolling the initiative and for resolving ties in initiative. But really. that's all that's required. The rest of the things on the tabs are just extra support for scripts and such.

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Re: Updates to Game Settings File Editor

Post by jay »

Joe suggested that I place the bleeding edge Initiative Tool zip file in a place where everybody can get it. Here it is. Just unzip it and run it like you would any normal release of IT.

You can now try out the new game settings editor and send me any feedback.

This IT also has the statistics gathering support and game file settings import support. You can get statistics by choosing the Collect Encounter Statistics on the Tools -> Options dialog. Just add some combatants and have them go through a combat. If you want to get damage statistics too you can use this game settings file for testing. Now, every time you assign damage to a combatant the currently active player gets recorded as doing damage to it. Be sure to start the encounter from the Actions menu when starting and end the encounter when you want to see the statistics. Search for a file called EventStatisticsxxx.csv (the xxx is a large random number) in your temp directory for the statistics.

If you have access to the DDI monster builder you can now import it's export files into the combatants. The posted game file settings now has a custom importer for those .monster files in the menus at File -> Game Imports -> Import Monster File. After selecting the exported file you will find the monster in lookup table used when creating encounters (File -> New -> Combatants, then press the Lookup... button). The monster will be the ones without a token.

If you find any bugs or can think of any improvements, just attach them to this thread.

Thanks for taking a look!

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Re: Updates to Game Settings File Editor

Post by jay »

New set of updates to IT, mainly in support of WotBS source file and supporting damage statistics.

Here's the new file links:
Last edited by jay on Wed Aug 08, 2012 10:31 pm, edited 1 time in total.

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Re: Updates to Game Settings File Editor

Post by jfrazierjr »

Thanks Jay! I keep meaning to get some time, but stupid crap always seems to come up that kills my "focus" time(ie, if I can't block off a certain amount of time, it's fairly useless since it takes so much time to get "going")
I save all my Campaign Files to DropBox. Not only can I access a campaign file from pretty much any OS that will run Maptool(Win,OSX, linux), but each file is versioned, so if something goes crazy wild, I can always roll back to a previous version of the same file.

Get your Dropbox 2GB via my referral link, and as a bonus, I get an extra 250 MB of space. Even if you don't don't use my link, I still enthusiastically recommend Dropbox..

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Re: Updates to Game Settings File Editor

Post by Zandorgard »

Greetings!

Is this still working? I am currently trying to edit some settings, but i always get an error when saving using the version on this post. =(

"Problem writing database d20Fantasy.itCombatantLookup to path 'poperty/database/itCombatantLookup.rpdat."

Is there no way to save the settings? I wanted to add some stuff, if possible.

Well, thanks in advance.

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jay
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Re: Updates to Game Settings File Editor

Post by jay »

I've not worked on it in a loooong time. The only way to do an edit now is to edit the files by hand. There are som Adopters *** sticky threads in the CT thread that tell you how to do that.

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Re: Updates to Game Settings File Editor

Post by Zandorgard »

I understand.

Thanks a lot anyway! ^^ Glad to get an answer, i wasn´t sure if you would answer at all.

I figured how to do what you said, so i´ve been doing that.

I use this tool A LOT on my table top games, it does help a ton on the speed of combat. I´ve been DMing a campaign for about 2 years now and i can´t thank you enough for this tool.

Awesome job. Granted it has some flaws, but even so, awesome tool indeed. The best on my book.

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Re: Updates to Game Settings File Editor

Post by jay »

Thanks. I still use it off and on too. I've got a version that will time user actions and keep track of their damage values and show it all in a report at the end of the combat. Something they suggested in a Faster Combat course I took from Johnn Four. That helped me make combat faster.

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