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Direct Pipe to Hero Lab

Discussion in 'Feature Requests' started by phloog, Aug 22, 2011.

  1. phloog

    phloog Member

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    This ties in to my question/complaint in the other forum where I have no items in D20Pro, and it looks like I'll have to add them all one by one manually....yick.

    I use Hero Lab for PC maintenance, then export it all to D20Pro. We're playing through DungeonADay, and the group will find loot....and we end up using PAPER to track this because none of the items exist in D20Pro and it's a nightmare to add them all. Even if it was EASY to add them in D20Pro, we would still have to update HL, then re-import to get the items with any impacts on the characters.

    What if you could pick, for example, from 7-10 characters, and D20Pro had what would essentially be a live "pipe" to HeroLab....so for those characters any changes in Herolab are instantly available in D20PRo...so my people find a magic weapon, I don't have to go through the nightmare of creation in D20PRo, I just add it to their official HL version, and it pipes across without the full export/import process....

    Well?
     
    #1 phloog, Aug 22, 2011
  2. bigkilla

    bigkilla Member

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    That would be very very cool. No idea if it could be done.
     
    #2 bigkilla, Aug 23, 2011
  3. edwardcd

    edwardcd Administrator
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    Yes, this would be very nice. It would probably increase sales of both Hero Lab and d20Pro if this was a feature.

    Only way I would think it would work is inside d20Pro, would read the updated POR file every so often (self defined: auto-every round, auto-every start-up, or manual-button). The disadvantage of automatic updates whenever the POR file has a new date/time stamp would mean that d20Pro needs to process the POR file and update any chances then submit that to the GM and also submit some other information to all the other players. Then if you have these mini-updates though the game it would slow the game down some with each update since data must be transmitted to the GM and to the other players.

    This method would require d20Pro to read the Hero Lab POR file and translate into a native d20Pro format then update the linked character, which I'm sure would take many programming hours to accomplish.
     
    #3 edwardcd, Aug 24, 2011
  4. ogexam

    ogexam Member

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    We have thought of this and have looked into doing live updates of the character sheets. Right at this point in time we have "bigger fish to fry".

    There are some possible changes to data exchanges between tools. I will keep this idea on the table when the updates are discussed to see how feasible it is to have d20Pro update a herolabs file.
     
    #4 ogexam, Aug 24, 2011
  5. Kizan

    Kizan New Member

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    +1 for this idea.

    Sounds like a timed auto-import feature for d20Pro. You'd have to associate the d20pro token with a specific file. d20Pro would have to re-import the .por file every once in awhile (user configurable timer?). We use Dropbox to share our HL characters and PDFs now. So this feature would work really well for us.

    With lots of .por files it could make d20pro work pretty hard if it were re-importing too often. Is the import function a separate program? Maybe that would help so it gets it's own thread and priority. (We have now reached the edge of my programming nerdiness and I will now defer to others that know WAY more about that than I. Please take my suggestions as pure wish-fulness.)

    Mostly I just wanted to put my two bits in for this idea as I think it's very kewl.

    Thanx,

    Kizan
     
    #5 Kizan, Aug 24, 2011
  6. phloog

    phloog Member

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    I actually thought of it while using ZBrush (a 3d modeling program) and Vue (landscape generation/animation) in conjunction with 3dsMax animation software. The interfaces are admittedly clunky, but Zbrush can pass models back and forth to 3dsMax, 3dsMax can import Vue data and edit it, etc.

    I guess where I'm troubled by this is that with all the 'bigger fish', I'm worried that one of the bigger fish may be more PC manipulation...granted that's nice for a lot (most?) of the d20Pro users, but for those of us invested in the pair, that's effort expended on the D20Pro side of character management that not only takes time away from the development of a 'pipe', but that D20Pro-Side work becomes IRRELEVANT for us if you did the other.

    And I recognize that's a big strategic decision, to essentially set up another company's product as your go-to PC-management software. But selfishly I'm all for it.
     
    #6 phloog, Aug 24, 2011
  7. kelendros

    kelendros New Member

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    I agree that character manipulation needs a bit of handling...I think on the player end making their character sheets interactive allowing them to switch weapons, use items from their inventory, and select spells in a simple mannor would be amazing. Expecially if this form could look like a traditional character sheet. This will give my players incintive to purchase more liscences. combine this functionality with some of the other feature request such as auto updating the game file, and even selecting a light source for the new fog of war would make this powerful, and make my players that hate using a computer feel a little less like they are using a computer ;).
     
    #7 kelendros, Aug 25, 2011
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