Massive rework of the spells and effects user interface

firebringer, we all agree with you on most all of your post and this is something we are actively working towards.

 

This has been requested by almost every person that posts feature requests on here, including myself.

 

This is the single most requested feature in my playing group. At the very least, let us save duration, DC, and templates to the spell effect library. But yeah, dynamic calculation is the way to go.

 

This makes me happy. <-- See?

 

Meanwhile, three full versions later...
-PCs still cant edit their character sheets.
-FoW is still not interactive.
-Spell Tab is still close to meaningless.

 

"At the very least, let us save duration, DC, and templates to the spell effect library. But yeah, dynamic calculation is the way to go."

As an interim measure, I've been setting up spells as abilities, with defined/saved DC's, effects, etc. I also like to put common or level/creature specific effects as descriptive text in brackets to the side of the spell name: things like 'no save', 'range 150' ', personal, or when I can't set an effect, like '+2 to attribute and skill checks'.

Examples:

In Abilities, Per Day (the label Wiz 3 causes the spells to effectively sort by class, level, then alphabetically)

------------------------------

Wiz 3: Fireball [range 680'; 20' radius spread]

The effect line is:

7d6 fire; DC 16 Ref half

------------------------------

Wiz 3: Haste [40' range; 7 creatures; +30 move]

The move only is listed as a label effect, because the other effects, including duration, are part of the calculated effects.

to hit +1; AC (dodge) +1; Ref +1; 7 rounds

------------------------------

Such needs to be modified due to changes to attributes, feats or other reasons why a DC might change--including leveling--but in the meantime works consistently from casting to casting.

Each needs to be defined for any PC's, NPC's, monsters, etc...so it takes work, but the result is quick casting and resolution with correct DC's and leveled damage, etc.

 

Yeah, I know about this workaround, but it is a really clunky way to simulate a spell list. What's frustrating is the the abilities tab contains the much of the basic functionality, but that same functionality isn't in the spell tab. It was a weird decision to let abilities save effects, DC, and duration, but to only let spells save effects. It's even weirder that it's stayed this way through multiple revisions. We've been an inch away from a usable spell tab from years, but that final step never gets taken.

 

This would also be very high up on my list of things to see improved. It is a clunky, really hard to use system (I'm pre-creating custom abilities as well). I don't know exactly how to best re-design this, but certainly something that minimized the amount of work we had to repeat would be great, particularly if we had scaling by level, so you only had to monkey with the spell one time, would be awesome.

 

I would suggest a addendum to the spells.txt file which could then be read by d20Pro, similar to the ability-effects.

example:

Code:

Cure Serious Wounds[conjuration, healing]|Heal 3d8+CL[max15]|Radiant 3d8+CL[max15]; Will half
Fireball[evocation, fire]|Fire CL[max10]d6; Ref half
Haste[transmutation]|to hit +1; AC (dodge) +1; Ref +1; CL rounds; Desc "Character gets an extra attack with a full round action, improves speed by 30', up to double."

In the CSW example the caster has to select at the point of casting which variant he wants to use.
The save DC should be automatically calculated through casterstats, spell level (which is defined in the classes.txt) and feats (spell focus). Of course the latter would need an addendum, as well as the caster level thing.

 

I'm glad to see this thread resurrected. It's my #1 priority item.

 

Same here. PLEASE.

You guys should make sure you visit the Google Moderator site and vote for this change request.