Author Topic: DFRPG Character Manager v2.0  (Read 16370 times)

Offline yakoaohw

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DFRPG Character Manager v2.0
« on: March 31, 2012, 06:01:17 PM »
The Dresden Files Roleplaying Game Character Manager v2.0.3 is now available for download at the following link:

Version 2.0.3

(The file is hosted on Mediafire. I have found other mirrors of my program floating around the internet, which is fine, but I have no idea who put them there or if they have been modified in any way. Please be careful running any executable files you find on the internet.)

My thanks to the following people who helped me with testing: (in no particular order) Soulless Mystic5523, lordoracle, devonapple,
Malraza, Zindaar, Jerry Luca, Steven Phelps, Geoff Williams, AJ Long, Christopher Smith (if I missed someone, I apologize.)

Without them the program would probably be paralyzed with bugs. Any errors remaining in the program (and I know there are some and I'm sure there are others I'm ignorant of) are the result of the programmer, not lack of input from the testers.

System Requirements:
-Windows XP or later (Vista or later is required for IE 9)
-Microsoft .NET framework 4.0 or later (available from Microsoft)
-Internet Explorer 9 or later (even if you don't use it regularly. The Character Sheet uses HTML5/CSS3 and the embedded browser is always the current IE install regardless of other browsers available. If you really object to having IE installed, you can "Export Character Sheet" instead and open it in your browser of choice. The sheet will still open without IE 9, but it will look terrible.)
-Sorry Mac people. I have nothing against you, i just don't have the kind of time it would take to learn a cross-platform programming language or to write in two different ones.

Installation:
There is no install file. Simply place the files in a directory (you must extract them, not run them from inside the zip file) where a user will have write access and run them (also included is a customization program, more on that later.)

Customization:
Included in this release is a customization program. It will create custom templates, powers, stunts, effects, magical traditions, etc. By default each item is placed in a separate dfcm file in the "resources" directory. The program will read all dfcm files in the directory at runtime and those items will be added to the program. If you add another custom file to the directory, you will need to restart DFRPG-CM for it to appear. These files are XML files (as are the character save files). If you know your way around XML, you may combine multiple custom files into a single DFCM file and all entries in it will be added at runtime, but you will not be able to edit the file with DFRPG-Custom.exe.

Old Characters:
Old character files will work, though there may be some hiccups in loading them. Please back up your old characters before converting them, just in case. I would hate for you to lose a lot of time and effort you put into a character because of a single typo in in over 15000 lines of code.

Bugs:
If/When you encounter bugs, you may post them here or message me, though if you post them here, you may help other people who are having the same problem you are or may get feedback from another user. When you post a bug, please let me know what you were doing and what happened (this is often more important that then huge list of text that accompanies some crashes.) For example: "I was selecting a template and the program crashed" or "I named my character Paul Neil Milne Johnstone (bonus points to anyone who gets the reference without using the internet) and he reached through my monitor and slapped me.")

That is it for now. Good luck. I hope this is helpful to other Dresdenites.

EDIT (4/11/2012): Updated link to latest version. Release notes available in the program.
EDIT (4/28/2012): Updated link to latest version (2.0.2). Release notes available in the program.
EDIT (4/29/2012): Updated link to latest version (2.0.3). Release notes available in the program.
« Last Edit: April 29, 2012, 12:52:23 PM by yakoaohw »

Offline spacepup18

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Re: DFRPG Character Manager v2.0
« Reply #1 on: April 01, 2012, 10:02:53 PM »
Found what I think is a bug while I was just looking around the program:
It seems that when selecting Channeling or Ritual, the Refinement upgrade doesn't show up like it does when Evocation or Thaumaturgy is.

Still looking around, but thanks for the Character Manager, I do really love them, and this one seems pretty good.

Offline yakoaohw

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Re: DFRPG Character Manager v2.0
« Reply #2 on: April 02, 2012, 05:10:51 PM »
Found what I think is a bug while I was just looking around the program:
It seems that when selecting Channeling or Ritual, the Refinement upgrade doesn't show up like it does when Evocation or Thaumaturgy is.

I will add them in in the next update, thought that may be delayed while I catch up on some other projects. In the meantime, you may just want to add a custom power.

Offline spacepup18

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Re: DFRPG Character Manager v2.0
« Reply #3 on: April 02, 2012, 09:30:23 PM »
Maybe its something I'm doing wrong with the custom power but adding a refinement power for Channeling seems to remove the ability to choose an Element from the Magic tab.  If I delete the custom refinement power, the choices are allowed, but if I load it no power seems to be able to choose a 'Magical Tradition' of from the 'Available Elements' on the Magic tab.

Offline HumAnnoyd

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Re: DFRPG Character Manager v2.0
« Reply #4 on: April 03, 2012, 05:04:27 PM »
Wow.  Some great work upgrading the previous program.  Great Job!
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Offline devonapple

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Re: DFRPG Character Manager v2.0
« Reply #5 on: April 03, 2012, 06:19:57 PM »
I'm not able to get any of my Custom templates to show up in the main program. How does that normally work?
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Offline yakoaohw

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Re: DFRPG Character Manager v2.0
« Reply #6 on: April 03, 2012, 10:24:57 PM »
I'm not able to get any of my Custom templates to show up in the main program. How does that normally work?

The custom template should be saved as a dfcm file in the 'resources' directory that is created by the program the first time you load it. When the program loads, a notice should appear on the splash screen that says "custom entries detected" or something similar. If the file is invalid, it should tell you so and then not load the erroneous file and run the program normally.

As to the custom power, I'll need to take a look at that more closely. I'll get back to you on that.

Offline devonapple

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Re: DFRPG Character Manager v2.0
« Reply #7 on: April 04, 2012, 06:49:33 PM »
I get the "custom entries detected" note, but all of the ones I create are invalid.
"Like a voice, like a crack, like a whispering shriek
That echoes on like it’s carpet-bombing feverish white jungles of thought
That I’m positive are not even mine"

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Offline Sanctaphrax

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Re: DFRPG Character Manager v2.0
« Reply #8 on: April 05, 2012, 01:39:42 AM »
Very nice. The quality of the generated character sheet is genuinely impressive, despite one or two quibbles.

Unfortunately, I got a weird Refresh calculation for my character. Said character had 1 stunt, Marked By Power, and Sponsored Magic for -4.

Also the stunt didn't show up on the sheet.

Offline tetrasodium

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Re: DFRPG Character Manager v2.0
« Reply #9 on: April 05, 2012, 10:38:03 PM »
I get the "custom entries detected" note, but all of the ones I create are invalid.
I get the same, I went so far as to create one that simply had the word test in the name & description for the intimidate skill & simply selecting it from the mortal stunts tab crashes the CM component :( Out of curiosity, I opened it up in notepad to see if I saw anything really funky, but nothing seemed odd
Code: [Select]
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<mortalstunts>
  <mortalstunt name="test" skill="Intimidation">
    <description>
      <p>test</p>
    </description>
  </mortalstunt>
</mortalstunts>

Offline yakoaohw

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Re: DFRPG Character Manager v2.0
« Reply #10 on: April 06, 2012, 01:29:39 AM »
I get the same, I went so far as to create one that simply had the word test in the name & description for the intimidate skill & simply selecting it from the mortal stunts tab crashes the CM component :( Out of curiosity, I opened it up in notepad to see if I saw anything really funky, but nothing seemed odd
Code: [Select]
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<mortalstunts>
  <mortalstunt name="test" skill="Intimidation">
    <description>
      <p>test</p>
    </description>
  </mortalstunt>
</mortalstunts>

That is very odd. But I made a lot of changes to the program right before I finished beta, and haven't done anything with the custom powers since the very beginning. It is very likely that when I fixed something else, I broke the customization. I am going to spend part o this weekend taking a hammer to it all to see what I come up with.

Offline Malivotti

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Re: DFRPG Character Manager v2.0
« Reply #11 on: April 11, 2012, 08:10:30 AM »
Just wandered in and saw that you are back and you brought a new DFRPG program with you, now that is how to make an entrance.  :)

Welcome back and I'll start playing with the program ASAP.

Offline yakoaohw

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Re: DFRPG Character Manager v2.0
« Reply #12 on: April 11, 2012, 11:49:40 PM »
Malivotti: I'm glad you like my stuff, I hope it proves to be helpful.

tetrasodium: The syntax that was being written was incorrect for the mortal stunt. That has been corrected in version 2.0.1 as well as adding a catch to prevent the whole program from crashing if the description cannot be viewed. If you'd like to corrected the custom stunt without making an entire new one, simply remove "<description>" and "</description>". They are required syntax for supernatural power descriptions, but not for mortal stunt descriptions. (The source file is really huge and each group of data differs from the others since it took me a while to compile it.)

devonapple: The syntax for the character templates was also being written incorrectly. This has been corrected in version 2.0.1. All the attributes that were supposed to be written to the XML were being added as elements instead. There isn't really a quick fix to change it up unless you know XML. name, minrefresh, refreshbonus, supernatural and skill should all be attributes of their parent. Also, the value of minrefresh should be negative.

spacepup18: I have now added the powers you mentioned. Also, there was a bug in the resource compile of custom and standard data at runtime causing all magical traditions to be missed. That has been corrected.

Sanctaphrax: The character you sent is showing a refresh adjustment of 6, 4 for Sponsored Magic, 1 for Marked by Power and 1 for a mortal stunt. The error with the stunt now appearing has now been corrected. (The program was testing for a number of stunts > 1 instead of >= 1)

New version is up. Thanks for the feedback.

Offline Sanctaphrax

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Re: DFRPG Character Manager v2.0
« Reply #13 on: April 13, 2012, 03:42:12 AM »
Aight. I'll give this thing another try.

Offline kacowkachow

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Re: DFRPG Character Manager v2.0
« Reply #14 on: April 14, 2012, 03:34:31 PM »
The new manager is looking great. Awesome work on it.

However, it seems as though adding a custom effect isn't working. The problem being that it always throws out: "There is no description for this effect" no matter what I put in the description field.

Thanks for the work, looking forward to the next update.
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