NPC Engineer

[Maasq]

Hiya, L.R., and thanks for the comments as always. To address a few of your points:

Tab stop order: I agree with you that the tab order is important, and I've been working to ensure the order will match the order of attributes in the statblock of the NPCs in the Monsters Manual etc. This is also the order that Par5e expects to find the info. The slight deviation is when there is extra info such as 'gender' - this will follow on from 'name' as you'd expect by its position on the screen. Continuing with that, when you get to the end of 'speeds' it'll jump to 'ability scores' and 'saving throws, and only then return to 'senses'. Again, this is to match the order of input of an NPC from any 5E source.

Monster Maker skips Senses, Skills, and Languages to go directly to Damage Modification. To get back to Senses, Skills, and Languages, one has to tab all the way through the interface.

Resistances will live on a separate tab header in NPC Engineer, but they should come before senses and languages (not skills though!) That's the order WotC set with the MM and published adventures.

Assignment of ability scores is perhaps the top priority. Without ability scores and their corresponding ability score modifiers, one has to return to the hit points section in Monster Maker to generate hit points with the Constitution ability modifier added. Why not simply bypass the hit point generation, go directly to the ability scores so those can be assigned, then bounce to the hit point generation afterward?

As above, I'll be sticking to the order set by the WotC published materials. Further, I am not intending (at this point) to be calculating much - NPC Engineer is primarily a text entering thingy for parsing. Maybe down the line, but the programs that I have used that do this usually have me grinding my teeth as something gets added twice or not at all. At the moment, everything will be entered other than ability score modifiers.

I've noticed that cells that have both the up and down arrows to change values disallow using the left arrow key to return to them. In other words, I can go back to a cell using left arrow key only if those up and down arrows are absent in the antecedent cell. It may be a good idea to design the interface so that it uses up and down arrows only when necessary.

This took me ages to reproduce mainly because you can't do it at all in NPC Engineer yet; I had to faff about with Monster Maker to see this behaviour! The behaviour you are describing, as far as I can see, is a Windows behaviour, and a logical one too. Your 'left arrow goes back a tab stop' only happens if your focus is on a button; if your focus is on any sort of text box then left arrow moves the caret left through the text and stops at the beginning of the box. It has nothing to do with the previous control being a spinner. This will be the same in NPC Engineer as it is just using standard Windows controls as far as I can tell - certainly they are not something I am drawing and coding from scratch. All is not lost though - the actual method for moving back through tab stops is <SHIFT><TAB> and this works in every Windows program.

My only concern with NPC Engineer is its multitab configuration, i.e., "Base Stats," "Resistances," etc. I like that Monster Maker has everything on one page. Does one have to use a mouse to move from tab to tab in NPC Engineer? If so, that may slow things down. If possible, it may be helpful to code in an AutoHotkey that moves from category to category.

The multitab layout does indeed take a place on the tab-stop order. It is first, before even 'NPC Name'. a quick <SHIFT><TAB> would put you on to it and then use left and right arrows to select tabs. a hotkey for each tab is a good idea, though, and the function keys would be the very fellows for that job. Good suggestion!

Hope this helps

Maasq

[Maasq]

Nice work. The unique bit is intriguing since I could see that being useful for creating a beast which didn't have a give away name such as Goblin; unless I'm misunderstanding the point of that box.

Thanks, Zacch.

The 'unique' identifier is still a muddle in my head. I think there are a few areas it could be useful, but I don't think I'll know exactly until I get to that part of the coding. I am very much open to suggestions along the lines you pointed out. So here are my musings - feel free to chime in on any or all!

1. My original plan was to distinguish 'Tarrasque' from 'goblin'. A unique beast would use 'the tarrasque...' instead of 'a goblin...' or 'goblins...' This was of course scotched by the fact that the 5E style guide has every monster referred to as 'the goblin...'

2. Named NPCs - so Zacchaeus the Hideous, feared chief of the kilted goblins of the north. Originally, I thought of the text throughout reading 'Zacchaeus.....' rather than the full name '...the Hideous' appearing each time. But I think I have superseded this with the addition of the 'name' toggle to do the same thing.

Basically, the combination of these two boxes and gender should lead to more easily read texts automatically. The more I think about it, the more I feel either 'unique' or 'name' might leave the party early, but it isn't a big change if I decide to do it later on.

[Zacchaeus]

Yeah it was number 2 I was thinking of. Any easy way to create a name for the NPC that din't give away the fact that it was a particular type.

[L. R. Ballard]

Hiya, L.R., and thanks for the comments as always. To address a few of your points:

Hi, Maasq. Thanks for the reply.

Tab stop order: I agree with you that the tab order is important, and I've been working to ensure the order will match the order of attributes in the statblock of the
NPCs in the Monsters Manual etc. This is also the order that Par5e expects to find the info. The slight deviation is when there is extra info such as 'gender' - this will follow on from 'name' as you'd expect by its position on the screen. Continuing with that, when you get to the end of 'speeds' it'll jump to 'ability scores' and 'saving throws, and only then return to 'senses'. Again, this is to match the order of input of an NPC from any 5E source.

Resistances will live on a separate tab header in NPC Engineer, but they should come before senses and languages (not skills though!) That's the order WotC set with the MM and published adventures. As above, I'll be sticking to the order set by the WotC published materials.

Hmm. The category "hit points" comes before "ability scores" in official WotC releases. It still looks like I'd be going backwards in the NPC Engineer. Also, I like that Monster Maker calculates hit point values. Otherwise, I have to keep asking Alexa things like "Alexa, what's 4.5 x 5 + 10?"

. . . the programs that I have used that do this [automatically calculate] usually have me grinding my teeth as something gets added twice or not at all. At the moment, everything will be entered other than ability score modifiers.

1. Monster Maker yields values with teeth-grinding calculation errors. For example, automatic calculations of spell save DCs for divine spellcasters like the priest (MM 5e, 348) do not add the proficiency bonus, but the automatic calculations for arcane spellcasters like the archmage (MM 5e, 342) do add the proficiency bonus to spell save DCs.

2. Monster Maker is inconsistent about entering the proficiency bonus to passive Perception.

So, I see why a program might prefer manual data entry. That said, manually calculating values slowed me down when I was working in Notepad++ only. I'll have to see if NPC Engineer leads to a gain of time or if it's quicker to use AutoHotkey to fix the erroneous stats in Monster Maker outputs.

The behaviour you are describing, as far as I can see, is a Windows behaviour, and a logical one too. . . . All is not lost though - the actual method for moving back through tab stops is <SHIFT><TAB> and this works in every Windows program.

Excellent, thanks for the shortcut. My Windows use is untrained, so I didn't know that. I tested out "SHIFT" "TAB" in Monster Maker, and its works. That's as handy as when a student advised me in class one day that "F5" makes a PowerPoint go full screen. It's like learning that "CTRL" "ALT" and "-" on the number pad makes a nonbreaking em-dash. That's useful indeed. Thanks again.

a hotkey for each tab is a good idea, though, and the function keys would be the very fellows for that job. Good suggestion!

That hotkey will speed up data entry between and among tabbed categories.

Hope this helps

Maasq

Yes, it does. Thanks, as always.

[L. R. Ballard]

1. Monster Maker yields values with teeth-grinding calculation errors. For example, automatic calculations of spell save DCs for divine spellcasters like the priest (MM 5e, 348) do not add the proficiency bonus, but the automatic calculations for arcane spellcasters like the archmage (MM 5e, 342) do add the proficiency bonus to spell save DCs.

Correction: I just caught an error in my data entry for the priest template. In the "Spellcasting" dialog box, I'd selected "Intelligence" as the spellcasting ability. After I changed that to "Wisdom," the priest's spell save DC began to calculate correctly. I've yet to test the correction on all the NPCs I made, but that's one of the tasks for the second edit of the FRE1 NPCs, which I'm working on now.

[kp9911]

This is the layout I would be using. However its not per say a creator since it acts as a transporter of completed information.
https://imgur.com/a/SnxeE

[Maasq]

The image link looks broken, KP?

[kp9911]

Fixed.

[Maasq]

Cool.

I was having misgivings about having all the spellcasting on one tab - I was worried I may not have space. I see you have split innate and spellcasting to 2 tabs - I feel I might just copy that idea

*cough* in the interests of having a somewhat unified user experience for people who download both our applications *cough* and not because I am a programming magpie stealing shiny ideas

In the interests of a swap though - here's an idea that you might find useful. I am going to include the option to tag an image file and a token file anywhere on your hard drive, and it'll copy it to the correct directory and rename it properly for the current NPC, ready for parsing. It's such a seemingly simple thing, and it came to me whilst I was doing a book of 80 monsters. Renaming all the pictures and tokens annoyed me greatly!

Maasq

[L. R. Ballard]

Hey Maasq!

I finally downloaded v.0.2.1 and tested it yesterday. I copied three different NPC stat blocks from Monster Maker, and your script reproduced each of them in a perfectly parsable format.

The new save feature you're building is awesome. I copied some stat blocks to the clipboard from Notepad++ that were made without Monster Maker. Thus, those stat blocks didn't have an original Monster Maker save file. But I was able to create an XML version of the stat block using your script. After the save file appeared on my desktop, it only then dawned on me that the XML format is a PC import format.

I used your tool to make a save copy of the NPC version of Dove Falconhand in XML format. Then I imported her NPC data to the PCs section. The save file imported her class, level, ability scores, and most abilities into a PC card.

Clearly, you've taken the first step toward converting an NPC stat card into a PC character record without users having to do data entry. I look forward to your next update.

Best,
LRB