Pathfinder Creature Parser V2

[Trenloe]

The problem is that "gear" is used in a lot of stat blocks for equipment. Gear, combat gear and other gear are frequently used after SQ - hence the parser found it and thought that was an equipment entry. The further issue with gear is that it is rarely at the beginning of a line (especially combat gear and other gear) so the parser can't just look specifically for "gear" at the beginning of the line.

What you're experiencing is a very rare occurrence that would be hard to fix 100% without opening up other/different possibilities of a similar issue. But, for a possible future release, I'll see if there's a relatively efficient and reliable way to not look for gear once special abilities is reached. I'm at the point where I don't want to rewrite key areas of code as these have been extensively tested with only a few issues. The danger of rewriting code is that you introduce new issues where the code worked previously.

[darrenan]

Making it obvious what was causing the problem would be good, even if fixing it isn't an option. But I hear ya on cracking open stable chunks of code.

[Trenloe]

Making it obvious what was causing the problem would be good, even if fixing it isn't an option.

"Making it obvious" would probably take more code than fixing it.

And, to be perfectly honest, I saw straight away what the issue was - "gear" was the only word missing at the NOMATCH section in the .fpf file. This is really the best way to debug these one-in-ten-thousand rare occurrences - look at the .fpf file first then enable logging and see if there are any clues to an issue. There is no way that I could even attempt to make things obvious for every possible occurrence of an issue - it would take lots of coding and would probably be wrong just as often as it was right.

I know this isn't what you want to hear. If something was breaking the parser on a regular basis I'd look to provide a reliable fix, if there's something that rarely occurs then I'm afraid it is going to be very low on the fix list. I, and other GMs I'm sure, would much rather my creature parser development time is spent on adding new features (such as feat and universal monster rule parsing) and fixing more regularly occurring issues.

[darrenan]

yeah, that's how I finally figured it out. thanks.

[Darmus]

Hi i have this error and i don't know why :Error in btnStartParse_Click, Message: character of not valid name in ' The invasiondelaplaiedumonde '. The character ' ', hexadecimal value 0x27, cannot be included in a name

can you help me

[Trenloe]

Hi i have this error and i don't know why :Error in btnStartParse_Click, Message: character of not valid name in ' The invasiondelaplaiedumonde '. The character ' ', hexadecimal value 0x27, cannot be included in a name

Remove any non alphanumeric characters from the creature name. In this case there is an apostrophe ' in the name, remove that.

[Darmus]

I sanw my mistake my file name have an apostrophe

Tanks ^^

but now i have this one :Error in ReadWriteFormattedCreature, Message: the empty chain(channel) " does not establish(constitute) a local valid name

i m on my files for see were is my error

[swest]

Well, I finally got to the point where I had to use the Creature Parser, so I downloaded and installed version 2.0.0.1, but, alas, it looks like it failed on me on my first attempt.

The .mod that was shared with me for RotRL is missing the Goblin Commando (page 18 of the Anniversary Edition). So, I created a text file with the stat block I had lifted directly from the .pdf:

GOBLIN COMMANDO XP
200
CR
1/2
HP
12
Male goblin ranger 1 (Pathfinder RPG Bestiary 156)
NE Small humanoid (goblinoid)
Init +3; Senses darkvision 60 ft.; Perception +5
DEFENSE
AC 17, touch 14, flat-footed 14 (+3 armor, +3 Dex, +1 size)
hp 12 (1d10+2)
Fort +4, Ref +5, Will +2
OFFENSE
Speed 30 ft.
Melee mwk horsechopper +4 (1d8+1)
Ranged shortbow +5 (1d4/×3)
Special Attacks favored enemy (animals +2)
TACTICS
During Combat The goblin commando makes sure to use his
Mounted Combat feat as often as possible to try to negate an
attack each round against his mount, and uses his superior
mobility to remain out of melee so he can shoot at the PCs with
his bow from dogback (taking the standard –4 penalty for using a
ranged weapon while mounted). If all of his goblin warriors are
defeated, he drops his bow and races in to fight the PCs in melee.
Morale The commando fights to the death—yet does so more by
accident than out of bravery.
STATISTICS
Str 12, Dex 17, Con 15, Int 8, Wis 12, Cha 8
Base Atk +1; CMB +1; CMD 14
Feats Mounted Combat
Skills Handle Animal +3, Linguistics +0, Perception +5, Ride +9,
Stealth +13, Survival +5
Languages Common, Goblin
SQ track +1, wild empathy +0
Combat Gear potion of cure moderate wounds; Other Gear
studded leather, masterwork horsechopper, shortbow with
20 arrows

Fed it to the Creature Parser, and this is what it says in the diagnostic output window:

Reading data file: C:\Users\swest\Desktop\tmp\PF FG Parser - V2.0.1\GoblinCommando.txt
Logging to: C:\Users\swest\Desktop\tmp\PF FG Parser - V2.0.1\GoblinCommando.txt.log
Formatting creature stat block: 20 arrows
Error in ReadWriteFormattedCreature, Message: Index was outside the bounds of the array.
Processing creature:
Error in ReadWriteFormattedCreature, Message: Index was outside the bounds of the array.
Processing creature:
Error in ReadWriteFormattedCreature, Message: Index was outside the bounds of the array.
Processing creature:
Error in ReadWriteFormattedCreature, Message: The empty string '' is not a valid local name.
Error in btnStartParse_Click, Message: The Writer is closed or in error state.
Module file created: C:\Users\swest\Desktop\tmp\PF FG Parser - V2.0.1\GoblinCommando.mod
Module file copied to : C:\Users\swest\AppData\Roaming\Fantasy Grounds\modules\GoblinCommando.mod
Parsing ended - check text above for errors.

The contents of the GoblinCommando.txt.fpf file are:

DESCRIPTION:GOBLIN COMMANDO XP 200 CR 1/2 HP 12 Male goblin ranger 1 (Pathfinder RPG Bestiary 156) NE Small humanoid (goblinoid) Init +3; Senses darkvision 60 ft.; Perception +5 DEFENSE AC 17, touch 14, flat-footed 14 (+3 armor, +3 Dex, +1 size) hp 12 (1d10+2) Fort +4, Ref +5, Will +2 OFFENSE Speed 30 ft. Melee mwk horsechopper +4 (1d8+1) Ranged shortbow +5 (1d4/x3) Special Attacks favored enemy (animals +2) TACTICS During Combat The goblin commando makes sure to use his Mounted Combat feat as often as possible to try to negate an attack each round against his mount, and uses his superior mobility to remain out of melee so he can shoot at the PCs with his bow from dogback (taking the standard -4 penalty for using a ranged weapon while mounted). If all of his goblin warriors are defeated, he drops his bow and races in to fight the PCs in melee. Morale The commando fights to the death-yet does so more by accident than out of bravery. STATISTICS Str 12, Dex 17, Con 15, Int 8, Wis 12, Cha 8 Base Atk +1; CMB +1; CMD 14 Feats Mounted Combat Skills Handle Animal +3, Linguistics +0, Perception +5, Ride +9, Stealth +13, Survival +5 Languages Common, Goblin SQ track +1, wild empathy +0 Combat Gear potion of cure moderate wounds; Other Gear studded leather, masterwork horsechopper, shortbow with 20 arrows
NAME:20 arrows
XP:arrows
TYPE:20 arrows
INIT:20 arrows
AC:arrows
HP:20 arrows
SAVES:20 arrows
DEFENSIVEABILITIES:20 arrows

So, what did I do wrong ?

Thanks.

- s.west

[Blackfoot]

The CR needs to follow the name on the same line and the XP needs to be on the following line.. your statblock doesn't look like it follows the standard format exactly.

[swest]

p.s., I based my trial upon the following statement:

The parser is designed to allow the GM to copy NPC statblocks directly from an adventure PDF, paste into a text file and parse the text file. If the NPC being copy/pasted adheres to the Paizo statblock standard and there are no strange characters introduced during the copy/paste process (sometimes this happens when copying from a PDF - erroneous spaces or other characters can be introduced).

I saw no extraneous characters... and so I assumed, since this was coming directly from a Paizo document, that it would work.

- s.west