In HeroLabs, by next weekend, I might be able to build those races and add character levels to them. Thus far, as much as I love HeroLab, I don't find it all that easy to use the Editor. But to be fair to HL, not all of the necesssary functionality has been added to it yet, but will be shortly.
What aspects of the Editor do you find least appealing? We're always looking to improve the product, but we need to know what needs to be tweaked in order to do that. Please provide as much detail as possible about the facets you don't find easy, since that will help us focus on the right areas.
but if some character builder would actually look at the AP's and see what races are really getting character levels, that would be awesome.
Based on this post, we've already started that discussion. I don't have any concrete answers yet, since the discussion just began, but we're definitely looking into it.
Here's a question: as a freelancer and contributor I'm always looking for programs that will save me time by out-putting NPCs to a word doc or rtf file in the Paizo official stat block format. I have a tool I work with that's pretty close, but can Herolabs and or PCGen do that?
I'm 99% certain that Hero Lab outputs the official Paizo stat block format. You can output it to text, HTML, or BBCode. We've got RTF output on the todo list for a future product update.
You can verify the output format with the demo version of the product.
Also, what about monster design? Can I design a monster in either Herolabs or PCGen and output that in stat block format?
You can design a monster as either a race or a class in Hero Lab. Both methods have their use, with the differences being outlined in the documentation. As above, you can fully experiment with how this works in Hero Lab by using the demo version. So there's no financial risk involved.
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Here's a question: as a freelancer and contributor I'm always looking for programs that will save me time by out-putting NPCs to a word doc or rtf file in the Paizo official stat block format. I have a tool I work with that's pretty close, but can Herolabs and or PCGen do that?
Also, what about monster design? Can I design a monster in either Herolabs or PCGen and output that in stat block format?
rpgExplorer definitely can with a little bit of tweaking...Pretty sure PCGen could too.
In 5.16.1 and up of PCGen, Statblock #5 is designed to imitate Paizo's statblock. So you would just output that, then clip and paste it into your design document for the publisher.
:)
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The help file for the Editor in HeroLab walks you step-by-step through the process of adding new feats, races, classes and items. If you copied those instructions word-for-word you'd have a new one of each entered. I printed out a copy and keep them on hand for doing just this. Admittedly, script writing is not my thing, but in those cases help isn't too far way on their forums.
I've had Herolab for sometime and I find the manual functions to be a major pain to access and the instructions rather opaque: Here's what I'd really like.
1. In addition to the built in manual, PDF manuals with appropriate bookmarking.
2. Examples of how to create items such as new races, feats, classes etc.
I'm not sure what you mean by the "manual functions", unless you are referring to accessing them. The main user manual is accessible from the Start menu, via the icon right next to the one used to launch Hero Lab itself (just like lots of products over the years). You can also access the basic manual from the Help menu.
Each game system has separate documentation that outlines all the particulars of using that game. You can access that manual via a couple methods. When you load a game system, the Configure Hero window appears, and there is a button there labeled "View Manual". You can also access the docs for the game system via the Help menu.
There is a final set of documentation for each game system that is specific to adding custom content for that game. The easiest way to access that manual is by launching the Editor (the tool used to add content) and then click on the Help menu. The editing docs for each game system include detailed walk-throughs of adding all sorts of different content, as TwoWlves just pointed out.
The docs are all simple HTML files that can be viewed in any browser, complete with links, so having PDFs would provide little extra benefit to most users. Maintaining separate PDF versions of all these different bits of documentation would be lots of work to orchestrate with all the different game systems being updated independently of the product. We're a tiny company, so we try to focus on the features that will benefit the most users, and I believe you are now the second person to request PDF documentation over the three years that Hero Lab has been out. I've made sure this is on the todo list, but I must warn you that lots more users are going to need to request PDF docs instead of HTML before this supplants some of the other new features we have slated for the product. In the meantime, if you really need PDF, I think there are tools available to convert the HTML docs to PDF files for your own use.
From personal experience Hero Lab is a great product, but if you ever decide to change your operating system, or an configuration, you better plan in advance, because while they are good about updating your program to work on your new system, they do it on their own schedule, not yours. This would have been two weekends in a row without being able to use my license on my laptop, had I not swallowed the bullet and just purchased another secondary license to get the program up and running.
I almost feel like you don't own the program when you buy it, you just pay a $ 30.00 deposit. Then when you need the locks changed on your door, the landlord is out of town on the weekends, and really doesn't care if you can't get in to use your stuff. Shame really because for the most part I love the software, but can't get this seemingly simple issue resolved.
While I understand the reasons for DRM, it punishes the people who actually spend good money for the program. I've got too much invested to change now, but doubt I'll ever buy this type of product again...and if one comes out like this that I can buy instead of rent, I'll probably switch, no matter the time invested.
From personal experience Hero Lab is a great product, but if you ever decide to change your operating system, or an configuration, you better plan in advance, because while they are good about updating your program to work on your new system, they do it on their own schedule, not yours. This would have been two weekends in a row without being able to use my license on my laptop, had I not swallowed the bullet and just purchased another secondary license to get the program up and running.
I almost feel like you don't own the program when you buy it, you just pay a $ 30.00 deposit. Then when you need the locks changed on your door, the landlord is out of town on the weekends, and really doesn't care if you can't get in to use your stuff. Shame really because for the most part I love the software, but can't get this seemingly simple issue resolved.
While I understand the reasons for DRM, it punishes the people who actually spend good money for the program. I've got too much invested to change now, but doubt I'll ever buy this type of product again...and if one comes out like this that I can buy instead of rent, I'll probably switch, no matter the time invested.
Is this some kind of activation scheme?
Again note: Same avatar, but not lonewolf-rob
From personal experience Hero Lab is a great product, but if you ever decide to change your operating system, or an configuration, you better plan in advance, because while they are good about updating your program to work on your new system, they do it on their own schedule, not yours. This would have been two weekends in a row without being able to use my license on my laptop, had I not swallowed the bullet and just purchased another secondary license to get the program up and running.
I almost feel like you don't own the program when you buy it, you just pay a $ 30.00 deposit. Then when you need the locks changed on your door, the landlord is out of town on the weekends, and really doesn't care if you can't get in to use your stuff. Shame really because for the most part I love the software, but can't get this seemingly simple issue resolved.
While I understand the reasons for DRM, it punishes the people who actually spend good money for the program. I've got too much invested to change now, but doubt I'll ever buy this type of product again...and if one comes out like this that I can buy instead of rent, I'll probably switch, no matter the time invested.
Your story is precisely why I absolutely refuse to spend my money on any product containing Digital Restrictions Management (DRM).
The sentence "had I not swallowed the bullet and just purchased another secondary license to get the program up and running" is precisely why the company puts DRM in their software. You'll cough up another $30 to overcome the defects they intentionally built into the software. (Roll Sense Motive to notice ulterior motives for taking one's sweet time to readjust license keys.)
Then, to add insult to injury, "See! Our sales figures show more people are buying, so that means fewer people are pirating!"
In my not at all humble opinion, DRM should be illegal.
Lonewolf-Rob,
Earlier you asked me what I disliked about the Editor. I'll give it a shot. Please note, I differ from Lazar-X in that I think the existing documentation is fine as HTML.
In a sense, I do think the documentation is lacking in some respects. Not because it isn't thorough in going through the examples, but because the examples provided are really simplistic. The tutorial on Race editing with the 'Storm Elves', for example, is great until you actually want to create a creature from the Bestiary. The Storm Elf tutorial only modifies an existing race. It's great to know you can modify an existing file, but that doesn't teach you a whole lot about the more sophisticated aspects of race editing. If you create a new race file based upon a Bestiary Creature, you're going to run into things like special abilities.. and it's a lot more complex than just modifying base attribute scores, racial weapons, and starting languages..
This is what I did today: I've been trying to create a Stone Giant race in Hero Lab. I did all the tutorials over to refresh my memory, then I sat down to do it. Admittedly, most of it was pretty easy. The problem is the parts that aren't easy are actually really hard, and when you get help.. you have no idea why it works other than it does.
Mathias was helping me (for which I am very grateful), but it serves as a good illustration.
Rather than creating new specials for each situational stealth bonus, I decided to make a single special that's designed to show those bonuses. So, add the racial ability raStealth to your race, and then in the bootstraps menu, go to the fields button for that, and add a new field entry. Put "livename" into the Field Id and "+8 Stealth in rocky terrain" in the Value. "Assign" is the correct selection in the other menu.
(I'll eventually get all those old situational bonuses converted over so they don't clutter up the list of specials).
For rock catching (raRockCat), just select it as a racial special. You may also want to modify the name like you did on the stealth bonus, giving it a livename like "Improved Rock Catching (+4)".
Start by adding Rock throwing (raRockThro) as before, and this time, edit its tags, and add a new tag. Enter "Value" as the Group Id and "180" in the Tag Id. That sets the range of the rock throwing ability to 180'.
Now again, before anybody gets the wrong idea, I'm grateful for the help. And it works. I don't want to give the wrong impression that Lone Wolf won't help you edit your files! But the problem is, I could never figure that out on my own. Even after Mathias explained it to me, I don't know how he arrived at those explanations. I don't know what Group Id, or Tag Id means. Nor would I known where to find those buried where they are. So I really didn't learn anything about editing in a new race. Do you see the long term problem with that? And a Stone Giant isn't a terribly complex creature, but that Storm Elf tutorial didn't teach me enough. I wish we had an example that tackled something fairly difficult, so that we could get more than just the basic examples.
Honestly, the first time I tried to create a Stone Giant.. it was a mess. The main panel says to add an Ability Score Modifier for the basic stats. A stone giant's strength ability modifier is (+8), so I put in. Then I got flabbergasted when my giant only had a Strength of 18. It took me 10 to 15 minutes to finally realize that that if I put 17 in that box, then I would get a giant with strength 27 and a (+8) strength modifier. Yeah, I realize that should have been friggan obvious, but it wasn't just because of the sheer ambiguity of using the term "ability modifier" in two entirely different contexts. Then I look the in the Bestiary and Stone Giants have 6 pre-set feats, so I add 6 bonus feats. Except all that does is allow my giant to select 6 feats instead of having the 6 that are listed in the Bestiary. Mathias again comes to the rescue, telling me to create them in the Bootstrap menu.. which works perfectly. Except I'd never have known that if he hadn't told me, and therein lies my critique. Not that he helped me, but that I wouldn't have known if he hadn't.
(And even still I'd like this Martial Weapon Proficiency to be specifically for a Greatclub, rather than offering me a drop down menu choice.. but having come this far, I'm not prepared to be pedantic about it)
Three or four hours of trial and error this afternoon to almost, but not quite, create one creature. I'm still fighting with this hide in rocky terrain part.
And if you jump to the Data Authoring Wiki for more detailed information, that's way over the average user's head. So we go from too basic of a tutorial to a very complex wiki.
What you need to realize Rob, is that if the tactical console feature is going to be of any great use during actual game play.. we need to be able to create monsters and creatures easily. Then we could use the tactical console to track the conditions, stats, and abilities of the enemies. You show a screenshot of that being done, and it laughingly has a couple of 13-14 level characters shown in the tactical console along with some hobgoblins. That is because the hobgoblins are one of the few NPC races that created and provided with the program.
Again, I can see why you wouldn't want to invest the man hours in creating a datafile just for the Bestiary... but without building creatures for the program, the tactical console will never live up to it's potential. So we need more help so that we can do it ourselves.
As much as I like the program, the Editor is not as crystal clear as it is sometimes made out to be. On a positive note, it appears to be more than comprehensive enough to handle anything the Core Rules can shell out... if you know how to use it.
Your story is precisely why I absolutely refuse to spend my money on any product containing Digital Restrictions Management (DRM).
The sentence "had I not swallowed the bullet and just purchased another secondary license to get the program up and running" is precisely why the company puts DRM in their software. You'll cough up another $30 to overcome the defects they intentionally built into the software. (Roll Sense Motive to notice ulterior motives for taking one's sweet time to readjust license keys.)
Then, to add insult to injury, "See! Our sales figures show more people are buying, so that means fewer people are pirating!"
In my not at all humble opinion, DRM should be illegal.
I really doubt there is anything malicious or underhanded going on, it's just a nasty side effect of the whole DRM process.
I'm not a huge fan of silly laws either. Let them have their DRM, nothing is forcing you to buy it.
From personal experience Hero Lab is a great product, but if you ever decide to change your operating system, or an configuration, you better plan in advance, because while they are good about updating your program to work on your new system, they do it on their own schedule, not yours.
First of all, I'm not happy that this situation was drug into a public forum, but here it is. So I need to deal with it publicly instead of privately. I've been up to my eyeballs with all sorts of other crapola all day (about 10 hours so far) and just got to the part of my job where I do stuff like check forums and such. So no, we're not here at your beck and call, but we are working our tails off to keep on top of everything.
Since I just discovered this problem here, I'm still trying to gather info about this issue from our tech support person. However, here is what I have learned so far.
After digging through lots of info on our server, I found that you sent an email to "no-reply@lonewolfdevel.com" on the 16th (four days ago, not two weeks). In the email, you requested that your license be unlocked so you can activate it on a new computer only a month after activating it already. Do you have an initial clue about why the email might not have been seen or replied to?
The email address is "no-reply". This is a pretty common convention nowadays for automatically generated emails from servers. The email you replied to was sent when you asked our server to give you a list of your license numbers. Needless to say, as indicated by the email address, there was no reply to this email (because it's not monitored by anyone).
Support emails should be sent to support@wolflair.com. This is the official email address listed in multiple places within the product (including on the Help menu) and on our website. The fact that you chose to pick a different email address - let alone one that specifically indicates you won't get a reply - leads me to believe this is a case of "pilot error". However, I don't yet know if you also sent emails to support@wolflair.com.
If you did send emails to the proper support email address, you should have received an automated reply that states we generally respond to support emails within 2-3 days. Nancy (our front-line support person) usually checks support emails every day, but we include some slop to cover weekends and cases where she needs to send the email to Colen or myself for more in-depth analysis (e.g. a crash report). Situations like unlocking licenses can be readily handled by Nancy, so you should have had this handled within 24-48 hours if you sent an email to the proper support address.
That is, unless you have spam blockers intercepting your email. Your email address appears to be with Earthlink, and they have all sorts of stupid blockers enabled by default. So it's quite possible that you also sent emails to support and the responses were blocked as spam. I don't know about this yet, as I'm waiting to hear back from Nancy. Unfortunately, it's late Friday night, so she's not readily available.
Before all the DRM decriers get rolling, I also want to clarify another important detail. We only lock licenses from activation on a new computer for about 4 months from the time they were last activated. This means that users can freely move a license from one computer to another every 4 months, without any involvement from us. The only time we need to get involved is when someone wants to move their license less than 4 months after the last time (like this user's situation). This situation is quite uncommon in our experience. So why do we restrict it then? To make sure Jimmy and his entire gaming group don't collectively buy one copy and install it on everyone's computers.
For those of you who scoff at the above scenario being rare, I have concrete evidence that this is *commonplace* among gamers. In fact, the reason we switched to our current DRM is because of how rampant the problem was. For every ONE of you honest folks out there, we found that there were THREE dishonest folks. Yes, you read that correctly. Among the gamer population that uses our products, roughly 75% are happy to pirate a piece of software. So we really didn't have much of a choice as a business, and the honest folks end up inconvenienced by the DRM due to the actions of the numerous dirtbags out there.
Now, for those of you who claim DRM doesn't work, I can definitely say that it *has* worked for *us*. Thus far (many years now), our DRM has not yet been cracked. I won't argue that it's existence has probably lost us a small number of customers who reject DRM out of hand. But I'm certain we've gained *significantly* more customers who have bought the software because they can't readily pirate it. From a business standpoint, that makes the DRM an unfortunate necessity.
If you are an honest user of software products, I commend you. Sadly, you are a dying breed in this world. And those of us in business are forced to take precautions against the common masses, which generally lack the scruples of you honest folk.
Once I hear back from Nancy, I'll share more about what I learn - even if this is a case where we screwed up. We're far from perfect, but we're open and honest about things. Stay tuned.
Now, for those of you who claim DRM doesn't work, I can definitely say that it *has* worked for *us*. Thus far (many years now), our DRM has not yet been cracked. I won't argue that it's existence has probably lost us a small number of customers who reject DRM out of hand. But I'm certain we've gained *significantly* more customers who have bought the software because they can't readily pirate it. From a business standpoint, that makes the DRM an unfortunate necessity.
Sorry you are having a bad day Lonewolf-Rob. I've stated in the past I would buy your product even with DRM, if there was a clause in the license stating your company would release a patch to the software if it's ever discontinued or the company goes out of business. So far, heard nothing on that. That might regain you some of the lost sales...
Your story is precisely why I absolutely refuse to spend my money on any product containing Digital Restrictions Management (DRM).
Then you're going to find yourself having fewer and fewer options for commercial software. Given the rampant piracy, there are really only two viable solutions out there: DRM and the use of key discs (or other hardware protection). We used the key disc technique years ago and our customers said they wanted DRM instead, so that's what we did.
There's quite a bit of freeware out there. Some of it is quite good. However, most of it that I've tried has been a matter of getting exactly what I paid for it. Nothing.
The sentence "had I not swallowed the bullet and just purchased another secondary license to get the program up and running" is precisely why the company puts DRM in their software. You'll cough up another $30 to overcome the defects they intentionally built into the software. (Roll Sense Motive to notice ulterior motives for taking one's sweet time to readjust license keys.)
Then, to add insult to injury, "See! Our sales figures show more people are buying, so that means fewer people are pirating!"
That's a load of crapola, and either you're trolling or you're pulling stuff out of the air without any knowledge of the situation. We've been in business for 15 years and have been selling our products to gamers for 12 of them. We wouldn't have a large and loyal customer base if that claim had even the slightest ring of truth to it.
In my not at all humble opinion, DRM should be illegal.
If piracy could be actually policed and there were meaningful repercussions for doing it, then DRM wouldn't be a business necessity.
From personal experience Hero Lab is a great product, but if you ever decide to change your operating system, or an configuration, you better plan in advance, because while they are good about updating your program to work on your new system, they do it on their own schedule, not yours.
OK, I just received some info from Nancy (our support person) about all this. According to her....
On October 12, there were a couple of emails back and forth to sort out an issue with one license needing to be unlocked.
Late on November 13th (a Friday), an email was sent to support asking to unlock a license. This happened to come in shortly after Nancy cleared the support queue on Friday. Due to family stuff that weekend, Nancy didn't get back to the support queue and reply until Monday (16th). No specific license number was provided in the email, and you had three license numbers at the time. So Nancy took her best guess and unlocked what she thought to be the license number you wanted. It seems she guessed wrong.
At some point later this week (Nancy didn't provide me with the date so I've requested it), you sent support another email indicating that you needed us to unlock a different license number and provided the correct license number this time. Nancy said that she unlocked the different license number today.
So it looks like this whole problem centered on two key things. First, the timing of your emails to support ended up being horrible, resulting in the maximum amount of time occurring between cycles of Nancy clearing the support queue. Second, inadvertently omitting critical information from the email (i.e. the correct license number) resulted in an extra cycle of emails being required.
I'm really sorry about the horrible timing, but I'm not sure what more we can do beyond monitoring the support queue more frequently. That begs the question of finding a balance against the volume of support emails we receive (which is pretty low). We could outsource our support, but I'm sure you've got plenty of personal experiences with how badly the quality plummets when that happens. So we make sure someone competent does it that can handle 95+% of the issues, with Colen and I dealing with the remaining few percent.
If we increase the support frequency, then that's an increased cost, so we have to pay for it somehow. In the past, we've polled our users and they've overwhelmingly said that they'd rather we keep our prices down instead of boosting services like support response times. So that's what we've done.
Beyond that, I'm open to suggestions for how best to handle things....
In a sense, I do think the documentation is lacking in some respects. Not because it isn't thorough in going through the examples, but because the examples provided are really simplistic.
<snip>
But the problem is, I could never figure that out on my own. Even after Mathias explained it to me, I don't know how he arrived at those explanations.
<snip>
And if you jump to the Data Authoring Wiki for more detailed information, that's way over the average user's head. So we go from too basic of a tutorial to a very complex wiki.
<snip>
As much as I like the program, the Editor is not as crystal clear as it is sometimes made out to be. On a positive note, it appears to be more than comprehensive enough to handle anything the Core Rules can shell out... if you know how to use it.
I think the above snippets summarize the fundamental points you're trying to make in your post. If not, please correct me.
I agree that the examples in the documentation *are* simpler than they could be. The docs are intended to get users started, and they focus on the stuff that everyone is going to want to understand. We don't want to scare users off by launching into all sorts of complexity when many of those same users won't ever need to delve into that complexity. Ignorance is bliss for users who want to add custom magic items, feats, and the like to support their house rules and the GM's particular world.
For the hardcore users, we've got the Authoring Kit, which provides all the gory details of the inner "magic" that Hero Lab achieves. It outlines all the sophisticated features of Hero Lab so you can accomplish virtually anything with it. As you point out, Hero Lab can more than handle all the complexities of Pathfinder. However, a tool that handles those complexities requires lots of sophistication, which in turn entails a significant learning curve.
Floundering in the middle are users like yourself. You want to leverage the product as fully as possible, which means wanting detailed access to all the creatures out of the Bestiary within the TacCon. That means you need to know more than just the basics. However, you also don't want to wade through all the complexities of the Authoring Kit, just to use 10-20% of it. You want something in between.
Unfortunately, we don't currently have suitable documentation that's really designed for users like yourself. Prior to Pathfinder, this really wasn't an issue, since users generally had all they needed with the Editor (plus a few questions on our forums) or they needed to really delve into the Authoring Kit. Things have changed with Pathfinder. We've recently realized this and begun discussing it internally to figure out the best solution.
Here's what my current thinking is, so let me know if you think this would work for you. First of all, we identify a subset of the Authoring Kit that is required reading. This would introduce all the basic concepts and terminology that Mathias was using in his post. Second, we identify 5-6 creatures from the Bestiary and fully implement them. We choose creatures that cover a broad range of mechanics so that we can demonstrate how to do 85+% of the stuff that is needed for creatures. For each creature, we do NOT write up a detailed walk-through, since we assume users will already know the basics. Instead, we identify what's special about each of those creatures and outline how to implement the creature, along with why we've done things that way. We gloss over the stuff that users should already understand. Where appropriate, we point out various sections of the Authoring Kit that are specifically used, allowing users to read just the sections that they need. We then assume that users can figure out the rest and/or post questions on our forums to ask about the nuances of certain creatures they try to implement.
Would that give you something highly useful?
I've stated in the past I would buy your product even with DRM, if there was a clause in the license stating your company would release a patch to the software if it's ever discontinued or the company goes out of business. So far, heard nothing on that. That might regain you some of the lost sales...
As I recall, you foretold that the lawyers would have a coronary if we did that. You were correct in your expectations.
They said doing that would paint us into a corner that we would regret, then they started rattling off all sorts of reasons why it was akin to business suicide. The lawyers said that our current philosophy of keeping products supported long after other companies would abandon them was perfectly fine, albeit confusing. Just as long as we never committed to doing it in writing. That leaves us an "out".
I realize this "out" is exactly why you object to the DRM in the first place, and it's why you're looking for a safety clause for yourself. So I'm sorry we couldn't figure something out.
FYI, I asked them about differentiating between the entire *product* being abandoned versus a *version* being abandoned. In other words, could we commit to unlocking the software if the entire product were ever abandoned, but still protect ourselves against users claiming that an older version of an actively supported product falls under the guarantee and needs to be unlocked. They said that's extremely difficult to word in a way that would be unassailable, plus there's the question of what if we ever changed the product name, even slightly? They shot holes in everything I could come up with, saying that any provisions we put in writing could be readily used to work against the spirit of the provision by exploiting the letter of any wording. And there were too many holes inherent in any wording that might be used. After an expensive process (aka lawyers fees plus my time), I finally gave up.
When I finally got done with the lawyers, I couldn't remember where you made the original post about this. So I didn't know where to post the outcome. Thanks for bringing it back up so I could at least give you the answer after you offered your suggestion. I still think the spirit of your proposal is perfectly reasonable, even though it's unworkable in terms of legal implications.
From personal experience Hero Lab is a great product, but if you ever decide to change your operating system, or an configuration, you better plan in advance, because while they are good about updating your program to work on your new system, they do it on their own schedule, not yours.OK, I just received some info from Nancy (our support person) about all this. According to her....
On October 12, there were a couple of emails back and forth to sort out an issue with one license needing to be unlocked.
Late on November 13th (a Friday), an email was sent to support asking to unlock a license. This happened to come in shortly after Nancy cleared the support queue on Friday. Due to family stuff that weekend, Nancy didn't get back to the support queue and reply until Monday (16th). No specific license number was provided in the email, and you had three license numbers at the time. So Nancy took her best guess and unlocked what she thought to be the license number you wanted. It seems she guessed wrong.
At some point later this week (Nancy didn't provide me with the date so I've requested it), you sent support another email indicating that you needed us to unlock a different license number and provided the correct license number this time. Nancy said that she unlocked the different license number today.
So it looks like this whole problem centered on two key things. First, the timing of your emails to support ended up being horrible, resulting in the maximum amount of time occurring between cycles of Nancy clearing the support queue. Second, inadvertently omitting critical information from the email (i.e. the correct license number) resulted in an extra cycle of emails being required.
I'm really sorry about the horrible timing, but I'm not sure what more we can do beyond monitoring the support queue more frequently. That begs the question of finding a balance against the volume of support emails we receive (which is pretty low). We could outsource our support, but I'm sure...
Rob. I appreciate your response. You have decided on DRM and I certainly understand your decision. I didn't take this to a public forum until I didn't get a response otherwise. It was Friday and I didn't want to not be able to use my program another weekend...and who knows how long after that.
If you're going to have control of when I use this program, then it's your responsibility to be available when I make changes and upgrades. I have a desktop, (2)laptops, and a Netbook, and I frequently change things about the systems so this is going to be a recurring thing. I'd be willing to pay for "emergency service" when I need it. In this case I had to spend $10.00 to get things working again, so if I had to pay $4.95 to get it reset or something like that I'd be willing. This is not something I want to do but I can't change anything about my computer without your permission. Just really frustrated because I like your software so much, but I feel it's not really my software.
As I recall, you foretold that the lawyers would have a coronary if we did that. You were correct in your expectations.
Honestly, I never really had a major dislike for lawyers, but... as time goes on, I'm becoming more and more convinced that if we deported a lawyer a day we'd be a better country in 50 years.
They said doing that would paint us into a corner that we would regret, then they started rattling off all sorts of reasons why it was akin to business suicide. The lawyers said that our current philosophy of keeping products supported long after other companies would abandon them was perfectly fine, albeit confusing. Just as long as we never committed to doing it in writing. That leaves us an "out".I realize this "out" is exactly why you object to the DRM in the first place, and it's why you're looking for a safety clause for yourself. So I'm sorry we couldn't figure something out.
This is pretty much it. All the power is in the hands of your company, not mine. You can change the license at any time, legally, and require more money, discontinue support, disconnect the servers (see Yahoo, Microsoft Zune, NFL Videos, Amazon Kindle, Blue Ray movies with 1st gen players, the list goes on). As much as I understand that piracy hurts your company, I just can no longer in good conscience support software that hurts me to make your life easier. And, I say this as a software developer (I do this for a living). In my own home I no longer use software that I can't be sure will work in an ongoing way. Are there a few exceptions? Of course. I do have windows XP (although I dual boot it with Ubuntu or Mint Linux). Other than that though I don't own software that 'calls home'. I use software that either installs from a disk onto any computer I own without calling home, or I use OSS (open office, gimp, etc).
I honestly hope your company does well, but I'm afraid I'm tired of buying stuff that someone else can disable at their sole discretion, and I'm tired of one-sided EULA's that give a company all the power and removes all my power.
FYI, I asked them about differentiating between the entire *product* being abandoned versus a *version* being abandoned. In other words, could we commit to unlocking the software if the entire product were ever abandoned, but still protect ourselves against users claiming that an older version of an actively supported product falls under the guarantee and needs to be unlocked. They said that's extremely difficult to word in a way that would be unassailable, plus there's the question of what if we ever changed the product name, even slightly? They shot holes in everything I could come up with, saying that any provisions we put in writing could be readily used to work against the spirit of the provision by exploiting the letter of any wording. And there were too many holes inherent in any wording that might be used. After an expensive process (aka lawyers fees plus my time), I finally gave up.
I'm not surprised, lawyers will always attempt to concentrate maximum evasiveness in any contract. I think there must be something unfortunate that happens to a lawyer in school, something that increases their sliminess to the maximum. :( I didn't used to feel that way, but as I've grown older and met more and more lawyers, it just makes me feel like I need to take a bath now when I meet most of them.
Ah well, good luck. I won't hold my breath that you can get a lawyer to agree to an ethical exchange of liability. The way the world works now days, all the liability is on the consumer's side. I may not be able to change it, but I can at least vote with my money and not encourage it.
I think the above snippets summarize the fundamental points you're trying to make in your post. If not, please correct me.
I think you got the gist of it. Here's a few observations to cheer you up however. I learned a lot from the hours I spent on making a stone giant last night. If I ever go to make another creature, it will be easier. That is something I think everyone getting into this will have to go through; i.e. the first time is going to harder till you get the basics down.
And if it cheers you up, over the years I've not only purchased Pathfinder, but d20, M&M and M&M Ultimate Powers Pack, and at least two of my friends have done the same based upon my experiences with the program. I'm not saying that to make you feel indebted, but rather to assure you that you're not wasting your time.
I hate to see anybody have a bad day.
I agree that the examples in the documentation *are* simpler than they could be. The docs are intended to get users started, and they focus on the stuff that everyone is going to want to understand. We don't want to scare users off by launching into all sorts of complexity when many of those same users won't ever need to delve into that complexity. Ignorance is bliss for users who want to add custom magic items, feats, and the like to support their house rules and the GM's particular world.
And there was a time I fit in that profile. However, now I GM all the time, and I am leveraging to get the most out of the program I possibly can.
Here's another quick observation, just to file away for future thought. Adding PC levels and special templates to monsters are Paizo Design 101. They love to do it. They get a more versatile and creative encounter out of doing it, and they do it often.
One thing that I'm encountering is that if you go back to their older material, published under 3.5, those creatures can be a lot different now with all the significant changes in the PC classes. For example, a Pathfinder RPG Ogre with 4 Barbarian levels is pretty different than an Ogre with 4 Barbarian Levels in 3.5. They have more options and tricks; in fact they can even be differentiated from each other with different tricks. Now I have a stat block that shows me the 3.5 Ogre, but one thing I'd like to see is how that same creature looks and feels when fleshed out with the Pathfinder rules. And again, in just the chapter I'm running I have:
And you're going to find that variation in all of the 3.5 Adventure Paths and individual modules, being converted over. And even when users finally run an Adventure Path written for the Pathfinder Core Rules (like Council of Thieves), then you have still have the TacCon issue.
Anyway, I'm beating a dead horse here.
I think your suggestion is a fine idea. You can learn a lot from studying an existing "thing" in the Editor.. and a directed guide to Authoring Kit that explains the 15%-20% that is immediately relevant (and is "required reading") certainly would not go amiss. Likewise, a handful of example creatures is also a great idea. Mathias was just saying the other day that Breath Weapons are difficult to codify because they vary so much from creature to creature. Having an example creature and a guide to explaining how a breath weapon is set up could be a great idea. But I'll leave it up to you guys to pick and choose what creatures and mechanics would be best illustrated. Just don't make them too easy. :)
Thanks for replying!
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Contributor
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I recently bought Hero Lab. Love the program. As a designer and contributor, I would love for monster creation -- using everything that's in the bestiary and including adding PC classes and PrCs -- to be as easy as making a character. I only want to go to something like the Editor when I'm inventing an entirely new magic item, ability, spell, race, class or PrC.
That ability, combined with what's already in Hero Lab, is my holy grail. I would utterly pay extra for a Bestiary data set and monster design screens.
I recently bought Hero Lab. Love the program. As a designer and contributor, I would love for monster creation -- using everything that's in the bestiary and including adding PC classes and PrCs -- to be as easy as making a character. I only want to go to something like the Editor when I'm inventing an entirely new magic item, ability, spell, race, class or PrC.
That ability, combined with what's already in Hero Lab, is my holy grail. I would utterly pay extra for a Bestiary data set and monster design screens.
It is an interesting thought.
It's not like they haven't charged for expanded content before. Case in point, they charged a little more to incorporate the M&M Ultimate Powers and Masterminds Manual to the main M&M Core rules. I don't see why they couldn't ask for a little more money for a proper Bestiary data set.
Your story is precisely why I absolutely refuse to spend my money on any product containing Digital Restrictions Management (DRM).Then you're going to find yourself having fewer and fewer options for commercial software. Given the rampant piracy, there are really only two viable solutions out there: DRM and the use of key discs (or other hardware protection). We used the key disc technique years ago and our customers said they wanted DRM instead, so that's what we did.
There's quite a bit of freeware out there. Some of it is quite good. However, most of it that I've tried has been a matter of getting exactly what I paid for it. Nothing.
If your assertion "then you're going to find yourself having fewer and fewer options for commercial software. Given the rampant piracy, there are really only two viable solutions out there" were true, then the lack of DRM would have killed the software market decades ago.
Yet, Bill Gates is a bajillionare by selling the most pirated piece of software in the history of computing.
Your argument is not sound on its face.
Moreover, I doubt any of your customers wrote your company a letter saying, "Could you please lock this software down to one computer, and not allow me to move it to another computer I own? I think that feature would be the best thing since sliced bread." Nice try, though.
That's a load of crapola, and either you're trolling or you're pulling stuff out of the air without any knowledge of the situation. We've been in business for 15 years and have been selling our products to gamers for 12 of them. We wouldn't have a large and loyal customer base if that claim had even the slightest ring of truth to it.The sentence "had I not swallowed the bullet and just purchased another secondary license to get the program up and running" is precisely why the company puts DRM in their software. You'll cough up another $30 to overcome the defects they intentionally built into the software. (Roll Sense Motive to notice ulterior motives for taking one's sweet time to readjust license keys.)
Then, to add insult to injury, "See! Our sales figures show more people are buying, so that means fewer people are pirating!"
The guy claimed, right here on this very forum, not a dozen posts up, that he spent an additional $30 to get another license running on his laptop due the DRM in your program.
If you want to call the facts "crapola" and me a "troll", that's fine.
If I'm wrong about motivations, then you'll give the guy his $30 back, right?
In my not at all humble opinion, DRM should be illegal.If piracy could be actually policed and there were meaningful repercussions for doing it, then DRM wouldn't be a business necessity.
Plenty of software and PDFs (Paizo's own, in fact) get by without DRM. One man's "business necessity" is apparently another man's "dealbreaker defect".
I do wonder though, how did your company ever manage to survive 12 years through the ravages of rampant piracy before it switched to the "uber-DRM" it uses today? Your claims regarding "business necessity" are contradictory in this regard.
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From personal experience Hero Lab is a great product, but if you ever decide to change your operating system, or an configuration, you better plan in advance, because while they are good about updating your program to work on your new system, they do it on their own schedule, not yours.
Install software that does hardware configuration hashing as part of its DRM into a virtual machine in VirtualBox. You can backup the entire machine and restore it if you need to do a bare metal reinstall or hardware changes on your host system. Makes life a lot less painful.
Alternatively, make sure you have planned ahead and got your licenses sorted before you tinker with your system.
From personal experience Hero Lab is a great product, but if you ever decide to change your operating system, or an configuration, you better plan in advance, because while they are good about updating your program to work on your new system, they do it on their own schedule, not yours.
Install software that does hardware configuration hashing as part of its DRM into a virtual machine in VirtualBox. You can backup the entire machine and restore it if you need to do a bare metal reinstall or hardware changes on your host system. Makes life a lot less painful.
Alternatively, make sure you have planned ahead and got your licenses sorted before you tinker with your system.
I have no idea what language you are speaking. It seems similar to english, but I don't recognize any of the word combinations ;-).
stuff
I think you are being a bit harsh. Here is what I know about these guys:
1) they are a small software house that specializes in gaming
2) they don't charge a lot for it
3) it has DRM
It's tough to be a small software company. Maybe you should try it sometime, it's really tough. And from the reviews I've seen they make good product.
Assuming they are using DRM to force people to buy multiple copies based on one persons casual comment on the boards is just silly.
You don't like DRM and I'm on board with that, but accusing them of unethical business practices when you clearly have never even dealt with the company is way out of line.
stuffI think you are being a bit harsh. Here is what I know about these guys:
1) they are a small software house that specializes in gaming
2) they don't charge a lot for it
3) it has DRMIt's tough to be a small software company. Maybe you should try it sometime, it's really tough. And from the reviews I've seen they make good product.
Assuming they are using DRM to force people to buy multiple copies based on one persons casual comment on the boards is just silly.
You don't like DRM and I'm on board with that, but accusing them of unethical business practices when you clearly have never even dealt with the company is way out of line.
I'll admit to being harsh sometimes. I'll counter that I am always fair.
If they refund the guy his money, I'll admit my conjecture was wrong, and offer an apology.
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As for your suggestion to start a small software company; are you also gifted with mind-reading, wise Ogre? :-)
If your assertion "then you're going to find yourself having fewer and fewer options for commercial software. Given the rampant piracy, there are really only two viable solutions out there" were true, then the lack of DRM would have killed the software market decades ago.
DRM has been used extensively for software since its inception. Due to rampant piracy, it's become more and more stringent over time. All of the software I've seen in the last 5 years has DRM of some form, unless it's shareware or freeware. So your assertion makes no sense to me.
Yet, Bill Gates is a bajillionare by selling the most pirated piece of software in the history of computing.
It's a question of volume. Unfortunately, we don't do the same level of volume as Microsoft for a niche product like Hero Lab.
That being said, I'm sure Bill would love to have another $100 billion.
Microsoft invests *heavily* into its DRM technologies, and that keeps the piracy down from what it otherwise would be. Heck, offsetting piracy is actually something that some companies I know of factor into their pricing model, so it's probable that Microsoft does, too.
Moreover, I doubt any of your customers wrote your company a letter saying, "Could you please lock this software down to one computer, and not allow me to move it to another computer I own? I think that feature would be the best thing since sliced bread." Nice try, though.
Perhaps you should get some facts before making uninformed claims based on pure assumption. We previously sold our software in two forms: key disc AND an electronic license. Users could choose which form best suited them. We polled our users for which they preferred, and they heavily favored the electronic license. So they knew exactly what they were voting for.
If I'm wrong about motivations, then you'll give the guy his $30 back, right?
Actually, it's $10. And yes, I already informed Nancy to relay that offer to the user.
I do wonder though, how did your company ever manage to survive 12 years through the ravages of rampant piracy before it switched to the "uber-DRM" it uses today? Your claims regarding "business necessity" are contradictory in this regard.
Again, get your facts before making patently incorrect assertions based on pure assumptions. We used to do extensive consulting work here in Silicon Valley. The consulting revenues covered all the losses associated with having a niche product for which three pirated copies were in use for every one that was purchased. Once we switched to the new DRM, our product revenues covered the development costs and the consulting became an elective option instead of a business necessity. That shift enabled us to develop Hero Lab in the first place.
I'll admit to being harsh sometimes. I'll counter that I am always fair.
I'll counter that counter with a claim that you rush to judgement based on assumptions in lieu of getting the facts before rendering your "fair" judgement.
In my original post to you, I made the following statement:
"That's a load of crapola, and either you're trolling or you're pulling stuff out of the air without any knowledge of the situation."
You fixated on the troll reference and ignored the latter half of that statement, but you were definitely rendering judgement without the benefit of some really important facts.
Now that I've explained those facts, you end up looking uninformed - and unfair - in the judgement you rendered. Had you simply asked me to explain myself, I would have been happy to do so. This isn't the first time I've had to explain these exact same details on a public forum.
This situation is the thing I truly hate about public forums. The impersonal nature and slow cycle time makes people impatient and even brazen. They don't bother to get the facts and make claims based purely on assumptions. Then folks like me need to spend hours settings the facts straight. Those are hours that I'd much rather spend adding new features to our products. I'm guessing most of our users share that preference. Alas, it's not the reality these days.
It's tough to be a small software company. Maybe you should try it sometime, it's really tough. And from the reviews I've seen they make good product.
That sounds like the weary voice of experience. What sort of software do/did you develop?
Assuming they are using DRM to force people to buy multiple copies based on one persons casual comment on the boards is just silly.
You don't like DRM and I'm on board with that, but accusing them of unethical business practices when you clearly have never even dealt with the company is way out of line.
And thanks for providing a voice of reason and temperance!
That sounds like the weary voice of experience. What sort of software do/did you develop?
I do web applications development right now. I don't have a business, but I know a few people who do and small business is tough.
As I complained when I didn't think I was receiving good service, I would be a hypocrite not to give Kudos when due. I received an email from Lone Wolf support today offering to refund the $10.00 that I had to spend for another license.
While I still hate the process, I no longer wonder if the company is out to fleece me. They have shown me that they are honorable.
I have been very happy with Hero Lab. I have no issue with the DRM, and I have found the program to be worth every penny as a GM mainly for quickly generating NPCs. I would cheerfully pay another 30 bucks for a beastiary version of the program. I found the interface to be intuitive and quick to learn. I use a lot of NPCs for bad guys and role playing, so I have gotten a lot of mileage out of this program.
I have struggled with the tutorials to add alternate classes and such, but I am not very computer savvy, so I don't blame the program for my lack of expertise.
Purchasing Hero lab has been my only experience with this company, but I found the experience to be quite satisfactory. I have recommended Hero Lab to several friends already.
As I complained when I didn't think I was receiving good service, I would be a hypocrite not to give Kudos when due. I received an email from Lone Wolf support today offering to refund the $10.00 that I had to spend for another license.
While I still hate the process, I no longer wonder if the company is out to fleece me. They have shown me that they are honorable.
Cool! It's good to know there are still some good guys out there!
Moreover, I doubt any of your customers wrote your company a letter saying, "Could you please lock this software down to one computer, and not allow me to move it to another computer I own? I think that feature would be the best thing since sliced bread." Nice try, though.Perhaps you should get some facts before making uninformed claims based on pure assumption. We previously sold our software in two forms: key disc AND an electronic license. Users could choose which form best suited them. We polled our users for which they preferred, and they heavily favored the electronic license. So they knew exactly what they were voting for.
My friend used to kill people in two ways: having them stung to death by killer bees AND throwing them to a pack of wild dogs. The victims would choose which method best suited them. He polled the next in line for which they preferred, and they heavily favored the pack of wild dogs. So they knew exactly what they were voting for.
By your logic, I can now claim, "His victims said they wanted to be thrown to a pack of wild dogs, so that's what he did."
I assert that a false dichotomy is a logical fallacy, and cannot be the basis to indicate anything, including what users want in a software product.
If I'm wrong about motivations, then you'll give the guy his $30 back, right?Actually, it's $10. And yes, I already informed Nancy to relay that offer to the user.
I am very happy to hear this. I am posting a reply with my apology shortly.
I'll admit to being harsh sometimes. I'll counter that I am always fair.
I'll counter that counter with a claim that you rush to judgement based on assumptions in lieu of getting the facts before rendering your "fair" judgement.
In my original post to you, I made the following statement:
"That's a load of crapola, and either you're trolling or you're pulling stuff out of the air without any knowledge of the situation."
You fixated on the troll reference and ignored the latter half of that statement, but you were definitely rendering judgement without the benefit of some really important facts.
On the forums, it is common to quote what a person has said when you are responding to it. Here is what I said:
The guy claimed, right here on this very forum, not a dozen posts up, that he spent an additional $30 to get another license running on his laptop due the DRM in your program.
If you want to call the facts "crapola" and me a "troll", that's fine.
If I'm wrong about motivations, then you'll give the guy his $30 back, right?
If you want say "[I] fixated on the troll reference", you are welcome to do that. I will agree to disagree with your assessment of the content of my statement.
In fairness, my statement does contain a factual error. The proper amount under discussion is $10, not $30.
And in fairness, you have refunded the money, so by my own words, my conjecture about motivations was wrong.
As I complained when I didn't think I was receiving good service, I would be a hypocrite not to give Kudos when due. I received an email from Lone Wolf support today offering to refund the $10.00 that I had to spend for another license.
While I still hate the process, I no longer wonder if the company is out to fleece me. They have shown me that they are honorable.
When this saga began, I wrote:
Your story is precisely why I absolutely refuse to spend my money on any product containing Digital Restrictions Management (DRM).
The sentence "had I not swallowed the bullet and just purchased another secondary license to get the program up and running" is precisely why the company puts DRM in their software. You'll cough up another $30 to overcome the defects they intentionally built into the software. (Roll Sense Motive to notice ulterior motives for taking one's sweet time to readjust license keys.)
Then, to add insult to injury, "See! Our sales figures show more people are buying, so that means fewer people are pirating!"
In my not at all humble opinion, DRM should be illegal.
I apologize for jumping to conclusions about the motivations for including DRM in HeroLab. scranford's refund makes it clear that the company is not trying to inconvenience regular users or extort money from them with DRM.
I found it suspicious; I am a skeptic by nature. However, I like to think of myself as fair, and here the actions speak louder than words. They have done right by their customer, and my conjecture of ill-motivation has proven to be incorrect.
I'm sorry for any misunderstanding or hard feelings my statements may have caused.
This is ridiculous. I came to this thread hoping for some advice on what some might think were the better RPG software suites. Instead I get the DRM debate. Bottom line. I don't like DRM. That said, it is a reality of how some copyrighted businesses need to operate in order to stay afloat. It was said that Bill Gates is making money on the most pirated software out there. Maybe, but they aren't pirating the newer software to well now. Try a pirated copy of Vista. 30 days, then you will run into something wanting authentication & then you will be saddled with what you 'paid' for, nothing. DRM is starting to work for them.
That being said, AND I won't answer a debate on the subject, can we please get back to talking about the features & capabilities of the software originally asked about?
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Agreed! Any chance of seeing this in the future with Hero Lab?
I recently bought Hero Lab. Love the program. As a designer and contributor, I would love for monster creation -- using everything that's in the bestiary and including adding PC classes and PrCs -- to be as easy as making a character. I only want to go to something like the Editor when I'm inventing an entirely new magic item, ability, spell, race, class or PrC.
That ability, combined with what's already in Hero Lab, is my holy grail. I would utterly pay extra for a Bestiary data set and monster design screens.
Agreed! Any chance of seeing this in the future with Hero Lab?
I recently bought Hero Lab. Love the program. As a designer and contributor, I would love for monster creation -- using everything that's in the bestiary and including adding PC classes and PrCs -- to be as easy as making a character. I only want to go to something like the Editor when I'm inventing an entirely new magic item, ability, spell, race, class or PrC.
That ability, combined with what's already in Hero Lab, is my holy grail. I would utterly pay extra for a Bestiary data set and monster design screens.
I'll second this. I already love and use Hero Lab, this would just be like the cherry on top of a sundae.
Hyrum.
Super Genius Games
www.supergeniusgames.com
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I bought hero lab for the mutains & mastermids books. at first i paid for the core book and the power suppmant. Then pathfinder came out bought that one too. in their resant update for the m&m they suprise me with about 6 suppments for free. So i have a good feeling about them when they put out a Bestiary update.
Agreed! Any chance of seeing this in the future with Hero Lab?
I would utterly pay extra for a Bestiary data set and monster design screens.
Yeah! Back to actually discussing product features and how best to continue evolving Hero Lab. :-)
We're actively discussing various options right now. We would *love* to provide a complete set of data files for the Bestiary, along with a more streamlined process for creating monsters. The reality is that it will require lots of work and only be of value to GMs (not players). Coupled with the facts that we already have tons of stuff on our plate and we're a tiny company with very limited resources, we're trying to figure out how to solve this without having to derail other major plans. With a little luck, we'll be able to figure out a viable solution over the next few weeks that we can put on the schedule and announce. Stay tuned....
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Agreed! Any chance of seeing this in the future with Hero Lab?
I would utterly pay extra for a Bestiary data set and monster design screens.Yeah! Back to actually discussing product features and how best to continue evolving Hero Lab. :-)
We're actively discussing various options right now. We would *love* to provide a complete set of data files for the Bestiary, along with a more streamlined process for creating monsters. The reality is that it will require lots of work and only be of value to GMs (not players). Coupled with the facts that we already have tons of stuff on our plate and we're a tiny company with very limited resources, we're trying to figure out how to solve this without having to derail other major plans. With a little luck, we'll be able to figure out a viable solution over the next few weeks that we can put on the schedule and announce. Stay tuned....
Hot dog! That sounds promising. Please, if its a mostly GM thing, charge me a premium.
To make it of more interest to players, might I also suggest building two features into a Bestiary data set and creation screens: 1) the optional-rules ability to custom grow your familiar or animal companion with monster feats, class levels, etc and 2) maybe a feature called something like "Monsters I Have Fought" which prints out a little book of monster strengths and weaknesses from an encounter list the GM maintains. This lets GMs hand a stack o' notes to players and say, "this is what you know about these monsters you fought..." Add a setting that lets the GM vary the amount of info printed, and you've got Knowledge (nature) or Knowledge (abberation), etc. in a box, so to speak. Hell, you could tie it to a DC setting.
You might also tie this to an gladiator-style encounter builder for players who just want to test builds against various monsters and go a few rounds of hack and slash without a GM.
Add in the original monsters and related feats, abilities, etc. from the various Pathfinder APs, and (I humbly submit), anyone who owns and plans to run those will want this. *drools* thinking about it.
Just some crazy noodles.
Agreed! Any chance of seeing this in the future with Hero Lab?
I would utterly pay extra for a Bestiary data set and monster design screens.Yeah! Back to actually discussing product features and how best to continue evolving Hero Lab. :-)
We're actively discussing various options right now. We would *love* to provide a complete set of data files for the Bestiary, along with a more streamlined process for creating monsters. The reality is that it will require lots of work and only be of value to GMs (not players). Coupled with the facts that we already have tons of stuff on our plate and we're a tiny company with very limited resources, we're trying to figure out how to solve this without having to derail other major plans. With a little luck, we'll be able to figure out a viable solution over the next few weeks that we can put on the schedule and announce. Stay tuned....
I can understand. People forget that Paizo is effectively a small business. They have a small staff, so when they ask for a bazillion things, they should expect some delay.
I don't know how feasible it would be, but could there be a GM version, and then a player version? I know some different programs out there do that. I just don't know if yours can have it's functionality split like that.
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If entering the entire bestiary is too much to ask (and big chunks are already in there), then please please PLEASE input the monsters that advance by character class at the bare minimum. The program is great for.... making character classes. There are SO MANY leveled "monsters" in Pathfinder's APs already, and this feature would make it SO very much easier to convert them from 3.5 to PRPG.
Pretty please?