Colen's page

Jesus. Hero Lab has been horribly stubborn about a number of issues that they're wrong on. Makes me really question whether or not I should purchase it.

Cheapy, can you give me some examples of these? I can take a look and see what the deal is with these incidents.

Hi everyone,

Colen from Lone Wolf Development here. Thanks for the pointers as to why Feint shouldn't be listed as a combat maneuver! As far as I'm aware, these haven't been brought up to us before, so this is very helpful information to us.

We tend not to make changes without external clarification like this, because we get a lot of bug reports from people who are misinformed about the rules. We'd rather be safe than sorry, since making the wrong change could cause a lot of confusion if people are taking Hero Lab as "canon" as is mentioned above. We've been focusing on more serious bugs for the last few months (such as missing stat bonuses, incorrect errors, etc), so this one hasn't been addressed yet.

Thanks for everyone's feedback! We appreciate your help. :)

I got to use the app in an actual gaming session Saturday. Really, really like it. The fact that I can pop on spell effects and conditions is absolutely wonderful. I picked up an iPad Mini for this app alone. I'm not an Apple fan and until now have only used Android tablets. I prefer smaller tablets but have even considered getting a full sized iPad now that I've seen how useful the app actually is!

The only problems I've had are some custom files not working. Had two custom loads from the community files that crashed out the program. Said something about file had already been replaced or something. Not a big problem as all of my custom content works perfectly (or at least it has now that I figured out how to get my .user files on there.)

Glad you liked the app! :) We've released some more detailed instructions on how to get custom content onto your iPad that might help:

http://wolflair.com/index.php?context=hero_lab&page=custom_content_on_t he_ipad

Based on the error you're reporting, it sounds like you're using two different files that are either duplicates, or trying to override the same thing. Drop us a line at support@wolflair.com and we'll do our best to help you sort things out.

Was it also that developing for Mac OSX was a major leg up in getting an IOS product out?

Yep, that helped a lot too. We were able to re-use a lot of the code from our OS X port, and just having that familiarity with how to program for Apple stuff likely saved us months of development time.

Is this something that a KickStarter type crowdfunding event would help to motivate?

I mean I am already in for the base package and maxed out on licenses and I have every package or update purchased for Pathfinder, but I could see throwing something more Wolf Lair's direction to help speed up the process. Just saying...

A kickstarter is definitely possible, but not the critical problem right now. Check this post on our forums for why this isn't just a "kickstarter and go!" problem: http://forums.wolflair.com/showpost.php?p=153300&postcount=21

We definitely appreciate that you're willing to kick something in to get the Android version going, we just have a lot of work to do before we could make something like that happen. :(

Any eta on getting it on Android.

I have a whole table full of people that all have Android tablets that will throw money at you when you make us the app!

Very surprised you guys went with apple first when Android has so much more of the market.

Did Steve Jobs leave you something in his will....../grumble grumble

Just Kidding, love Hero Labs!

This is answered in our FAQ. Spoiler alert: Unexpected bequests from tycoons are not involved. :(

Doesn't the keyboard just come up automatically when you put the cursor into an edit control? I would have thought that was built into the OS, unless you had an external keyboard connected...

TwoWolves, how's Hero Lab working out for you on the surface pro? The screen is pretty small, how usable is it?

Colen wrote:

Can you let us know (either here or at support@wolflair.com) which bugs you're running into? We've had a few reported, such as the "wrong hero being selected" and "no way to delete portfolios from inside the app" we'll be tackling, but if you've run into others, we'd love to hear about them.

Just spending a few minutes with the App, I noticed:

1. When making journal entries, the formatting (inheritance?) on the date fields is inconsistent. At least one of them defaults to the year "0000', whereas the next one over does not.

2. Excessive text in some fields (like the melee weapon entries) doesn't produce a new line or result in scroll bars, but instead wraps back to the beginning of the same line and overlaps previously rendered text.

3. It crashed on me (not useful, and I didn't try to reproduce, but definitely affected my impressions given the short time I tried it out).

This was on a 32GB iPad 3rd gen, no cell.

Hope that helps. I enjoy Hero Lab and the prospect of running it on an iPad is very promising.

1. Guilty - that's something we didn't have time to do well for 1.0. :( I'm going to work out a better way of entering game dates.

2. A fix for this for weapons is on our list for next release. Was there anywhere else you noticed it?

3. Can you tell me what you were trying to do when the crash occurred? Even just knowing what you were doing would help us fix it for the future.

Thanks for the feedback!

Wait a sec, is there any iPhone compatibility?

Sorry, we're iPad only for the forseeable future. It was a lot of work reworking the Hero Lab UI to fit on the iPad, and it'd be a big chunk more to make everything work properly on the iPhone.

Not working on the iPad 1 is disappointing but unsurprising. Made my nine-year-old daughter (who just inherited an iPad 1) happy. :)

Pulled it down on the wife's iPad 3 and it has promise, but the current build is very buggy and unpolished. At best, I'd call it a beta. If it matures enough to reach its potential, it may be enough to retire my Nexus 7.

Can you let us know (either here or at support@wolflair.com) which bugs you're running into? We've had a few reported, such as the "wrong hero being selected" and "no way to delete portfolios from inside the app" we'll be tackling, but if you've run into others, we'd love to hear about them.

Mead Gregorisson got it - Hero Lab doesn't run on the iPad 1 because of a lack of memory. :(

The original iPad has precious little of it and Pathfinder is monstrous. So we were unable to squeeze the entirety of Pathfinder into a tiny enough footprint to cram it all into an original iPad.

We're still working on that, and we have some ideas of things to pursue, but we aren't certain it will be enough and we didn't want to withhold the tool from everyone else while we tried to figure this out. Ultimately, we may not be able to solve the memory issue, since Pathfinder continues to grow at a prodigious rate. We simply don't know at this point in time, but we're working on it.

Here's the answer we posted in our FAQ:

Realm Works will not have export capability in its initial release. As with most products, our focus in the initial launch is to have Realm Works do its own tasks exceptionally well, and to efficiently get material into the product. We wholly expect there will be demand for export to other products and formats, and we'll shift our focus to include those capabilities once we get the core product off the ground.

If there are specific export formats in which you are interested, we encourage you to let us know in the Comments section or on our product support forums.That will allow us to better anticipate future needs and capabilities while implementing the current feature set.

We've added a bunch of commonly requested information to our FAQ now, so I recommend everyone give it a quick look if they have questions. :)

I've just uploaded a V4.1b release for Hero Lab. This includes a bug fix for the crash issue, so once you download it, you should be able to use the V7.7 Pathfinder data files as normal. (Note that this release is Windows only, as the bug didn't affect people running OS X.)

Thanks for everyone's patience while we got this issue worked out!

FYI - a few users, mostly those on Windows XP and Vista, are experiencing crashes with the latest Pathfinder update. We're investigating a permanent fix for this right now. For users who are currently experiencing the crash, here's a link to the previous version of the Pathfinder data files, which should fix the problem until we get the permanent fix out:

http://www.wolflair.com/download/hp/pathfinder_rollback.hl

(Close Hero Lab, download the file, then double-click to import it. When you're asked if you want to import the older game system, say "yes", and don't allow Hero Lab to download an update to it.)

If anyone's being affected by the crash, the above file should restore your Pathfinder files to the previous version, which doesn't seem to have the same issue.

Hope this helps, and sorry for the inconvenience!

--
Colen McAlister
Lone Wolf Development Support

That’s right, our Kickstarter launched today! You can find it here: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/610004753/realm-works-streamlined-rpg- campaign-tools

From the creators of Hero Lab, Realm Works takes campaign management for RPGs to the next level, making it faster and easier to prepare for games, and greatly enhancing the actual game experience. GMs can create, manage, and share their world using a single tool, rather than trying to cobble things together with multiple, disconnected applications.

We're excited about this Kickstarter, as it will help us make Realm Works even more awesome than we're already planning! We have an array of rewards to offer backers, including the ability to get pre-release access to Realm Works, exclusive perks, and a whole lot more. We've also included some special options exclusively for Pathfinder players, so be sure to check those out!

For those of you who've been anxiously awaiting a peek at what Realm Works will offer, we encourage you to watch the Kickstarter video. We provide a glimpse of many key features in the video. So take a look at what's in store in just a few months’ time!

As we mentioned in the December newsletter, the primary features that will benefit most from the Kickstarter are the cloud server and community repository components. Each of these is detailed more fully within the Kickstarter and on our website. We'll also leverage your support to further refine the overall user experience and enhance the core Realm Works feature set. Check out the kickstarter page and video for more details!

If we exceed our funding goal, we have stretch goals that we’d love to deliver early. These include advanced functionality for GMs and players, plus some great new setting and adventure content from well-known creators, who are ready to take advantage of Realm Works’ time-saving capabilities.

Your support is instrumental in making this a successful Kickstarter and allowing us to deliver as much functionality as possible in the initial release. So please check out the project and spread the word to everyone you know. Thanks in advance for your support!

Nah, let him work on the iPad code, I'm looking forward to that for sure.

Grimmy, do you still run into the problem if you check the "run in low resolution" checkbox as described in this thread:

http://forums.wolflair.com/showthread.php?t=21834

?

Fix is now up - download the latest Hero Lab update and you should be able to import the file without any problems.

This appears to have been happening because when the .hl file was extracted from the zip file with the PDFs, it had its creation time and modification time incorrectly set to "-1". The creation / modification time is meant to be 0 or higher, and count in seconds from the start of 1970 or something similar, so this confused the third-party library that we use for our import/export mechanism.

I've now fixed the issue in the import/export libraries we use, so it handles incorrect dates gracefully instead of crashing. It took so long to diagnose because when you email a file, the creation and modification times are changed - so when people emailed me the file it removed the actual problem, and I never thought to download the file from Paizo myself to test it. :(

Anyway, it should be fixed now, and the fix should remove this as a source of problems in the future. Thanks for your patience, all! And thanks again to the users who helped me get to the bottom of this.

I think we have this issue identified, we're just doing some final testing now. Question for people - did anyone who had problems with Hero Lab crashing download through drivethruRPG?

Colen from Lone Wolf Development here. Sorry about the problems you guys are having with Hero Lab - can someone who is experiencing the crash please email me at colen@wolflair.com? Also, can anyone verify if the updated file Cheapy refers to fixes the problem?

Thanks for your help.

I think Masika is talking about adding the monsters from PFS adventures and other modules into Hero Lab?

This is on our radar, but I don't have a specific timeframe for you yet. It's defintely something we're considering for the Pathfinder files.

And we're live! Check out Hero Lab for the Pathfinder Beginner Box here:

http://wolflair.com/index.php?context=hero_lab&page=starter_edition

(This information was originally released in our newsletter last week - I wanted to repost it here to make sure everyone saw it, in case they missed it in the newsletter.)

As usual, we'll be releasing the Hero Lab add-on package for the upcoming Pathfinder Bestiary 3 supplement at approximately the time the book hits the street, which is expected to be in late November 2011. However, when that happens, we'll also be introducing a new discounted bundle for purchase. Starting on that date, all three of the Bestiary add-on packages will be available for the low bundle price of $29.99. That's a savings of 15%!

Please note that this bundle option will not be made available until the Bestiary 3 add-on package is released in November. This announcement gives everyone advance notice regarding the upcoming savings opportunity and lets each user make the choice that best suits his or her needs. Both Bestiary 1 and Bestiary 2 add-on packages remain available for purchase and immediate use in your games. To take advantage of the Bestiary Bundle discount, you'll need to wait until late November. The choice is yours!

Hi all,

Colen from Lone Wolf, publishers of Hero Lab, here. Sorry to hear that people are having problems importing the file - as ShadowChemosh said, please make sure you're running the latest version of Hero Lab, v3.6g.

If anyone is experiencing problems with Hero Lab crashing when they import the file, please email me directly at colen@wolflair.com with the details (like Min Bein'Meleth Rámalóce posted), and we'll see if we can figure out what's causing this problem. Thanks!

I don't see how UM could not be a separate purchase given the volume of content, but perhaps Inner Sea Magic (July release) will be a free add-on as part of that package?

Inner Sea Magic is part of the Pathfinder Campaign Setting line, so it will be added to one of our Campaign Setting packages along with the other upcoming Campaign Setting releases (Rival Guide, Undead Revisited, etc).

Sweets. I cant remember, is UM going to be part of the standard package or a add on that is purchased separately and if so what is the cost?

As one of the core PFRPG sourcebooks, Ultimate Magic will be a separate package costing $9.99. That's the price point we'll generally be using for those books in future - those books take a lot of work for us to implement, especially when you add new mechanics like Words of Power, etc.

Hi everyone,

We've recently firmed up our plans for near-term Pathfinder updates, including Ultimate Magic, and we'd like to share those with everyone so you know what to expect in the run-up to PaizoCon.

Ultimate Magic includes a significant amount of new content, including new archetypes, feats, and a major new mechanic, Words of Power. Unfortunately, given the volume of new material and how we received the final version of the book just over a week ago, we are not going to be able to release an Ultimate Magic update on the book's release date. :(

Instead, we are planning an update that includes the Ultimate Magic package sometime between the book's release date and PaizoCon (likely late May / early June). However, we aren't confident that all of the new mechanics, like Words of Power, will be ready for release at that point. We'll do our best, but Words of Power may slip to a follow-up release, a few weeks after PaizoCon.

Another new book, the Rival Guide, also releases later this month. Since Ultimate Magic is going to be such a must-have book for many players, we're concentrating our efforts on UM for now. Once we have the Ultimate Magic content finalized, we'll switch our focus back to the Rival Guide for a near-future update.

Also, a reminder - we'll be at PaizoCon showing off the upcoming Mac version of Hero Lab, so if you're planning to be at the show, drop by our booth to say hi! :)

I hope this helps answer any questions you had about our upcoming release schedule. See you at PaizoCon!

Once when I finally did get all the DDI info, the Updater crashed on me, which starts the whole process over. Today will be my 5th attempt to get the DDI info added.

The crash shouldn't be happening - that means there may have been some sort of unannounced change to the Compendium data (I haven't checked it since the middle of last month). I'm grabbing stuff again now to test it - please keep an eye on this thread on our forums for updates:

http://forums.wolflair.com/showthread.php?t=11616

Question: Does HeroLab currently require a DDI subscription in order to work with 4E, or can you simply buy a yearly license as with 3.5 OGL and pathfinder? Also, has HeroLab been updated to include Essentials?

Hero Lab developer checking in!

1) You need a DDI subscription to download all the content from the D&D character builder. Once you've done that, you can continue to use that same data in Hero Lab. If you want access to anything new they subsequently add, you'll need to maintain your DDI subscription to be able to download it.

2) Hero Lab grabs content from the D&D Compendium, not the character builder itself. As I recently posted in another thread:

"The [Hero Lab] 4e downloader will download everything you have access to in the D&D Compendium. Right now, that includes "Heroes of the Fallen Lands" and "Heroes of the Forgotten Kingdoms" from the Essentials line, I believe. You can check the Compendium itself for more up to date info:
http://www.wizards.com/dndinsider/compendium/database.aspx

Currently the new classes from Essentials aren't being imported by the downloader, but I'm planning to fix that in the next update."

3) There is no yearly license for Hero Lab - once you buy it, there's no yearly fee. :)

Hope this helps!

Will Herolab be adding the Essential line into its program ?

The 4e downloader will download everything you have access to in the D&D Compendium. Right now, that includes "Heroes of the Fallen Lands" and "Heroes of the Forgotten Kingdoms" from the Essentials line, I believe. You can check the Compendium itself for more up to date info:

http://www.wizards.com/dndinsider/compendium/database.aspx

Currently the new classes from Essentials aren't being imported by the downloader, but I'm planning to fix that in the next update.

Hope this helps!

Now, I would LOVE to know why the HeroLab guys are having so much trouble putting a Mac version out, but I'm sure it has more to do with them being unable or unwilling to put a Cider wrapper on it (or deal with Transgaming's licensing prices) and more of them wanting to keep it in-house and have full control over it.

We actually looked into something similar to this as a solution for Hero Lab, and spent quite a while investigating it. Unfortunately, what we ended up with was slow, clunky, and didn't look good. :(

Rather than put out an application we weren't proud of, we went back to the drawing board and are now taking a different route, one that will hopefully end up with much better results for users. It's taking longer to create, but we'd rather produce something good late than something mediocre sooner.

I would love to suggest, however, that Lonewolf Development update their website to indicate that a Mac version of the product is under development, along with a development status blog/log. It'd go a long way toward securing interest and future sales.

We'll almost certainly do something like this when we're nearer to release. Right now we don't have a lot to report - as soon as we have something we can show off to users, and a plan for how long it will take to turn that into a finished product, we'll put something up on our web site. :)

Thanks for your feedback!

What all do you get extra when you download stuff from DDI Insider into Hero Lab ?

When you download the 4e content, you get all the stuff in the D&D Compendium. If you have a D&D Insider account, that's everything (except backgrounds for some reason); if you don't, I think you get access to the basic stuff from the original player's handbook, but everything else is just a "stub" with no details.

Hope this helps!

So are you launching the APG on the 5th or 6th?

We'll be launching it on Thursday the 5th, probably to coincide with the opening of Gen Con, since that's when you'll be able to buy the physical book. :)

Dragnmoon wrote:

I am also getting errors on Non APG Characters

We accidentally removed a source that some user-created content was relying on in this update. :( (we've since added a "user content" source that's intended for users to use, since the others might change as the data files are updated.)

Once we get the Internet activated in our hotel room, I'll see if i can post a file which should fix the problem for people who are encountering it.

Update on this - ShadowChemosh beat me to it! If you're running into this problem, you can simply download updated files from http://www.d20pfsrd.com/ and you'll be good to go.

I am also getting errors on Non APG Characters

We accidentally removed a source that some user-created content was relying on in this update. :( (we've since added a "user content" source that's intended for users to use, since the others might change as the data files are updated.)

Once we get the Internet activated in our hotel room, I'll see if i can post a file which should fix the problem for people who are encountering it.

Matthew Benjamin wrote:

Just a clarification question. I haven't researched this so sorry if it is false. Pretty much everyone in our Pathfinder Group uses Hero Lab and a couple of months ago someone mentioned that we will need to renew our license every year. If this is true will we only pay for Hero Labs itself every year or will we be repurchasing the add-ons also?

No, that is not true. Once you buy the program it is yours. The only exception to that is if you want to put it on more than two computers, which would required an additional license.

Of course, you will want an 'official' answer, but I'm pretty certain that it will be close to what I said.

Wolfthulhu is correct. Once you buy Hero Lab, it's yours - you don't need to pay a license fee for it, and any addons you buy are yours forever.

Warning to all, If you have characters from the Beta Classes from the APG Test, Print them up before installing the latest update, because the new update removes the Beta Classes!

There should be a red warning message about this when you import the files - we also mentioned at the start of every APG class description that we'd be removing them once the play test period is up.

We're doing this because it lets us migrate peoples characters over automatically if they use the new APG add-on. Your old play test characters will be properly converted over to the new versions of the classes the first time you load them after activating the APG.

What about those of us who have already purchased the product and are currently supporting the company/product. (would you like my customer number?)

I have already got the added beastry (at extra cost) am I now going to be worse off than someone who buys it after you sort out your pricing?

The price of the Bestiary add-on isn't changing - it'll still be $14.99, as Rob describes above. We're simply announcing the pricing of our other Pathfinder packages now.

I have not downloaded the demo yet, but looking at the description of the Pathfinder support on the HeroLabs web site, there are some issues that jump out at me.

Thanks for flagging these to our attention. I based the Pathfinder page on our site heavily on the d20 page, so it looks like some old terms weren't removed - I'll ask Mathias, our pathfinder expert, to check the page for any other anachronisms. Rest assured, we support the new Pathfinder content as well as the old 3.5 stuff.

HeroLab Web Site wrote:

Never forget a favored class bonus again - Hero Lab automatically adds your bonus skill points or hit points to the hero

This sounds like HeroLab expects the Favored Class bonus to be set once and repeated from level to level. The bonus is actually selected separately at each level (and the Advanced Players Guide adds new choices). HeroLab can remind you so you do not forget, but it cannot automatially make the choice for you.

Hero Lab defaults the favored class bonus to a skill point every level, but you can change this on a per-level basis. We'll also be adding support for the custom favored class bonuses (e.g. +1 round of rage per day for some barbarians) in the Advanced Player's Guide too.

You can see how it works on the first screenshot on our Pathfinder page:

http://wolflair.com/hero_lab/images/pth_classes.png

I definitely recommend you download the demo version, so that you can check stuff out for yourself. :)

As someone who bought a copy a week or so ago for Windows (run in a VM on a Mac), will I be able to get my windows licenses invalidated and trade them in for brand, spanking new Mac licenses?

Also, are you in need of beta testers? ;)

We're hoping to get something like this in place, but we can't release the details yet. You definitely won't need to repurchase the product to get it running on the mac.

And when we need beta testers, we'll definitely let you guys know. ;)

Within the past week, I tried out both HeroLab (demo) and PCGen. I wasn't happy with either:

The HeroLab demo was clearly labelled as limited functionality, but I'd hoped everything it did do would be done right. Somehow the 6th L Human Cleric I built was only entitled to 2 feats instead of 4. Also, I knew the demo would not allow me to save or print the result, which is fine, but the Print Preview image was so small as to be useless.

Hi Damon,

If you add 6 levels of Cleric, you get the full 4 feats as described. It sounds like you created a 6th level character, but only added one level of cleric to it; you need to assign the remaining 5 levels before Hero Lab sets your feat count properly.

Also, the Print Preview window can be resized to fit your monitor, and there are three levels of zoom so you can expand the image to much larger than the default size. Hopefully this resolves your issue with the print preview image being too small.

Hope this helps!

Looks like I screwed up the links in the first post. Here's a proper link to the Hero Lab web site:

http://www.wolflair.com/hero_lab

And here's a link directly to the page for our Pathfinder data package:

http://www.wolflair.com/index.php?context=hero_lab&page=pathfinder_role playing_game

In recognition of all the hard work GMs invest in their games, Lone Wolf Development and Paizo are teaming up this PaizoCon to reward all official GMs with a free copy of Hero Lab, the ENnie award-winning character management tool.

GMs are a vital part of the roleplaying community. They put an immense amount of work into running games that the rest of us enjoy. This is especially true at conventions, where volunteer GMs take up their dice so that players from across the country can play and enjoy RPGs. This reward is our way of saying thank you to these volunteers.

Anyone who GMs an officially scheduled game at PaizoCon is eligible. GMs can simply drop by our booth in the dealer's room at any time during the Con to collect their reward.

If you have questions about Hero Lab, or if you just want to see Hero Lab in action, drop by our booth at PaizoCon. We look forward to seeing everyone at the con!

BTW, Can this be used to add class levels to monsters?

Yes - in Hero Lab, monsters are just characters with a nonstandard race. So you can go all out and make an Adult Green Dragon Witch 4 Alchemist 6 character if you want.

I am a GM, I just want to make sure with this new package I can build my own monster based on the rules in the Bestiary, will this package allow that?

The monster creation stuff in Hero Lab (see my previous reply for details) doesn't require the new package - the package just adds the prebuilt monsters from the Bestiary in a convenient, easy to use way.

If you want to make your own, you can just go into the editor and start creating them, whether you have this package or not.

... if it uses the rules from the back of the bestiary and calculates all the stuff for creating your own monsters would be awesome.

To answer this point - you can use Hero Lab's editor to create new races very easily. You can pick the creature type and number of hit dice, and everything related is calculated for you - skill ranks, class skills, base attack bonus, etc. Then you just go in and add movement modes (like fly, climb, burrow), natural attacks, ability score modifiers, automatic feats, innate skill ranks etc to customize the monster.

There's a full tutorial included with the Pathfinder data files that guides you through implementing a race from the Bestiary, so check that out if you're curious how that works.

Dragnmoon wrote:

Other then adding a bunch of monsters, will this add any other functionality to Pathfinder in herolabs that is worth spending $15?

Kind of what i was thinking, i have herolab and its great but to spend another 15$ for 300 monsters im not to sure about, but on the other hand being able to export them to d20pro and if it uses the rules from the back of the bestiary and calculates all the stuff for creating your own monsters would be awesome.

The new package just adds the Bestiary monsters - it's most useful for GMs who want to use Hero Lab to build their own encounters. You can also export them to d20pro, as mentioned above.

If you're a Pathfinder player and you don't have any use for 300 new monsters, this probably isn't a package you'll be interested in - in that case, you can just keep using the Pathfinder files as before. But I know a number of GMs were clamoring for this addon a few months ago, so this package is targeted at them. :)

Hi everyone,

We just released Hero Lab v3.6a, which includes a major addition for the Pathfinder game system - the "Pathfinder Bestiary I" package. This new data package includes all material from the Pathfinder Bestiary and Bonus Bestiary, with over 300 creatures and stock heroes ready for instant use in your games.

This optional add-on package costs $14.99, and is available to Pathfinder users by going to the "License" menu within Hero Lab and selecting "Purchase Data Package...".

If you have any questions about Hero Lab or the new data package, we're happy to answer them here, or on our forums. You can read more about Hero Lab here:

http://wolflair.com/hero_lab

Enjoy!

Hmmm...

So PC users will receive cutting edge software while Mac users will get stuck with "hand-me-down" products and make-shift workarounds?

If Mac and PC users pay the same amount of money for the program, Mac users should receive equal quality.

Personally, I'm not inclined to spend money on something half-baked.
I'll wait a few years until you've have the chance to rewrite the program for Mac.

This is not at all accurate. Let me expand on what I wrote earlier:

If we were to sit down and rewrite Hero Lab for the mac, this would take at least six months, possibly more. During this time, we would be spending all our time working on the mac version, not the PC version.

However, once we did that, the mac version would be released in parallel with the PC version. It would be just as "cutting edge" as the PC version - new game systems would be released for both at the same time, and new features would be available for both at the same time.

We wouldn't release something "half-baked" on the PC or the Mac, because that isn't the sort of thing that makes for popular software. :)

Hopefully this clarifies matters.

For people like LazarX concerned about the application looking too "windows-like", here's a screenshot of a Pathfinder character:

http://wolflair.com/hero_lab/images/pth_classes.png

Hero Lab uses its own stylized interface, not native windows controls, so it shouldn't really "feel like" a windows application. (For the mac port, the menu bar would appear at the top of the screen like all mac applications.)

For people who are concerned about the GUI being too "windows-ish", does that reassure you? If there are any mac users who have had experience of Hero Lab on PC or running in a virtual machine, I'd be interested in hearing your opinions on this.

LazarX: Unfortunately we wouldn't be able to use the native printing / PDF output with the solution we're looking at (you would still be able to print, of course). The application would include its own way to generate PDF files.

Thanks for your feedback, everyone.