PDA

View Full Version : And now for some new 4E NPC Stat Blocks...



Zeus
April 1st, 2010, 22:44
NEW VERSION AVAILABLE: (v1.4) is now available for download. See last post for update notes.

A little later than I anticipated but as promised I've uploaded and made available the latest version (v0.5b) of my Personalities extension for 4E. The extension, whilst having been tested against MM1, MM2, DMG, DMG2 and a sample of other 4E rulebooks and supplements including Dungeon magazine, is still under development and being tweaked. This due to the amount (and variance) of published NPC data, it's therefore best to consider this version an extended beta.

Please post back comments and feel free to feedback on anything you feel isn't working as it should be or could be done better. Lastly those of you who have 4E modules which have been created using Tenian's 4E Parser tool, please note the important note section below.

4E Personalities

Introduces new 4E style window skins for Personalities - NPCs (MM3 style stat blocks), Traps (DMG2 style stat blocks) and Vehicles (AV style stat blocks).


Replaces the Adventure and Reference Class Personalities windowclasses with new 4E stat block style
and layout. The skins are based on the latest available information from WotC and follow the styles
of DMG2 for Traps, AV for Vehicles and the soon to be released MM3 for NPCs.
Supports MM1 and MM2 shortdescription formats for NPCs ensuring backwards compatibility with existing
4E compatible modules.
Supports AV shortdescription formats for Vehicles ensuring backwards compatibility with existing
4E compatible modules.
Supports DMG and DMG2 shortdescription formats for Traps *** see IMPORTANT NOTE


https://farm2.static.flickr.com/1099/4551452021_f0f0998fc4.jpg (https://farm2.static.flickr.com/1099/4551452021_3a6a9a78e5_o.jpg)

IMPORTANT NOTE


Existing NPCs module data (using MM1 and MM2 formats) is fully compatible. No changes are required.
Existing Trap module data requires reparsing using version v4.0.66 or higher of Tenian's 4EParser tool.
Existing Vehicle module data is fully compatible. No changes are required.


Note: Please ensure you backup your campaign files before you use. Please also read the readme.txt file before using.

Download from my FGII 4E Resources (https://zgp.eugenez.net/index.html) page.

Enjoy!

DrZ.

Czarisyn
April 1st, 2010, 22:45
How do you make those tokens? I've got the minis-to-token ones but I rather have those

Zeus
April 1st, 2010, 22:52
Very simple really. I use the stock images provided in the MM and MM2 or any other source books I source the NPC from.

Once I have the JPEG images, I use a Photoshop CS4 Action which produces the disc based counters.

The Action effectively crops the image to squarish dimensions, creates a disc based cutout and gold border, adds a few effects and then masks outs the non-disc part of the image. Finally it creates 50x50,100x100 and 150x150 pixel size versions and saves these as transparent background PNG-8 files.

I then use a batch process on a whole subfolder of images, eg. MM2.

Each token comes out at about 8-10KB in size.

Czarisyn
April 1st, 2010, 23:09
Ah, too bad you don't have a template for GIMP... ;) otherwise I'd switch

EugeneZ
April 2nd, 2010, 00:12
DrZeuss, like many of your projects, I am looking forward to this one. Looks awesome.

madman
April 2nd, 2010, 14:02
here are a couple of programs(free) that do a good job of tokens like that.
check them out.

https://www.rptools.net/index.php?page=downloads#TokenTool

and

https://www.kloogeinc.com/download.shtml Demo

both work well

Czarisyn
April 2nd, 2010, 14:46
yea I thought about using my licensed copy of Klooge for just the token maker. Might still do it.

DNH
April 2nd, 2010, 17:19
tokentool really is the best for making tokens. so simple and powerful. it's a tool made for that one job. i made some square borders that are simple colour-coded (red=foe, etc) borders and i get some really cool tokens. this, chiefly through using the MM pics, as DrZ suggests.

Robbo
April 2nd, 2010, 18:09
Wow, I'm really looking forward to these npc stat blocks. It's like reading them in their native tongue.

Czarisyn
April 5th, 2010, 22:03
Well, I used TokenTool to do mine, it was far better than Klooge's due to the fact that I could re-size on the spot. I did both Monster Manuals for a total of 618 tokens now.

Thought about doing portraits now, going through all the books I have...

Thanks for the advice

Czarisyn
April 5th, 2010, 23:56
going back over them, I don't thin 25x25 was such a good idea for Small and Tiny...

gmkieran
April 12th, 2010, 18:19
I've never gotten TokenTool to give me a borderless token. It seems to insist on having a base, which I'd rather not, and then limits my token size to what fits inside that base (making my pole-arm-wielding guards look MUCH smaller than my sword-wielding guards). Probably I'm doing something wrong, but what I usually end up doing is creating the token in Tool and then erasing the base in GIMP or PS. Also never got ImageMaker to function correctly. :(

Talen
April 13th, 2010, 13:35
FWIW, the new templates looks amazing- count me among those looking forward to their completion should you release them!

maobul
April 14th, 2010, 12:15
Sooooooooo great! :-)

Griogre
April 17th, 2010, 04:02
I have to say the Monster personalities have long needed an upgrade and I am very much looking forward to the completion of this extension.

DNH
April 17th, 2010, 08:54
Hear, hear.

Zeus
April 18th, 2010, 10:48
Hi all, I just got back from a family holiday. I had hoped to get a build out before I left but I unfortunately stumbled with a technical issue surrounding the use of formattedtext fields used in Traps. I discussed the issue with Tenian and JPG before I disappeared but didn't have time to implement it, I'm back now and will pick up from where I left off.

Stay tuned, more to follow this week. ;)

Zeus
April 25th, 2010, 21:07
Right so after some challenges that required some revisions to the Trap class, with some support from Tenian I have been able to crank out the remaining windowclasses and controls for the new skins.

Here's a screenshot which shows a couple of example NPCs, Traps and a Vehicle. What do think?

https://farm2.static.flickr.com/1099/4551452021_f0f0998fc4.jpg (https://farm2.static.flickr.com/1099/4551452021_3a6a9a78e5_o.jpg)

I have packaged up the skin as an extension and its currently in testing with a few forum members. As soon as I receive confirmation its stable and get any obvious bugs fixed I'll upload to my usual crypt.

More to follow.

DrZ.

PublicJohnDoe
April 26th, 2010, 08:32
Absolutely sweet, DrZ!
Looking forward to it :)

maobul
April 27th, 2010, 10:36
As expected. This looks amazing! :D

Zeus
May 7th, 2010, 23:22
4E Personalities v0.5 beta is now available for download. See post #1.

:D DrZ.

Mortani
May 9th, 2010, 16:37
Awesome looking stuff! Do you know where to find the 4E Parser v4.0.66? It doesn't seem to be in the normal spot. Also, are you aware if we have to scrape again, or just parse again?

Hye Jedi
May 9th, 2010, 17:44
Dr. Zeuss - just saw that this was available. Downloaded right away and am extremely pleased with the update. It looks like you've included the updates to the stat block that WotC made recently?

As always thanks for your contributions to the community! They are very much appreciated.

Zeus
May 9th, 2010, 22:01
Awesome looking stuff! Do you know where to find the 4E Parser v4.0.66? It doesn't seem to be in the normal spot. Also, are you aware if we have to scrape again, or just parse again?

The Parser's home is here (https://tenian.eugenez.net/Parser).

I have just checked and it looks like Tenian hasn't released 4.0.66 which is the test release he made available to me to work with when writing the extension. I will send him a note asking when he plans to update the release, I am sure its not too far away. :)

In the meantime, you can still use your existing modules, however Trap information for Perception, Countermeasures, Triggers (and attacks) will not be available on the front sheet, instead use the Powers and Other tabs.


Dr. Zeuss - just saw that this was available. Downloaded right away and am extremely pleased with the update. It looks like you've included the updates to the stat block that WotC made recently?

Thats correct or at least my interpretation of what they will look like. They don't officially get released until HS1 The Slaying Stone is published (next couple of weeks) with the core release of course being in MM3 in June.

Its worth baring in mind that the format may change, as such I can't promise it will remain accurate but will do my best to adjust it if necessary.

Thanks for the kind words.

Talen
May 10th, 2010, 10:41
DrZeus

We used your new stat block extension last night in our weekly game and it worked great! It definitely adds to the DM experience -thank you!

And as far as this being a beta, there was only one minor issue with a damage entry not working quite right. There was ongoing damage associated with it and neither the die nor the ongoing worked. Not sure if there was a problem before we made the switch to the extension, but I have a backup and can test before/after later tonight.

Zeus
May 10th, 2010, 12:55
Glad to hear it worked well for you Talen.

With regards to the damage die and ongoing damage effect not working, could you send me a PM with the details of the specific NPC and its source (parsed with the Parser (manual), Parsed with the parser (scraped) or hand entered directly into FGII. Could you also include a copy of the short description field.

I can then take a look and address any fix.

adminwheel3
May 10th, 2010, 16:07
Used ours as well and it made things much easier when dealing with NPCs who had multiple standard and minor actions.

Thanks very much for your hard work.

Talen
May 11th, 2010, 13:39
With regards to the damage die and ongoing damage effect not working, could you send me a PM with the details of the specific NPC and its source (parsed with the Parser (manual), Parsed with the parser (scraped) or hand entered directly into FGII. Could you also include a copy of the short description field.

I can then take a look and address any fix.


Thnaks for the offer DrZeuss - I sent you a PM, but the "problem" was more user error on my part than anything else I think. The template worked as it should have!

Zeus
May 11th, 2010, 19:18
No problem, glad its sorted for you.

I sent you a PM with a suggestion for re-formatting the short description for the power causing you problems in the CT. Try that and let us know if it makes any difference.

Griogre
May 23rd, 2010, 00:40
I've been using the Personality extension for a couple of weeks and I'm quite pleased with it. I did notice one small bug in the display of Alignment. Good is displayed as Goo - and Any is displayed as An so the last letter is being clipped out. Unaligned, Evil and Chaotic Evil seem to work fine.

Zeus
May 23rd, 2010, 01:13
Thanks Griorge. I had noticed the Good alignment being cut off and planned to fix it in the next release. I hadn't realised about Any though so cheers for that.

On another note I'm awaiting the results of the latest round of testing of 4E Items, if all goes well I should be able to release it next week.

EugeneZ
May 26th, 2010, 02:12
I love this extension. Been using for a while and it's made my NPC management noticably easier. However, some comments:

When the Powers tab is updated, the main sheet is not recalculated until the NPC is closed and re-opened. I'd recommend recalc'ing when the Powers tab loses focus, if that's possible.
The order of the powers confuses me, and though there's probably a pattern, I can't see it. Regardless, I hardly care about order, especially since grouping is so much more useful. The one exception is Basic Attacks. They should always be at the top, above their non-Basic siblings.
Your extension reformats the power description by trying to detect the Attack/Hit/etc text and sticking them on their own lines. In 90% of cases, this works as intended. However, on that other 10%, it can occassionally obfuscate the power horribly. I have attached an example screenshot, but there are many different ways in which this reformating fails. However, considering it works in the clear majority of cases, I wondered how to phrase this comment. I find that most of that 10% of erroneous reformats occur on Traits. And Traits rarely have a need to be reformatted, since they rarely contain attacks. More rarely than traits that get messed up by your formatter. So I would suggest powers that register as Traits be exempt.
Sometimes I make quick NPCs on the fly. I usually put the action type as all lowercase, i.e. "standard". The grouping functionality is case sensitive and categorizes it under Traits until I capitalize the letter "s". I would suggest it be made case insensetive for those of us who make NPCs on the fly.


Thanks for reading.

Zeus
May 26th, 2010, 09:14
Thanks Eugene, always good to get feedback. I have received surprisingly littl feedback for this extension so I have presumed its been working well, well it has for me and my groups anyhow.



When the Powers tab is updated, the main sheet is not recalculated until the NPC is closed and re-opened. I'd recommend recalc'ing when the Powers tab loses focus, if that's possible.


The main sheet should refresh but you need to ensure that you have clicked off the control you updated in the Powers tab first. e.g you update a short description field, next click anywhere off the entry in the Powers tab and then switch to the main tab. It should then work.

As for an event that fires when a window loses focus, I'd love to but I don't believe FGII supports this functionality yet.



The order of the powers confuses me, and though there's probably a pattern, I can't see it. Regardless, I hardly care about order, especially since grouping is so much more useful. The one exception is Basic Attacks. They should always be at the top, above their non-Basic siblings.


It should be listing them either by order they appear in the Powers tab or alphabetically, can't remember now that I'm at work. Was there any other particular order you believe would make greater sense?



Your extension reformats the power description by trying to detect the Attack/Hit/etc text and sticking them on their own lines. In 90% of cases, this works as intended. However, on that other 10%, it can occassionally obfuscate the power horribly. I have attached an example screenshot, but there are many different ways in which this reformating fails. However, considering it works in the clear majority of cases, I wondered how to phrase this comment. I find that most of that 10% of erroneous reformats occur on Traits. And Traits rarely have a need to be reformatted, since they rarely contain attacks. More rarely than traits that get messed up by your formatter. So I would suggest powers that register as Traits be exempt.


Now thats unfortunate but not surprising. The sheer number of different formats WotC employs always meant it was unlikely the new formatting would work 100% of the time. Having said that Traits should be just dumping the short description field with no labels so I must have broken something in the last update. I'll take a look. To help me debug, could you PM the names of the NPCs and their sources and the offending Powers and I'll see if I can get a fix together for the next update.

I was also thinking of adding an override switch to each power entry so that users can default the description field back to the standard. This should also help with those powers with too complex a description to parse. What do you think?



Sometimes I make quick NPCs on the fly. I usually put the action type as all lowercase, i.e. "standard". The grouping functionality is case sensitive and categorizes it under Traits until I capitalize the letter "s". I would suggest it be made case insensetive for those of us who make NPCs on the fly.


Fair point, I tend to capitalise the first letter but I appreciate not everyone will. I'll add it to the list of changes for the next release.

Thanks again. Keep the feedback coming guys. :)

EugeneZ
May 26th, 2010, 14:17
The main sheet should refresh but you need to ensure that you have clicked off the control you updated in the Powers tab first. e.g you update a short description field, next click anywhere off the entry in the Powers tab and then switch to the main tab.

That did it. Thanks.


It should be listing them either by order they appear in the Powers tab or alphabetically, can't remember now that I'm at work. Was there any other particular order you believe would make greater sense?

Aha! Alphabetical. That's what it is. I think the order they appear in the Power tab would be superior. But even alphabetical makes a degree of sense, if only Basic Attacks were at the top. In all WotC stat blocks, basic attacks are always at the top.


Now thats unfortunate but not surprising. The sheer number of different formats WotC employs always meant it was unlikely the new formatting would work 100% of the time. Having said that Traits should be just dumping the short description field with no labels so I must have broken something in the last update. I'll take a look. To help me debug, could you PM the names of the NPCs and their sources and the offending Powers and I'll see if I can get a fix together for the next update.

The ones I was running into last night are actually from EnWorld's War of the Burning Sky, but when I get home I'll try and find some in Scales of War. I remember seeing them there, too.


I was also thinking of adding an override switch to each power entry so that users can default the description field back to the standard. This should also help with those powers with too complex a description to parse. What do you think?

I think that's actually a good idea. A lot of the problems I run into are in EnWorld's War of the Burning Sky campaign because they're not as good at properly "phrasing" their powers like WotC is. So your reformatting often tends to make the powers weirder than intended. Being able to to turn it off in that campaign but back in Scales would be nice.

That said, if you're right about Traits formatting being accidentally on, fixing that might eliminate the problem even in Burning Sky.


Fair point, I tend to capitalise the first letter but I appreciate not everyone will. I'll add it to the list of changes for the next release.

Thanks again. Keep the feedback coming guys. :)

Thanks again.

EugeneZ
May 27th, 2010, 03:14
Okay, I have no idea what happened to my screenshot. I can't find any WotC NPCs that cause this (though I vaguely recall seeing some), but I can find several War of the Burning Sky ones that do. The issue is actually not in Traits. I'm no longer sure why I said that. But I think your suggestion is still the best: add another icon at the bottom of NPC sheet that lets you turn Formatting on and off... and maybe I'm going overboard here, but also a campaign-wide option to indicate which one to default to?

I've attached a Burning Sky sample for reference.

Zeus
May 27th, 2010, 08:34
Beer and D&D don't often mix that well, Lol.

I do see a couple of oddities in the screenshot you attached. I suspect a tweak or two to some of the description fields might yield better results but I'll see what I can do.

For the record whilst I only aimed to support WotC style formatting I am happy to also help support as much 3rd party material as I can, the challenge comes in that I haven't purchased (and am not planning to) any of (in this case0 the WotBS material and so testing that might be prove a bit challenging.

I will look into the kill switch feature and will get back to you.

EugeneZ
May 27th, 2010, 22:10
I complete agree with the pure-WotC stance. I don't want to see you wasting time on my own choices in 3rd party modules. Any tweaks you make may end up making things worse, and no tweak will fix all issues. Rather, I think the best approach is what you call the "kill switch."

Demogorgon
June 11th, 2010, 05:05
Hi DrZeuss

Maybe I didn't look hard enough, but I noticed that on your monster sheet there is no place to add +2 Saves. This is needed for when you want to add a class template to a monster.

Let me know if there is another way to do this.

Zeus
June 11th, 2010, 07:50
Demogorgon - Saving Throws are definitely included but maybe hidden (if the field is currently empty).

Try clicking on the reveal all Fields icon (graphic of an Eye in the bottom left corner) and the look to the first block after Speed and Special Defenses and before Traits/Aura's etc.

For a reference see the #1 post and the Ancient Red Dragon's sheet.

For future reference note 4E Personalities is keyed to hiding all empty fields by default.

Z.

ShadeRaven
June 25th, 2010, 22:14
Love your 4E Personalities, Z... so far, in just a couple of days of using/testing it, I've really enjoyed it.

Incidentally, your 4E CTTokenstoMapImage extension (version 0.1b that I grabbed off your site) steps all over the new map buttons Moon is giving us in 2.7.0. Not that dragging mobs individually from the tracker is that tough, but I enjoyed your little tool. (PS: If you decide to update it, is it possible to get the drop to bunch them up in a radiating circle instead of a diagonal line?)

Zeus
June 26th, 2010, 07:00
Love your 4E Personalities, Z... so far, in just a couple of days of using/testing it, I've really enjoyed it.

Incidentally, your 4E CTTokenstoMapImage extension (version 0.1b that I grabbed off your site) steps all over the new map buttons Moon is giving us in 2.7.0. Not that dragging mobs individually from the tracker is that tough, but I enjoyed your little tool. (PS: If you decide to update it, is it possible to get the drop to bunch them up in a radiating circle instead of a diagonal line?)

Thanks ShadeRaven - Nice to know the extensions are proving useful.

Thanks for the heads up on CTTokenstoMapImage, I am not surprised though as I have yet to make all my extensions 2.7.0 compatible. I'm just waiting for 2.7.0 to stabilize then I'll release some updates.

Griogre
July 2nd, 2010, 01:09
I noticed a problem with the Immune/Resist/Vulnerable entry. The entry only shows up on one line and is clipped at the end of the line. This is a problem with verbose entries like a lot of high level monsters or things with a bunch of text. A good example of this are Trolls which have conditional regeneration or Mad Wraiths. Orcus is another as is just about any high level solo.

Zeus
July 2nd, 2010, 07:59
Thanks Griorge, I am working on the next version of 4E Personalities as we speak. Tenian has just released a MM3 compatible parser so I'm busy updating support for the new formats.

The reason the clipping sometimes occurs is because FGII doesn't offer a way to right-align text controls so I have to crudely try and guestimate the start/end position of some fields and as you can see its not working 100% on some fields (you mentioned a similar issue with the Alignment field I believe).

The current approach uses the length of the current string in the field to try to determine the pixel width of the field (this so I can trim the field to the exact length of the current string), the problem is most charsets don't use symmetrically sized glyphs for all characters so an A will consume more pixel width than the letter I. This can throw the sizing out and results in either oversize fields or clipping as pre your case.

I'll see if I can come up with an alternative approach.

Any suggestions from other developers as to how better to handle right-aligning fields, please feel free to let me know.

Griogre
July 2nd, 2010, 20:31
I hate to say this because it is considered heresy in some places, but the simplest solution is to use non proportional fonts. Given the way fonts work in FG it might well be the easiest and best looking solution. Otherwise you are going to have do something like assume every letter is an "o" or extreme cases a "w" in width.

We use to have to assume W's in the worst cases with proportional fonts and limit the number of characters to how many Ws would fit in the case of certain user interfaces - and that didn't always work either for localization. In your case it doesn't matter as much if you go longer rather than shorter so assuming o should "in theory" be ok (but you know what they say about theory).

Zeus
August 2nd, 2010, 10:12
A quick update. Pending the imminent release of 2.7.0 and a new version of the 4EParser, I have updated the 4E Personalities extension fixing all the reported bugs and incorporating a few of the functionality requests made by the community here.

Its currently in testing, which is going well so as soon as 2.7.0 and the new version of the 4EParser are released I'll update the Resource Site with the newer versions.

Stay tuned.

Talen
August 3rd, 2010, 14:33
Great news, but a question....I have mod files put together with much older versions of the parser- will the new extension work with these older files or only with mods parsed with the most recent parser utility?

Damn the new MM3 format and essentials line! :mad:

Actually, at a RL table, I quite like them, but as primarily a luddite online player, they make my life a living hell as I try to scrap together a mod collection.

Zeus
August 3rd, 2010, 16:02
Talen - You can use your older modules without the need to re-parse with two exceptions:

- as per the previous release you will need to re-parse Trap data using Parser 4.0.66 or higher - this is because a change was made by Tenian and I to adapt a Traps formattedtext fields so that triggers, countermeasures and attacks could be output individually.
- for MM3 data you will need to use the latest version (still in development) of the 4EParser; this is to accommodate the syntax changes WotC introduced with the new NPC style in MM3.

Talen
August 3rd, 2010, 17:03
Great news. Traps are no big deal since the few times they are used are relatively easy to enter manually. MM3 is a different bird, but not unanticipated. Thanks for the great material as always!

You too Tenian!

Zeus
August 17th, 2010, 09:26
Hey All,

I have uploaded a new version of the 4E Personalities extension to my resource site. I believe I have addressed the issues/bugs raised in this thread as well as incorporate support for MM3 and non-WotC formatted powers (kill switch). Full update notes can be found in the readme.txt which accompanies the extension. Summarised below:

8th August 2010
v0.9 - test build

- Adjusted NPC Type control width and positioning to accomodate the new Power Format Control in the Control bar. Fix prevents the new control from overlapping with the NPC Type Radio controls.
- Adjusted Power powertitle string alignment preventing long values from overlapping with the new Power Format control.
- Updated Aura powers so that Aura n is now displayed as part of the Power's title string. If Aura n is detected within the powers Shortdescription text but not set in Recharge field, Aura n is now set in the recharge field in line with the new MM3 format.

2nd August 2010
v0.8 - test build
- Fixed a bug that prevented Aura Range from being output under the new MM3 format correctly for MM3 sourced Aura powers.

1st August 2010
v0.7 - test build
- Updated MM3 support after realising I have been using a stale sample test set of data. Newer versions of the 4EParser now output the shortdescription field with cleaner line breaks, this benefits multi-effect (see Eye of Shadow) and complex powers.

31st July 2010
v0.6 - test build
- Updated compatibility to support 4E 2.0.2 and FGII 2.7.0.
- Fixed field alignment issue which prevented Special Defenses from spanning multiple lines. Fix prevents defenses from being prematurly cut off.
- Fixed field alignment issue which prevented Alignment entries of 'Good' and 'Any' from being displayed properly.
- Enhanced MM3 formatted shortdescription blocks to support new mm3mode support introduced in 4EParser v4.0.89.
- Added iconcycler for setting the format of a Power's shortdescription field. Modes supported include 'MM3' for MM3 format, MM for MM1/2 format and Off for default shortdescription block. Note: the output style will always mimic the new MM3 style format. Setting the format merely changes the way the shortdescription field is parsed. The default format for new entries is MM. NPC windows will autodetect MM3 source material when opened and will output accordingly. Users who hand enter NPC data can elect which format to use. Finally, power shortdescription field format can be controlled via the icon on each powers title bar (right hand side) or globally (all NPC powers) via the Icon in the Control bar (bottom left of the NPC sheet next to File Lock/Unlock icon).

Enjoy!

DrZ.

Stitched
August 17th, 2010, 23:25
Hey there,

Not sure if this is related to the updated of 4E Personalities but I may have run into a bug.

I've entered powers for a "Hazard" (non NPC trap) and on the Main tab, it only displays "Attack" and "Attack 4". It also doesn't allow me to roll dice for those attacks, here, but on the Powers page (intended?)

Powers Page (https://dl.dropbox.com/u/3919708/Statblock_MissingEntries.png)

Main Page (https://dl.dropbox.com/u/3919708/Stat_MainTab.png)

If I deactivate the 4E Personalities for the campaign, it doesn't display any attack information at all (but you can still roll from the Powers page).

Zeus
August 18th, 2010, 02:19
Was this Trap and its data hand entered in FGII or created using the Parser?

It looks like there maybe foreign characters embedded as the bullet points are being replaced with the character f. These lists are built from the Other tab, check the text.

As for Attack 1 and Attack 4. If the trap has only two powers they should be listing as Attack 1 and 2 so I'm guessing this trap was parsed using the 4E Parser and two of the powers haven't parsed properly. Most likely due to syntax errors or as above because of foreign characters present in the powers text.

There also appears to be a line break in the first powers' shortdescription field, try deleting it.

As for no clickable powers, thats sounds like a bug, well spotted. I'll add a fix in the next few days.

Stitched
August 18th, 2010, 07:39
It was copied and pasted from WoTC's PDF (freebie).

It only had two powers. Since I made mistakes, I would delete the line, and it would numerate up, which is why it says Attack 4. Would be nice to rename these Attacks so I know which one I am using.

The character "f" appears in the blank <<New Personality>> template. Nothing I added or pasted.

Trap Cards (https://dl.dropbox.com/u/3919708/Trap_Cards.png)

Maybe a problem with 4e Fonts?

***Yup. Deactivating 4e Fonts fixed the problem...***

Zeus
August 18th, 2010, 08:57
Ah Ha. That explains the mysterious f's.

I first released the 4E Fonts extension when the ruleset was 4E_JPG and just prior to the 4E re-skin project. When I created the 4E Personalities extension I updated the regular and bold standard fonts for the ruleset to include a bullet character but forgot to go back to update the 4E Fonts extension. Thanks for helping me find another bug. :)

As for Named attacks/powers, the majority of the Traps I used as sample test data, mainly from DMG and DMG2 did not include named powers, simply Attack 1 .. n, so I mimicked that. I'll take a look, maybe it would be better to use the Power's Name as opposed to just Attack 1 e.g.

Attack 1 (<Name of Power>) or something similar, what do you think?

Stitched
August 18th, 2010, 09:38
No problem. I honestly wouldn't have found this if I wasn't so damn determined to finish entering my KotS module. :)

I think if traps had regular melee/ranged attacks AND Power then I can understand seperating the two.

However, I think that the Main Tab feels a bit like the Mini sheet, in that it should contain all rolling mechanics for a given NPC; powers included.

So to answer your question:
Have Powers appear under a new Powers heading on the Main Tab
OR
Have the "Attack" name appear as the Power name (if using a Power to populate the slot).
OR
Have the ability to rename the "Attack" name, manually.



Ah Ha. That explains the mysterious f's.

I first released the 4E Fonts extension when the ruleset was 4E_JPG and just prior to the 4E re-skin project. When I created the 4E Personalities extension I updated the regular and bold standard fonts for the ruleset to include a bullet character but forgot to go back to update the 4E Fonts extension. Thanks for helping me find another bug. :)

As for Named attacks/powers, the majority of the Traps I used as sample test data, mainly from DMG and DMG2 did not include named powers, simply Attack 1 .. n, so I mimicked that. I'll take a look, maybe it would be better to use the Power's Name as opposed to just Attack 1 e.g.

Attack 1 (<Name of Power>) or something similar, what do you think?

Griogre
August 29th, 2010, 02:15
DrZuess I've been using your stat block extension for a while and like it. The one thing I dislike is the order of powers. I would suggest you use a more monster manual type sort order rather than just alphabetical within each category.

IE in the Standard Action list sort first by icon power types: basic melee, basic range, melee attack, range attack, Close Attack, Ranged Area Attack and then anything without an attack icon. I'd then break ties within the icons with the power id number or an alpha sort on the power name.

In particular, I really would like the basic attacks first like in the monster manuals.

Zeus
August 29th, 2010, 08:41
:) I'll see what I can do for the next release. In summary you prefer the order within power action lists to be first based upon power type, then by either Power Name as per the MM books.

EugeneZ
August 29th, 2010, 19:17
I strongly agree with Griogre. Love the extension with the exception of this one niggle.

9/10 times, the reason it bothers me is when I'm looking for the NPC's basic attack. I have manually scan for the icon rather than just jump to the top like my eyes are used to. The other 1/10 times is when I'm looking for their non-basic melee attacks, which come second or third on the list usually but can end up anywhere alphabetically with the extension.

Zeus
August 29th, 2010, 20:44
I think you have asked me for this functionality in the past Eugene, I just had forgotten to make the required changes during the last update.

The request is duly noted and its on the committed change list for the next release. Hopefully not that far off too.

On a similar note, now that I have included a power format switch (MM/MM3/OFF) as of the last update, are you now able to better use the extension with non-WotC content like WoBS?

Griogre
August 30th, 2010, 07:49
1) Yes, order sort by icon within the Standard, Minor, Traits sections. :) Like EugeneZ says my eyes have been trained to expect the basic attacks first and I tend to flounder around when they aren't. :p I see I didn't have the melee/range catagory in the sort list but it seems to be after the range.

2) I'm not EugeneZ but I like the MM/MM3/Off switch. It helps deal with powers the extension parser doesn't do well. I used it on Friday for Drow Poison which the extension parses out as three separate effects instead of one + 1st failed save + 2nd failed save. Setting the power to off got it to drop right.

Thanks once again for all the effort on this extension I really think it makes running the 4E monsters much easier than the old 3 tab personality sheet. That was one thing I never liked about FG d20 ruleset. This and the Savage Worlds NPC's are much easier to use.

EugeneZ
September 1st, 2010, 02:14
On a similar note, now that I have included a power format switch (MM/MM3/OFF) as of the last update, are you now able to better use the extension with non-WotC content like WoBS?

Yes! I wasn't around when you originally released that version so never got a chance to thank you properly but, yes, I love this option, especially for WotBS. If I could grant this extension some sort of extension-of-the-year award, I totally would. I accidentally forgot to load it in one of my campaigns and remembered the many shortcomings the old one had, and how much time I've saved...

Nilaihah
September 2nd, 2010, 17:51
Took me a second to figure out why powers weren't displaying (I hadn't put a title on the description categorizing them) but smooth sailing since.

It looks beautiful and I don't want to ever do without them again! Thank you very much for the time/effort put on this and for sharing it.

DaffyRoth
September 22nd, 2010, 02:42
Ok so I DL the NPC, Treasure Parcel, and Item extentions and put them into the Extentions folder. Howerver only the Treasure Parcel shows up in the Launch window. I have no idea how to get the others to appear so that I can turn them on.

Griogre
September 22nd, 2010, 05:01
I'm not clear on whether you are saying the extensions don't appear when you launch your 4E game or whether you don't see anything different after you select the extensions and start FG other than the new treasure parcel button.

If they don't show up when you launch so you can select them are you running the beta 2.7? I believe the latest downloads of the NPC and Item extensions have been updated to work with the new release of FG. If this is true then you either need to wait until 2.7 releases or update FG to beta 2.7. We should be close to the release version of 2.7.

If you do have the extensions on you won't see any difference until you open an item or NPC from a library module if you have one or input one by hand.

DaffyRoth
September 22nd, 2010, 09:33
Ya its when I go to load a campign or start a new one. The extenstions dont show up at all, aside from the Treasure Parcel extention. Its really annoying lol. So your saying that I have to wait for 2.7 for the extensions to even become an option?

Griogre
September 22nd, 2010, 20:06
I think the extention versions available for download now are all for 2.7. The earlier versions of the extensions are not compatible. FG's release version was briefly updated to 2.7.1 (hence the version update for the extensions) and then rolled back to 2.6.5 because of problems with non 4E rulesets. It's a big reason I'm running 2.7.1 even though the release was rolled back to 2.6.5.

If you are running the 4E ruleset you might want to try running 2.7.1, the test version, there are a lot of new features. It seems very likely 2.7 will be released in the next week or so, though; if you are in no hurry.

DaffyRoth
September 22nd, 2010, 20:42
Ahhh sweet got it to work with the test mode option. Makes my desktop look sooooo much better! Thanks for the reply guys and for a wonderful extension.

Zeus
January 11th, 2011, 00:37
Hey All,

I finally got around to fixing some of the quirks found with the extension. v1.1 has been uploaded to usual spot in the Public Area (see my sig for link to the resource page). v1.1 includes the following changes:

10th January 2011 v1.1 - release build


Adjusted NPC powers lists to closer mimic format of published npc stat blocks. Powers under Standard, Minor, Move, Triggered and Free Action types will now be listed by powertype and then by name. Powertypes are ranked as follows (in order): m, r, c, M, R, C, A, MR, MC, MA, RC, RA, CA followed by powers with no power type. Powers belonging to the same type will be listed alphabetically. As WoTC seem to inconsistently interveave basic melee, melee, basic ranged, area and ranged powers for some NPCs and not for others, this ranking (whilst not 100% correct in every instance) appears to be the closest representation that can be applied systematically.
Adjusted Trap Trigger lists so that the names of Triggers can be edited. Default is 'Trigger'.
Adjusted Trap Attack lists so that the name of the Attack is automatically set to the name of the associated power from the Powers tab.
Adjusted Trap Trigger lists and Attack sublists: For single trigger Traps, all powers will be listed under the Trigger by default regardless of Attack power name. Multiple trigger/attack based traps must use the naming convention of Trigger %d for Trigger names and Attack %d for Power names (where %d can be any integer) if multiple attack powers exist and you want to assosicate powers with specfic triggers. You can still apply custom labels to the trigger and power names but they must also contain the above substrings for the list filtering to work correctly. e.g. to setup a two trigger, two power based Trap: i) change the name of the 1st Trigger to 'Trigger 1', ii) create your second Trigger and name it 'Trigger 2' iii) Switch to the powers tab and create/name your powers embedding Attack 1 or Attack 2 somewhere in the Power's title name. Switching back to the main tab will reveal Trigger 1 followed by Attack 1, Trigger 2 followed by Attack 2.


Enjoy!

DrZ.

EugeneZ
January 11th, 2011, 02:40
Thanks! That first one has been eagerly anticipated. :) Traps are for chumps! Nah, just kidding.

Fot5
January 13th, 2011, 15:02
Minor thing, but on your website, you still list the updated date for version 1.1 as 02/05/10.

Zeus
January 13th, 2011, 21:47
Minor thing, but on your website, you still list the updated date for version 1.1 as 02/05/10.

Oops that for pointing it out. :o

Zeus
July 3rd, 2011, 11:04
New updated v2.8 compatible version has been uploaded.

4E Personalities
1st July 2011 v1.2

Updated to support latest 2.8 API


Click the banner in my signature to goto the new site where you can download all my latest test releases.

Enjoy!

DrZ.

Zeus
August 1st, 2011, 00:09
Update: 4E Personalities v1.3 has been uploaded to the FGII Extensions page of my site (see banner in sig for link).

4E Personalities 31st July 2011 v1.3


Fixed a bug with Trap Attack Lists and Vehicle Power Lists that manifested in a spurious anchor error message for dynamic power labels.


DrZ.

Griogre
August 4th, 2011, 20:52
Thanks for the update, this is my favorite extension.

Griogre
August 8th, 2011, 09:28
I've noticed some problems with the Personality sheets. The text in powers doesn't wrap around to more than one line. IE for a MM Wight the hit line never wraps and is just truncated.

Zeus
August 8th, 2011, 16:21
OK. Let me check.

Is this specific to MM only NPCs or all NPCs (i.e. from other sources).

Griogre
August 9th, 2011, 19:27
It seems to be for all monster books. It looks like if you have a long line it doesn't wrap around, ie it only starts a new line on a CR. It is not as noticeable in the newer books, though, because of the "Hit:", "Attack: ", "Miss: ", "Effect: " syntext of the newer monsters typically making shorter lines.

Zeus
August 11th, 2011, 22:40
An update to the 4E Personalities extension has been uploaded to the FGII Extensions (https://www.drzeuss.co.uk/fantasy-grounds-ii/extensions/) page

4E Personalities 11th August 2011 v1.4

Fixed a bug that prevented long power description components from wrapping to the next line, thus hiding portions of longer text when on the NPC front page.
Fixed a bug that prevented long power titles from wrapping to the next line, thus hiding portions of longer title text when on the NPC front page.


Enjoy!

DrZ