4E Item Parser

[crittman]

Ok, so one of my player has a couple of powers I cant figure out effect for. 1 is that he takes the damage aimed at another player(not too big an issue for me to change manually) 2 player is granted another healing surge. Any ideas? Again I can always do them manually just wanted to check if there was a way to automate them.

[spite]

There's no way to automatically redirect damage, so you'll need to remove and add the damage to the other player, or hope he calls out before you roll damage and then roll it on him instead.
As for the granted another healing surge, you mean another one to use temporarily, or spending another healing surge? If the former, you can set up a heal action that provides no healing but costs -1 healing surge. This will then add one surge back to them, lowering their spent healing surges by one.
If the power gives them a surge even if they are at maximum healing surges left though, this will not work. It will only return a spent healing surge.

What is the power name? I can have a look and see how it is worded to try help further.

[crittman]

The two powers in question are Martry's blessing(redirect damage) and the power connected to Aecris the magic weapon(gain healing surge)

[spite]

So for Aecris weapon, how I said should work fine. You can add a healing effect that looks like this https://puu.sh/vaxyG/2035984078.jpg where Str should be replaced with an attribute that adds no bonus. This is just to ensure there is no actual healing, but that the button will actually appear (it doesnt show if there is no value set). If you have no attribute without a bonus, just add an attribute, and put a minus afterwards equal to the attributes bonus, like this. If the player used dex and has a +5 dex mod, it'd show like this https://puu.sh/vaxKj/3374605e5c.jpg

For martyr's blessing, the player is just going to need to interject when they want to use it, hopefully before you roll damage. That way, you can drag the rolled attack onto the new target, see if it hits and then roll damage on him instead. Otherwise, you'll need to heal back the damage they took and apply it to the new target. No automation exists for taking the hit as that power is worded.

[crittman]

Thanks

[mrgrey]

I don't suppose there's an alternative to this that works on Linux, is there? Fantasy Grounds works fine on WINE, but unfortunately this program doesn't. I'm guessing there's a browser component to the program? If so, then apparently that component would have used libgluezilla on WINE, but that library has been discontinued...

[crittman]

I couldn't get WINE to install on OS x 10.8.5 Granted I am not a MAC guy.

[Moon Wizard]

spite,

The correct type for the "cost" field should be a "string" for all rulesets.

I don't know what changed in the parser, but the cost field in the base item record has been a "string" type for over a year in the 4E ruleset. I just checked backwards through all the revisions on the ruleset for the last 15 months. So, it seems like someone changed the parser to use numbers sometime recently perhaps?

I only added the number compatibility for reference items for modules built prior to that, which were not in the base item paths accessible to the item campaign list. If the records were moved over to be seen in the main campaign list, they'll need to be updated to use the correct data type.

Regards,
JPG

[valeros]

So sorry, I am still not understanding. For magic items which use a windowreference for a class of "item", the cost in this parser is a string. For mundane armor, weapons, and equipment, they use a windowreference for classes of "referencearmor", "referenceweapon", and "referenceequipment" respectively. Those windows all require that cost is a number, not a string. I tested and they all throw errors if the cost is a string. (So that is opening from the module itself, not the new Items list.) I do not believe I changed anything about the cost field in this parser in years. So the mundane items do not use the "item" class window by default with this parser. I would assume the only functionality lost if they were changed to use a class of "item" would be the drag and drop to create a specific magic item, but I am not sure if that is the only thing. But I would also assume that the "referencearmor", "referenceweapon", and "referenceequipment" windows were made different on purpose. I can change the parser to put them out with a class of "item" with the cost as a string instead if that is what they should be.

[Moon Wizard]

Let me break it down a bit to see if it helps.

Database Paths

The 4E ruleset only pulls item records for the master campaign list from "item" path (i.e. default campaign path), and "reference.items" path (i.e. defined as new path available for module items to be placed).

I'm not sure if the parser originally placed the items in the "reference.items" path, or if it was updated to do so. I assumed that it used a different path based on the older files that I have. Any records in these paths are assumed to use the standard format for items (used by all CoreRPG derived rulesets) that the "cost" field is a "string".

Database Fields

There is no built-in field that can read either strings or numbers to allow editing; it has to be either one or the other. Therefore, there is no easy way to make the item records both editable and support multiple field types. Plus, it complicates all the scripts that need to handle items across 4E and CoreRPG rulesets.

In order to support older modules that used "referenceweapon", "referencearmor" and "referencemagicitem" displays pointing to older data, as well as magic item lists that used older data, I enabled the "cost" information to be a read only non-database control to simply read a number or string without the ability to change the data.

Current Issues

I'm not sure if the current parser already used the "reference.items" path or if it was updated to use that path. As I mentioned, the "item" record has been the same for over a year, since the master list changes at least.

Moving Forward

Here are some options:

1) The parser can be updated to use "string" data type for item cost fields.
2) The modules can be processed after being created by the parser to convert the fields.
3) Someone can write the code for the 4E ruleset to handle all the item coding for making a complex control that can read either data type and write either data type, as well as handling in all the item scripts. This would also need to be maintained.

I would prefer that the parser matched up with all the other CoreRPG rulesets, so that a bunch of exception code doesn't need to be managed. Plus, I have higher priority items I have to work on at the moment that apply to commercial rulesets and/or affect multiple rulesets.

Regards,
JPG