Character Builder Lite

[EllisDee37]

Is it possible to change it to 2-3 letters as this way seems to be quite confusing...so like lthis

Two-letters is a possibility; three would make the skills output too wide.

But could you give me an example of an actual build where the one-letter technique described might be confusing? Remember that you're not interpreting the letter in terms of all classes. Only in terms of the classes that are actually part of the build.

[Failedlegend]

Two-letters is a possibility; three would make the skills output too wide.

But could you give me an example of an actual build where the one-letter technique described might be confusing? Remember that you're not interpreting the letter in terms of all classes. Only in terms of the classes that are actually part of the build.

Well mainly trying to remember which letters represent the 2nd and 3rd class would be hard especially for people reading the output in the forums who are not familiar with the system (making giving feedback or reproducing the build hard)

The other issue is despite the 3 different letters some could still conflict ie. Rogue/Barbarian/Bard would be R R R if I'm not mistaken

There's no need to have a weird system like you have suggested just have the class show up with 2 letters, much easier to notice.

[Ayseifn]

Well mainly trying to remember which letters represent the 2nd and 3rd class would be hard especially for people reading the output in the forums who are not familiar with the system (making giving feedback or reproducing the build hard)

The other issue is despite the 3 different letters some could still conflict ie. Rogue/Barbarian/Bard would be R R R if I'm not mistaken

There's no need to have a weird system like you have suggested just have the class show up with 2 letters, much easier to notice.

Agreed, zero learning curve vs all that complexity just to save 3 characters is a little too reductive.

[EllisDee37]

Well mainly trying to remember which letters represent the 2nd and 3rd class would be hard especially for people reading the output in the forums who are not familiar with the system (making giving feedback or reproducing the build hard)

The other issue is despite the 3 different letters some could still conflict ie. Rogue/Barbarian/Bard would be R R R if I'm not mistaken

There's no need to have a weird system like you have suggested just have the class show up with 2 letters, much easier to notice.

Learning curve? The Level Order section is right above the skills screen. They're also colored -- both the level order and the skills grid -- though since cleric is yellow it's probably tough to see in the sample output.

A ranger/rogue/barbarian would be:

R = Ranger (primary class is always the preferred letter)
O = Rogue (secondary class can never duplicate the first class)
B = Barbarian (nobody else is using B, so barb gets its first choice)

Would this example really be confusing?

EDIT: There's also the issue of scrolling. Because the display is forced using courier font and blackened dots, as opposed to [Code][/Code] tags, if a line break is forced due to a narrow screen, the display is broken. There's actually a minimum forum width in place, where if you make your browser window small the post area scrolls to the right instead of redrawing smaller. I'm intentionally supporting the minimum forum width. 3 characters per column fits, while 4 characters (3 letters + space) would not.

A second letter is certainly not out of the question.

[EllisDee37]

Here's a thrown-together sample Ranger/Rogue/Barbarian build I wouldn't recommend to anybody:

Initial Test
13/5/2 Ranger/Barbarian/Rogue
Human


Level Order

1. Rogue. . . . . .6. Ranger. . . . .11. Ranger . . . . 16. Barbarian
2. Ranger . . . . .7. Rogue . . . . .12. Ranger . . . . 17. Ranger
3. Ranger . . . . .8. Barbarian . . .13. Ranger . . . . 18. Ranger
4. Ranger . . . . .9. Ranger. . . . .14. Ranger . . . . 19. Barbarian
5. Ranger . . . . 10. Ranger. . . . .15. Barbarian. . . 20. Barbarian


Stats
. . . . . . . .28pt . . 32pt. . .34pt . . 36pt . . Level Up
. . . . . . . .---- . . ----. . .---- . . ---- . . --------
Strength. . . . .8. . . . 8 . . . 10. . . .12. . . .4: DEX
Dexterity . . . 18. . . .18 . . . 18. . . .18. . . .8: DEX
Constitution. . 14. . . .16 . . . 16. . . .16. . . 12: DEX
Intelligence. . 14. . . .14 . . . 14. . . .14. . . 16: DEX
Wisdom. . . . . .8. . . . 8 . . . .8. . . . 8. . . 20: DEX
Charisma. . . . .8. . . . 8 . . . .8. . . . 8. . . 24: DEX
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .28: DEX

Skills
. . . . . O .R. R .R. R .R. O .B. R .R. R .R. R .R. B .B. R .R. B .B
. . . . . 1 .2. 3 .4. 5 .6. 7 .8. 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20
. . . . .------------------------------------------------------------
Disable . 4 .1. 1 .1. 1 .1. 1 .1. 1 .1. 1 .1. 1 .1. 1 .1. 1 .1. 1 .1. 23
Search. . 4 .1. 1 .1. 1 .1. 1 .1. 1 .1. 1 .1. 1 .1. 1 .1. 1 .1. 1 .1. 23
Spot. . . 4 .1. 1 .1. 1 .1. 1 .1. 1 .1. 1 .1. 1 .1. 1 .1. 1 .1. 1 .1. 23
UMD . . . 4 .1. 1 .1. 1 .1. 1 .½. 1½ 1. 1 .1. 1 .1. ½ .½. 1½ 1½ ½ .½. 22
Open Lo . 4 .1. 1 .1. 1 .1. 1 . . 1 .1½ 1½ 1. 1 .1. . . . 1 .1. . . . 19
Jump. . . 4 .1. 1 .1. 1 .1. 1 . . . . . . .1. 1 .1. . . . . . . . . . 13
Balance . 4 . . . . . . . . 5 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .9
Bluff . . 4 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .4
Diplo . . 4 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .4
Haggle. . 4 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .4
Swim. . . 3 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .3
Tumble. . 1 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .1
. . . . .------------------------------------------------------------
. . . . .44 .9. 9 .9. 9 .9 11 .7. 9 .9. 9 .9. 9 .9. 7 .7. 9 .9. 7 .7

[Failedlegend]

Yes having Rogue represented by an O is extremely confusing...sure users of the program would eventually memorize that but since two letters is no issue Ro would represent rogue much better (and it would make the forum output less confusing g for people who don't use your char planner)

Not to mention its probably easier than coding the 3 different single letters per class

[EllisDee37]

Yes having Rogue represented by an O is extremely confusing...sure users of the program would eventually memorize that but since two letters is no issue Ro would represent rogue much better (and it would make the forum output less confusing g for people who don't use your char planner)

Not to mention its probably easier than coding the 3 different single letters per class

I'll give the two-letter idea a shot and see if it looks okay.

I'm honestly confused by what you're saying, though. I don't understand what you mean by "memorizing." If ever you think "What's that 'O' above the '1' mean?" you only have to look up two inches at the Level Order section to see that level 1 is Rogue.

As for easier to code, no, because the single letter setup is already coded, so at this particular moment switching to two letters will take longer.

I suppose I could just remove the class line from the output. It doesn't technically add any information.

[EllisDee37]

In a happy surprise, there were no formatting changes that needed to be made to support 1-, 2- or 3-letter initials in either the output or the display screen. So I was able to play around with all variations with very little coding. My conclusions:

- Having some 1-letter and some 2-letter abbreviations (my first thought) was inelegant. It looked off kilter.
- Having all 2-letter abbreviations looks a touch busy. Not terrible, but not quite as good as I'd like.
- Using 3-letter abbreviations on the display screen was super cluttered, and actually harder to read than you might think. "Rog" and "Rgr" look very similar, especially when squished together.

So I decided to go with: (Same rules apply to both output and screen display.)

- If all classes have unique 1-letter initials, those are used.
- If any two classes share the same 1-letter initial, all classes use 2-letter abbreviations.

Artficer: Ar or Art
Barbarian: Bb or Brb
Bard: Bd, Brd
Cleric: Cl. Clr
Druid: Dr. Drd
Favored Soul: FS, FvS
Fighter: Fi, Fgt
Monk: Mo, Mnk
Paladin: Pl, Pal
Ranger: Ra, Rng
Rogue: Rg, Rog
Sorcerer: Sr, Sor
Wiz: Wz, Wiz

I intentionally came up with my 2-letter abbreviations without referring back to your list, and now cross referencing to see if I can improve on mine:

I went with Bn for Barb to make it more different than the Bd for Bard. (Bb and Bd could bleed together.)
I considered FS for Favored Soul but opted to keep the Xx pattern so went with Fv.
I like your Mo better than my Mk for Monk.
Pa feels better for Paladin.
We both had the same idea for Sr and Wz.

Ranger and Rogue are resisting elegant solutions. Ra and Ro look pretty similar, Rg kind of bleeds down below to the level row, and Rn looks kind of squished. I'm setting them to Rn and Rg for now.

[Failedlegend]

Awesome

[EllisDee37]

The nightmare that is selector-specific requirements draws to a close as I (finally!) put the finishing touches on the feats screen. Nothing in the GUI has changed, but now selectors enforce their own prereqs, like for instance Exotic Weapons, where Bastard Sword & Dwarven Axe require 13 Strength and can be Artie bonus feats, but none of the other exotics have prereqs or can be artie bonus feats. This logic is now implemented and seems to be working. I can re-use that code to start on the enhancements, now, which is good because I mainly wrote that code for enhancements.

Anyway, the recent discussion made me realize that I have lots of space in the feats area, so I expanded the "source" from 1 letter to 7. I chose 7 because "Deity" doesn't shorten well, and since I'm already at 5 for Deity might as well add two more for "Destiny". It's not great to be too long, though; "Favored Soul" just leaves a huge ocean of space. ("FavSoul" is where I landed for that.)

Here's a comparison of the Feats output from the OP and how it looks now:


Old

.1 : Power Attack
.1H: Least Dragonmark of Passage
.1F: Cleave
.2F: Stunning Blow
.3 : Weapon Focus: Slashing
.3C: Follower of the Sovereign Host
.6 : Great Cleave
.6F: Weapon Specialization: Slashing
.9 : Empower Healing Spell
10F: Improved Critical: Slashing
12 : Extend Spell
13C: Unyielding Sovereignty
14F: Greater Weapon Focus: Slashing
15 : Two Handed Fighting
17F: Improved Two Handed Fighting
18 : Greater Two Handed Fighting
19F: Greater Weapon Specialization: Slashing
21E: Overwhelming Critical
24E: Great Ability: Strength
26D: Perfect Two Weapon Fighting
27E: Blinding Speed
28D: Perfect Two Handed Fighting


New

.1. . . . : Power Attack
.1 Human. : Least Dragonmark: Passage
.1 Fighter: Cleave
.2 Fighter: Stunning Blow
.3. . . . : Weapon Focus: Slashing
.3 Deity. : Follower of: Sovereign Host
.6. . . . : Great Cleave
.6 Fighter: Weapon Specialization: Slashing
.9. . . . : Empower Healing Spell
10 Fighter: Improved Critical: Slashing
12. . . . : Extend Spell
13 Deity. : Unyielding Sovereignty
14 Fighter: Greater Weapon Focus: Slashing
15. . . . : Two Handed Fighting
17 Fighter: Improved Two Handed Fighting
18. . . . : Greater Two Handed Fighting
19 Fighter: Greater Weapon Specialization: Slashing
21 Epic . : Overwhelming Critical
24 Epic . : Great Ability: Strength
26 Destiny: Perfect Two Weapon Fighting
27 Epic . : Blinding Speed
28 Destiny: Perfect Two Handed Fighting


I took advantage of the new selector logic and wrapped all the dragonmarks into a single selector feat, as well as the deity feats into one feat per "level." Speaking of deity feats, I hammered that out to now support multiclassing deity classes. Before, if you took both paladin and cleric levels (for example), the second class to get to level 1 wouldn't be able to select any deity feat, which in turn would mean the feat screen would never be considered complete and thus would never appear in the output. That's all squared away now.

[EllisDee37]

The Enhancement screen is finished; all that's left now is the enhancements output -- which will re-use the same code used for destiny output -- and some cursory testing/bugfixes on my end. Once that's done I'll get it up somewhere where people can download it and start playing with it. Figure a day or two; I'm shooting for Monday.

I added the rest of the destinies, but the enhancement data is still unchanged at four trees so far: Kensei, Warpriest, Stalwart Defender, and Swashbuckler. I'm thinking I finish the coding and post it so people can play with it to uncover bugs while I enter the rest of the enhancement trees. Once the trees are done and bugs are fixed it should be good to go.

EDIT: Enhancement output is finished. Now doing my own bug hunt before posting it, hopefully tomorrow morning if I can figure out how/where to post it.

[EllisDee37]

Added the Human tree so I could finish off my test build, then ran into some issues with exclusive selector logic. Exclusive selectors are ones where you can't select the same one twice, like Action Surge. The Human tree is chock full of em. Anyway, I think I have that squared away now. Testing the output:

Kensei Warpriest
12/8 Fighter/Cleric
Chaotic Good Human


Level Order

1. Fighter. . . . .6. Fighter . . . .11. Cleric . . . . 16. Fighter
2. Fighter. . . . .7. Cleric. . . . .12. Fighter. . . . 17. Fighter
3. Cleric . . . . .8. Fighter . . . .13. Cleric . . . . 18. Fighter
4. Fighter. . . . .9. Cleric. . . . .14. Fighter. . . . 19. Fighter
5. Cleric . . . . 10. Fighter . . . .15. Cleric . . . . 20. Cleric


Stats
. . . . . . . .28pt. . .32pt . . 34pt. . .36pt . . Level Up
. . . . . . . .----. . .---- . . ----. . .---- . . --------
Strength. . . . 16 . . . 18. . . .18 . . . 18. . . .4: STR
Dexterity . . . .8 . . . .8. . . . 8 . . . .8. . . .8: STR
Constitution. . 14 . . . 14. . . .14 . . . 16. . . 12: STR
Intelligence. . 12 . . . 12. . . .12 . . . 12. . . 16: STR
Wisdom. . . . . 10 . . . .8. . . .10 . . . .8. . . 20: STR
Charisma. . . . 14 . . . 14. . . .14 . . . 14. . . 24: STR
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .28: STR

Skills
. . . . . F .F. C .F. C .F. C .F. C .F. C .F. C .F. C .F. F .F. F .C
. . . . . 1 .2. 3 .4. 5 .6. 7 .8. 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20
. . . . .------------------------------------------------------------
Concent . . .1. 4 . . 3 .1. 1 .1. 1 .1. 1 .1. 1 .1. 1 .1. 1 .1. 1 .1. 23
Heal. . . 2 . . . . . 1 . . 3 . . 3 . . 3 . . 3 . . 3 . . . .1. . .3. 22
UMD . . . 2 . . . .1. . .1. . .1. . .1. . .1. . .1. . .1. 1 . . 1 . . 11
Jump. . . 4 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .4
Balance . 1 .1. . .1. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .3
Tumble. . 1 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .1
. . . . .------------------------------------------------------------
. . . . .16 .4. 4 .4. 4 .4. 4 .4. 4 .4. 4 .4. 4 .4. 4 .4. 4 .4. 4 .4


Feats

.1. . . . : Power Attack
.1 Human. : Least Dragonmark: Passage
.1 Fighter: Cleave
.2 Fighter: Stunning Blow
.3. . . . : Weapon Focus: Slashing
.3 Deity. : Follower of: Sovereign Host
.6. . . . : Great Cleave
.6 Fighter: Weapon Specialization: Slashing
.9. . . . : Empower Healing Spell
10 Fighter: Improved Critical: Slashing
12. . . . : Extend Spell
13 Deity. : Unyielding Sovereignty
14 Fighter: Greater Weapon Focus: Slashing
15. . . . : Two Handed Fighting
17 Fighter: Improved Two Handed Fighting
18. . . . : Greater Two Handed Fighting
19 Fighter: Greater Weapon Specialization: Slashing
21 Epic . : Overwhelming Critical
24 Epic . : Great Ability: Strength
26 Destiny: Perfect Two Weapon Fighting
27 Epic . : Blinding Speed
28 Destiny: Perfect Two Handed Fighting


Spells

1. Cure Light Wounds, Nightshield, Protection From Evil, Remove Fear, Divine Favor, <Any>
2. Cure Moderate Wounds, Resist Energy, Eagle's Splendor, <Any>, <Any>
3. Cure Serious Wounds, Magic Circle Against Evil, Protection from Energy, Prayer, <Any>
4. Cure Critical Wounds, Death Ward, Freedom of Movement, <Any>

Enhancements

Kensei (32 AP)

• Kensei Focus: Axes, Spiritual Bond, Strike with No Thought, Power Surge
  
  1. Extra Action Boost III, Weapon Group Specialization, Haste Boost III
  2. Tactics III, Weapon Group Specialization
  3. Weapon Group Specialization, Strength
  4. Weapon Group Specialization, Strength
  5. Keen Edge

Warpriest (24 AP)

• Smite Foe, Resilience of Battle
  
  1. Divine Might III, Toughness III
  2. Smite Weakness, Wall of Steel III, Inflame III
  3. Inflame: Energy Absorption II, Strength
  4. Ameliorating Strike, Strength

Stalwart Defender (15 AP)

• Toughness, Stalwart Defense
  
  1. Item Defense II, Durable Defense III
  2. Resilient Defense III
  3. Strong Defense III, Strength

Human (9 AP)

• Damage Boost, Strength
  
  1. Dragonmark Focus: Orien II, Improved Recovery
  2. Lesser Dragonmark: Orien

Destiny

Legendary Dreadnought

1. Legendary Tactics III, Extra Action Boost III, Strength
2. Momentum Swing III, Imp. Power Attack, Strength
3. Lay Waste
4. Anvil of Thunder
5. Devastating Critical
6. Master's Blitz, Headman's Chop

Twists of Fate (15 fate points)

1. Sense Weakness (Tier 4 Fury)
2. Rejuvenation Cocoon (Tier 1 Primal)
3. Brace for Impact (Tier 1 Sentinel)

[EllisDee37]

Everything seems to check out, so here's a link for you guys to download it and play around. I'm using MediaFire to host it. Logging out of MediaFire to test, I had to temporarily disable AdBlocker in Firefox to make it download, but then it worked fine.

CharacterBuilderLitev0.9.zip

To install, unzip to anywhere under your documents folder. It will run natively on any Windows version post-Windows 2000, no installation necessary. Double-click the exe to run it, or create a shortcut if you like.

The zip is a svelte 277k. The only files in it are the exe, the data files, one save file (the trusty Kensei Warpriest sample build), and a half-dozen or so color scheme files. Builds (*.bld) and color schemes (*.clr) go in the \Save folder beneath the program folder. Data files go in \Data. The only file in the program folder is the exe, plus a config file (CharacterBuilderLite.cfg) gets created automatically when you run the program. The cfg file stores your settings.

All data is in except for enhancements. Play around with it to see if you can find any bugs, or if it doesn't look right. I'm particularly interested in how it looks in 1024x768, since it's designed for 1920x1080. I have no idea how it will scale down. Maybe not terribly? Who knows. If you can find any examples of text getting squished or not lining up properly, let me know. Screenshots welcome. EDIT: The group filters are currently disabled for enhancements.

Any runtime errors will terminate the program. If you can find one, and can post the steps to reproduce it, I can fix it quickly. If you can't reproduce it consistently, just give me the general idea of what you were doing and I'll take a look to see if I can find it.

I figure several days to enter the enhancements. Help me out by testing it during the next few days, then hopefully I can get you the first official release with all the enhancement data by this weekend.

[Ancient]

This tool is looking amazing! Thank you for all your hard work.

[Theolin]

I like it so far,
get an error when going from the skills page to the feats page

run time error '308':
Invalid property value

-crashes the whole program

happens when i click the "next' button to go to the feats page
doesn't matter if I select skills or leave them blank

[Yeww2]

Hi Ellis - great work, thanks for all the effort you've put into this. I'm not getting the bug Theolin is reporting. I'm on Windows 8.1.

[EllisDee37]

I dispatched a couple PMs to the early bug reports. I'm crossing my fingers that it's a data problem with some class/race combination I never tested as opposed to a core problem that I can't reproduce on my end.

First thing to check is if you get the same error when loading the Kensei Warpriest sample build. If so, bummer, I'll need to try and guess the problem to fix. If the Kensei Warpriest build works fine, though, then it should be fairly straightforward figuring out the problem with the builds being tried.

[EllisDee37]

Early reports on that bug point to the drag & drop ability slots used in the feats, spells, enhancements, destinies and options (color demo) screens. That's a custom control I wrote, but just being a custom control isn't in and of itself a problem because there's custom controls all over the first three screens and those don't appear to have any issues. The "max levels" spinner, the stat allocation controls and every checkbox is a custom control. (The checkboxes in the stat allocation area are custom controls inside custom controls, actually.)

As an aside, I'm not thrilled with how the checkboxes ended up looking, but lacking even an ounce of artistic ability that was the best I could do to make it so that the colors could change.

Anyway, for people experiencing the Invalid Property bug, I'm hoping to get a debugging version posted tomorrow that you can download, run, and hopefully help pinpoint where the error is coming from.

EDIT: I opted for lots and lots of custom controls for two reasons: First and foremost, they're pure native code, meaning there's no installation required. A secondary reason was to allow customizing the colors.

[ValariusK]

I assume all the enhancements aren't in yet---wasn't given the option on a ranger-2/fighter-9/druid-9 for any trees other than PDK, Stalwart Defender, and Kensei

Also, the natural fighting feats are either not there or hard to find.

Really looking forward to when harper works also

[EllisDee37]

Also, the natural fighting feats are either not there or hard to find.

Yeah the enhancements aren't in yet, but feats should be all done. What are the natural fighting feats? I may have missed them, having no knowledge of druids.