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View Full Version : Concerning the demo



TheElf
March 14th, 2009, 23:52
While I understand that a demo version should have limitations in it for good reasons, sadly for me it isn't enough to decide i I would want to buy this software or not. Why?

I am sure there are plenty of d20 fans around, and most of them are able to see the most important features... Not sure if they can see flying, aerial combat, tools to decide who is above / below a fireball and who is hit, etc. but they should be able to decide on many things easily.

But the moment I seen the limitations of the demo, I have decided against downloading it and against considering this software as a potential "investment". Why?

Simply because I see no way to see how hard it would be to use Fantasy Grounds with the games I like. Lets see a few examples.

I realy like Legends of the Five Rings. But I am not sure if we are going to "automate" some rules with your tools, how easy / hard it would be to work with the roll and keep mechanism.

In other games instead of dice you can use cards.

In some games a test can have more results than "success" or "no success", or eithersuccess or failure can be possible in different ranges of rolls.

In some games the damage of a spell is influenced by a few factors, like "how far away your character is from the center of the spell."

Have you tried grenades in Shadowrun 3rd edition?

The moment when any such games would be included in your important games list and d20 wouldn't be your favorite system, you can see often it hs hard to see if this tool would work well for you with only reasonable amount of work invested in it.

While you say the software is cheap, I wouldn't say that, since while in a party it is often enough if one member buys a book, your whole party would have to buy this software if you would want to use it and requiring others to spend money on a tool that can be discarded right away isn't nice, buying it for the whole group is well out of the price range I would find ok, if it might be for a tool we might discard after 1 session, or just invest work in preparing some rules and then discard it without any chance to play with it.

Zoetrope
March 15th, 2009, 00:41
Unfortunately, the software has its limitations and cannot be a "catch-all" for every conceivable rule system out there (let's face it, it would be brilliant if it could!).

It would be excellent if there was an easy way to integrate new rules systems into the program, but it requires programming expertise and dedication to do so.

Bear in mind the purpose of the software is to allow gaming with people you don't/can't normally sit down face-2-face with. If you can, then you don't need the software in the first place.

However, there's nothing stoping you using it as a communication tool for rolling dice and gaming discussion, having the character sheets as scans in the program. It can be forced to work to a certain degree.

If you haven't downloaded it, give the demo a try and see what you can do. After all, it's free! :D

Cheers,
Z

TheElf
March 15th, 2009, 11:48
It can be a replacement for irc client, dice bot, tools to share character sheets (web based) with some extra limitations and some extra powers. But who knows if it is easier to add a new system to this, or to to code a program that does what we need :)

Updating features list with relevant information, etc could help to determine, if this tool a good investment or not. :)

Valarian
March 15th, 2009, 12:24
It would definitely be easier to tailor FGII than write your own internet software. As to the difficulty of customisation, that would depend on your familiarity with XML and Lua scripting. It's not difficult to pick up and, if you're confident enough to consider writing your own software, I'm sure you'd have no difficulty adding customised rulesets for your own games.

The Library section describes, in brief, modifications and the interface. There are custom rulesets available for download in the FGWiki. You could download one of these and go through the code.

As you mentioned Shadowrun, I know someone is working on a 4th edition ruleset. I don't know how similar this is to the 3rd edition you mentioned.

Foen
March 15th, 2009, 22:59
Valarian mentioned the Wiki: it is well worth taking a look there so you can see:
(i) what is possible, if you want to have a go at programming; and
(ii) what is available (because others have already built it) if you don't want to have a go at programming.

The Wiki is here (https://oberoten.dyndns.org/fgwiki/).

Foen

Valarian
March 15th, 2009, 23:08
There's also a rather long thread on the rulesets people are developing.
https://www.fantasygrounds.com/forums/showthread.php?t=6645