Fantasy Grounds and Excel Spreadsheets

[Laukai]

Hi again,

Is there any way to integrate Excel Spreadsheets with Fantasy Grounds? Or is something in the works that would allow it?

Basically, I'd like to be able to create characters using the generator I use from https://www.theonlysheet.com/... I'd like for my character sheet in Fantasy Grounds to be more automated in its generation.

Thanks.

[Blahness98]

Nothing currently will import excel spreadsheets. I know PCgen is free and has the ability to export to FG. Herolab requires a good deal of money and a secondary program to convert that export.

What were you looking at automating?

[Laukai]

Well, for example, if you have feats remaining or if you have taken too many feats, TheOnlySheet will tell you. If you don't have the prerequisites for a feat, it will let you know.

It also tracks stat gains, so you know where they came from.

Prestige classes and archetypes are available to apply with just a click or two, where here you have to jump through hoops to make sure you are applying them correctly. I spent a bunch of money for the official "Ultimate Magic" book, and the only class it shows is the Magus, which does not list anything about the archetypes for it unless you read through the reference manual. For new players, to learn the game and Fantasy Grounds at the same time makes it a deal breaker.

I guess I am just irritated that I spent $200 on official content which seems incomplete or poorly integrated.

It just seems like character and item creation should be a lot easier than what it is... In my opinion, in terms of character generators, TheOnlySheet has no rivals for the #1.

[Talyn]

Archetypes are found in the Special Abilities list. There's one for the main archetype which lists out which abilities to swap out for the archetype abilities and so forth. Just takes a couple seconds to do. I guess the decision was made that was a simpler solution than having several hundred classes built out, which take up a lot more data and memory than the special abilities do.

To import a spreadsheet (or whatever TheOneSheet uses) you'd need either 1) a community member (and hey, you're one of those too!) to come up with a tool to convert the spreadsheet data into the specific XML data that FG uses, or 2) request TheOneSheet devs look into writing an FG export, like the folks over at PC Gen did.

[Blahness98]

Trust me, the number of availible archetypes it pretty huge. Currently, I have just started Cavalier (just got done inputting the orders and order abilities and base class) and I am at roughly 250-260 archetypes for the classes that start with A and B. Those are just the archetypes. I am looking at over 1100 special abilities and counting. I don't even want to imagine what the total is going to look like, and I am afraid I am going to run into memory issues with the amount of data that this module is most likely going to have.

I could say FG isn't a character builder and is a Virtual Table, but with 5e's automation, lines are starting to get blurred.

-edit: And thanks for reminding me of prestige classes.. completely forgot about those..

[Laukai]

I think for the sake of consistency, the character building portion of Fantasy Grounds should be a high priority. It would make it easier for me to attract players to my game who are new to playing Pathfinder or D&D. It would lighten the load for the GM so we won't need to spend so much time policing the characters for mistakes.

[Trenloe]

I think for the sake of consistency, the character building portion of Fantasy Grounds should be a high priority.

Yes, this would be great. But... FG has never claimed to be a character generation application. What is there is really up to the individual ruleset developer as to how much automation they spend time coding into a specific FG ruleset for character creation. The ruleset developer will have to prioritize all their limited development time based off many ruleset needs, which may be (but not limited to): combat automation, data entry, related DLC, base character sheet functionality (not character creation), ruleset complexity, bug fixing, etc., etc.. Most ruleset developers are community developers who aren't employed full time and are paid on commission basis and simply don't have time to spend the many hundreds of hours to get even 80% of character creation operational - especially for very complex systems with lots of DLC and many character options.

If advanced/complex character creation automation is a major need for you then please check for/add this in the FG wishlist here: https://fg2app.idea.informer.com/

[Zacchaeus]

I think for the sake of consistency, the character building portion of Fantasy Grounds should be a high priority. It would make it easier for me to attract players to my game who are new to playing Pathfinder or D&D. It would lighten the load for the GM so we won't need to spend so much time policing the characters for mistakes.

There is no character building portion of Fantasy Grounds. Each ruleset has different rules for the way characters are built.

Edit: and Trenloe said it way better than I did.