Upgraded Character Generator, Updated Generator Based on work from Autarkis and Blakkie Options

[Dakka Dakka]

Since it's not RAW-legal, and it'd be a pain to support (it took long enough to come up with a way to support breaking up groups afterchargen), it probably won't be implemented, although that's always DK's call. I think for minor rule breaking, unprotecting the sheet and changing it by hand is sufficient.

As i corrected myself it does work. But for some reason the cell is protected. Btw what counts as RAW? The FAQ state that they advise against it but they don't forbid it either.

Did you put in that you were buying 5 magic, or was your magic rating 5 after taking essence into account (i.e. you put in 6)? (The final values show up a few columns over). If the former, it's certainly wrong, if the latter, that's intended behavior - you put in your base stats, and then they get adjusted for racial modifiers, essence loss, and so on.

I put in 6 (Cell bpMagic) for 65 BP shown in Cell AA5, the modified magic Attribute (modMagic) is 6 as well. After I added a synaptic booster, modMagic is 5 as it should be, but AA5 is at 40 BP and P11 is at 6 and red. If you enter 5 in bpMagic after the 'ware AA5 increases to 55 but modMagic at 4?!

I asked about mystic armor - the response was that since it listed under powers, it didn't need to add in to armor as well.

I just realise that there is no list for the 'ware on CharSheet. OK, but both the list and the calculated mystic armor would be nice.

[DamienKnight]

First of all OO claims that there are links to other files and asks if i want to update them. What other files?

I believe this may be due to the way Excel wraps sheet references in single quotes when the sheet name has spaces in it. The new character data mapping sheets were like this. I changed the spaces in their names to underscores and corrected related 'Names'. Hopefully this will fix it, but I only have Excel 2003 which does not get that error.

On the Main sheet the Check Buttons for Karma or BP Creation do not exist.

They do in excel 2003.

The Martial Arts Advantages are red on yellow background even though the appropriate quality was selected.

I am not seeing this problem on my sheet. Which Styles/bonuses etc. did you choose? You must select a style for each advantage, so you cannot just put Aikido Once, then select two advantages. Each advantage must list AIKIDO next to it. I did notice that cell AE33 was empty when it should have a formula similar to the cells below, but that would only affect the first martial arts advantage slot. BTW, AE33 fixed for next version.

Also the different skills and qualities on the CharSheet are not sorted right. It looks something like this Skill ASkill B   12 instead of
Skill A   1
Skill B   2

Nope. Looks great on Excel 2003. If you would like to create a charsheet that works nicely in OO, I will include it in the list of selectable charsheets to print. Hopefully when the data outputting is completed this will be a moot point.

Specializations for knowledge skills cost 4 BP if you are over the limit of (LOG+INT)*3 or 2 of those points

I dont know about that, but I changed the way those are calculated so they don't count towards the free knowledge skill limit.

Attributes improved by Cyber- or Bioware are listed as total on the CharSheet not as Natural Attribute(Augmented Attribute)

Interesting. Perhaps this will be addressed in the future.

Specialized skill ratings should be listed like this 1(+2) not as 1(3) as the specialization does not improve the skill rating but adds two bonus dice.

yes, lets use the format suggested by the book, it does make sense. Fixed in next version.

[Dakka Dakka]

I think you misunderstood me DamienKnight. The four issues you quoted first work fine in microsoft office 97 als well, but they are a problem with OpenOffice.

As for the martial arts, when you open the sheet in OpenOffice cells AJ33:AJ39 are already yellow. Once you select one of the martial arts positive qualities, AG:33AG39 abnd the maneuvre cells become green, but even if you select a style and a corresponding advantage, AJ33:AJ39 remain yellow with red letters.

[Cabral]

First of all OO claims that there are links to other files and asks if i want to update them. What other files?

There is a reference to a location within the workbook (Workbook#location) which it handles as an html bookmark. That's the only "external" file I know of. It's a reference to the same workbook but it's handled as an external link.

On the Main sheet the Check Buttons for Karma or BP Creation do not exist.

In Open Office, you modify Cells AG14:AG16 and AG18:AG22 directly.

The Martial Arts Advantages are red on yellow background even though the appropriate quality was selected.

There doesn't seem to be any error checking for the Martial Arts.

Also the different skills and qualities on the CharSheet are not sorted right. It looks something like this Skill ASkill B 12 instead of
Skill A 1
Skill B 2

Ah. It doesn't seem to be registering the char(10) in the formula for the skill value. Odd. Near as I can tell, it should work

[brennanhawkwood]

Also the different skills and qualities on the CharSheet are not sorted right. It looks something like this Skill ASkill B 12 instead of
Skill A 1
Skill B 2

Ah. It doesn't seem to be registering the char(10) in the formula for the skill value. Odd. Near as I can tell, it should work

I was messing with a character using the spreadsheet in OpenOffice last night and noticed the skills being listed wrong (on the charSheet) as well. It seemed to be doing this:

Skill 234
Skill
Skill

instead of:

Skill 2
Skill 3
Skill 4

If I added a skill with no skill rating the display generally started to work right. Sometimes once the display was correct I could add a number as the rating for that last skill and the display on the character sheet would stay correct, but not always.

[Cabral]

Weird. Now it seems to be messing up on the skills list too. SkillSkillSkill 234.

I suspect the problem is related to OpenOffice's difficulty with large updates. though, that's not the entirety of the problem. If it were, it would update properly after a moment. Interestingly, including a specialization causes the skill names to line up (ratings are still wonky)

I'll see if I can massage the formulas to work properly. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/biggrin.gif)

[Unnamed Technoma...]

i was wondering can you add something that will allow me to add program options to complex forms?

also when looking at immersion for Technomancers there is a place for Mesh (groups) but no place for an Ordeal thus the cost is to high

i noticed in P11 it states "=IF(L11<>"",MAX(N11,O10,1)+AM11,0)" and it needs to be "=IF(L11<>"",MAX(N11,karmaMagic,1)+AM11,0)"

and one last thing, when you select a technomancer shouldn't the living Persona info show up on the CharSheet under Commlink?

[Blind Guardian]

First of all, thanks for all your hard work on the character generator. This is an incredibly useful program.

I've only run into one rather curious bug so far. I'm using Excel 2000, and everything seems to work fine in BP Gen mode. If I switch to Karma Gen, I'm having an issue with the magic stat. If I choose a Magician, Adept, or Mystic Adept, the Magic attribute is not being calculated properly. If I fill in a value for magic before all other stats, the stat stays at 1 no matter what value I put in for magic, though the karma cost is calculated and deducted from my karma point total. Once I fill in a value for the Edge attribute, Edge overrides Magic and is used instead. If I give a character an Edge of 4, suddenly magic changes to 4 in all relevant fields.

[Dumori]

that is due to a cell refrance being wrong. came across this with my technomacer it links to the edge cell not the magic/resonance.

[DamienKnight]

First I want to say, Thanks to Dakka Dakka and all those OO users who help me make this sheet more compatible with the wise OO users.

Now some rambling:
If I did not already have Excel provided by my work I would bite off my left hand before I paid microsoft for something I can get for free from a community established by Sun. My father worked for Sun for a decade and has convinced me the wondrous wisdom in Open Source. As a professional programmer I feel I must make a note that there is a difference between sharing knowledge and stealing it, and if you pirate software you are stealing food from the tables of hardworking people. That said, knowledge increases at a much quicker rate if techniques are shared freely, rather than lamely protected with copyrights.

I think you misunderstood me DamienKnight. The four issues you quoted first work fine in microsoft office 97 als well, but they are a problem with OpenOffice.

As for the martial arts, when you open the sheet in OpenOffice cells AJ33:AJ39 are already yellow. Once you select one of the martial arts positive qualities, AG:33AG39 abnd the maneuvre cells become green, but even if you select a style and a corresponding advantage, AJ33:AJ39 remain yellow with red letters.

No, I do not misunderstand you. I know you are on open office. When I look at a problem and say 'It works on Excel 2003' I am saying, that is my only test environment and that is all I can guarantee. I do work to make things compatible with OO, but its difficult without having it to test with.

The first quote about external references... I was aiming my reply at OO users. The problem never manifests in Excel so long as there are not any actual outside references. I theorize that the problem has to do with single quotes in the 'Names'. I think this is fixed, we will see when 8 gets tested on OO.

As for the comment about skills not displaying correctly... I checked again and found some issues, and have them mostly worked out.

when you select a technomancer shouldn't the living Persona info show up on the CharSheet under Commlink?

Nope, this appears in the Technomancer page, which is the perfect place for it.

I've only run into one rather curious bug so far. I'm using Excel 2000, and everything seems to work fine in BP Gen mode. If I switch to Karma Gen, I'm having an issue with the magic stat. If I choose a Magician, Adept, or Mystic Adept, the Magic attribute is not being calculated properly. If I fill in a value for magic before all other stats, the stat stays at 1 no matter what value I put in for magic, though the karma cost is calculated and deducted from my karma point total. Once I fill in a value for the Edge attribute, Edge overrides Magic and is used instead. If I give a character an Edge of 4, suddenly magic changes to 4 in all relevant fields.

Yeah, the relationship between essence and magic is messed up and I am going to have to fix it. Thanks to those who pointed this one out to me.

[Cabral]

Damien,
I don't know if this is one of the errors you mentioned above, but I just noticed that Row 46 is not included in some of the calculations.

[DamienKnight]

Damien,
I don't know if this is one of the errors you mentioned above, but I just noticed that Row 46 is not included in some of the calculations.

Examples would be helpful.

[Cabral]

It looked like you inserted a row and did not update the references. For example, the concatenate functions does to gather the list of skill names and ranks (including language skills) I think it's also the same way qualities.

I don't know all the calculations that reference row 42. References to the range should be fine (ie. G15:G43) but where each cell is referenced individually (such as in the concatenate function) are likely to be in error.

[DamienKnight]

Thats more helpful cabral. Yeah, I would very much like a different method for concatenating them than that one big statement. It seems like there should be a built in function for cacatenating all items in a range... If anyone knows of one please enlighten me.

Added missing columns in to concatenate function for version Beta8.

It appears that there is something not working right in the calculations dealing with the Bod, Str and Agi associated with cyberlimbs. In beta7 selecting a cyberlimb would give you #VALUE in the spots at the top of the page (Cyberparts!I4 for example) and would end up giving similar results in the CharSheet. In beta7b the error #VALUE no longer appears, but the numbers never change.

I am not seeing this problem. Maybe I fixed it earlier and forgot to reply or make note of it.

On this topic though, I am working on the cyberparts page and need some help figuring out the rules. I noticed that according to the Core book p. 335 each cyberlimb adds one box to the Physical Condition Monitor. Does this only apply to Full Limbs... or does it also apply to lower limbs, or hands/feet? I assume only full limbs, but cant find that specifically in the text.

Oh, and thanks to Damaleon, who has designed a modified cyberlimbs sheet for adding multiple spare modular limbs, which I am working to integrate into version 8.

[Xerxos]

Melee_Weapon_List in Gear_Data should only go to A68, not A71
Amor_List in Gear_Data should only go to AF84, not AF92

[brennanhawkwood]

Thats more helpful cabral. Yeah, I would very much like a different method for concatenating them than that one big statement. It seems like there should be a built in function for cacatenating all items in a range... If anyone knows of one please enlighten me.

A couple quick google searches doesn't turn up any range-based concatenate functions in excel unless you build your own using a macro. Of those there appear to be a number of them available on the web simply by searching for 'excel concatenate range of cells'. I have no idea how that would translate over to use in OpenOffice.

[DamienKnight]

A couple quick google searches doesn't turn up any range-based concatenate functions in excel unless you build your own using a macro. Of those there appear to be a number of them available on the web simply by searching for 'excel concatenate range of cells'. I have no idea how that would translate over to use in OpenOffice.

Anything can be accomplished in Macros, but since they are often incompatible on OO, I have been avoiding them whenever possible.

[DMFubar]

Melee_Weapon_List in Gear_Data should only go to A68, not A71
Amor_List in Gear_Data should only go to AF84, not AF92

Having it go a little beyond is handy, if you want to add your own items to those lists. For example, there are a couple of armor options missing from Arsenal (Auto-Injector, Gel Packs, etc.) but I just added the oens I wanted onto the table and did not have to change formulas anywhere. Handy in my opinion.

[DamienKnight]

Having it go a little beyond is handy, if you want to add your own items to those lists. For example, there are a couple of armor options missing from Arsenal (Auto-Injector, Gel Packs, etc.) but I just added the oens I wanted onto the table and did not have to change formulas anywhere. Handy in my opinion.

In excel 2003, whenever you perform an insert inside of a range it extends the range. I changed these ranges to reach down to just one blank space after the list (i think in these instances they were going into the next list). If you are customizing any data sheets, you can 'Insert->Names->Define' and find the name of the list you are looking at, then click in the range definition and it should highlight the range as it is used by the formulas. From there you can tweak the range to fit your new values if necessary, or hopefull, if you are inserting into an existing range, it will have extended with your inserts.

Now this only applies to Excel 2003. I am not aware of what other versions of Excel or OO have the auto-range-extending feature.

Also, this depends on your using the 'Insert' command. Simply adding entries to the end without inserting spaces within the range for them will not extend the range.

[Xerxos]

Well currently Melee_Weapon_List includes a baseball (throwing weapon), so that can't be right (IMG:style_emoticons/default/wink.gif)

[Draco18s]

I threw all of these at the email address I found in the credits page. The version I have is from early October, so I don't know how many of these are still floating around (doing a quick check now), but...


1) Oriental Drakes are attributed a +2 Reaction in dracform, which they do not get, they get +2 Strength (which the sheet says they don't get). RC page 76
2) Fixed
3) Can't add an external smartlink to a gun to make the "this mod needs a smartlink" error to go away (and does a Gas Vent system actually NEED a smartlink? Runner's Companion even mentions that it takes a standard action to turn it off if you don't have a smartlink). Arsenel page 152
3b) Smartlink is not listed as a mod in the mods list, despite being an accessory-slash-mod (internal doubles cost, external is $400). Core page 311
4) Custom weapons costs aren't subtracted from total cash. Half-fixed. The BASE COST is subtracted, but not the TOTAL COST.
5) Adept power descriptions could be updated to say +2 [text] when you have 2 levels of it because each level gives you a cumulative +1 (otherwise why on earth would you ever get Mystic Armor 4 if you don't get any bonus past Mystic Armor 1). Confusing if nothing else. Core page 188
6) Can't find the rules right now, but armor mods (please increase the number of slots by 1 to 4 total) have a limit of, I thought, the higher times 1.5 (so an armored jacket has 12 "slots" (8 + 4) not 14 as indicated by the sheet).
6b) Using the (mods) base item listing it grants a whopping 0 total mods allowed, resulting in an error when mods are added.
7) Manuevers have a limit to the number you can know ("Only two maneuvers may be learned/purchased per level (5 BP) of the [Martial Arts] quality") Arsenel page 158
(IMG:style_emoticons/default/cool.gif) Additional Clip may have a rounding error, when I did the math on paper (extended clip and additional clip, extended is explicitly rounded up) I got 48, the sheet says 47. Arsenel doesn't say if Additional clip rounds up or down, but.... For SMGs that last 1 bullet does make it an even 3 for burst firing, so.... Arsenel page 149 and 150
9) (minor and annoying--not checked for this post) Some comment boxes aren't large enough or are oddly shaped:
a) Type of Awakened on Magic sheet (too narrow, words broken across multiple lines).
b) Earned after char gen checkbox on Contacts on Main Sheet (both), also Qualities "earned after"
c) Karma System on Optional rules.
d) Languages (last word cut on unseen line).
e) Base Magic square (last line and a half unseen).
f) Max bound spirits
g) Adepts powers (both boxes--comment box seems to have been shrunk horizontally to 0 pixels)
10) Fixed
11) Negative Qualities doesn't complain if you go over (under?) the maximum of -35 points (in normal games the limit is 35, this 800 BP...thread doubled everything, so we're using 70, which is why I ran across it).
12) Paid (under the debt) could maybe use a comment indicating that this is where you put money that has been put towards paying off the debt. Up to you, I just saw it and went "I think I know what that's for, but..."

[Bobson]

Yeah, the relationship between essence and magic is messed up and I am going to have to fix it. Thanks to those who pointed this one out to me.

I think I found it, if you haven't yet. Cell P11 is referenceing O10 instead of O11, so it's using your karma-raised edge as your karma-raised magic value (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

[DamienKnight]

1) Oriental Drakes are attributed a +2 Reaction in dracform, which they do not get, they get +2 Strength (which the sheet says they don't get). RC page 76
...
3) Can't add an external smartlink to a gun to make the "this mod needs a smartlink" error to go away (and does a Gas Vent system actually NEED a smartlink? Runner's Companion even mentions that it takes a standard action to turn it off if you don't have a smartlink). Arsenel page 152
3b) Smartlink is not listed as a mod in the mods list, despite being an accessory-slash-mod (internal doubles cost, external is $400). Core page 311

Fixed drakes. Added top mount and underbarrel Smartgun Systems.
3b: Yes, its listed as 'Smartgun System' as stated in the book. Even in versions prior to 8 adding Smartgun System doubled the base cost of your gun and made your gun compatible with smartgun enabled mods.

4) Custom weapons costs aren't subtracted from total cash. Half-fixed. The BASE COST is subtracted, but not the TOTAL COST.

This is true of the first custom weapon (the second and third were being added correctly). Fixed the first custom weapon in 8.

5) Adept power descriptions could be updated to say +2 [text] when you have 2 levels of it because each level gives you a cumulative +1 (otherwise why on earth would you ever get Mystic Armor 4 if you don't get any bonus past Mystic Armor 1). Confusing if nothing else. Core page 188

Added formulas that will replace '+1' in description with the actual rating when the rating is greater than one. Changed description for Power Throw to '+2 Str per rating...'

6) Can't find the rules right now, but armor mods (please increase the number of slots by 1 to 4 total) have a limit of, I thought, the higher times 1.5 (so an armored jacket has 12 "slots" (8 + 4) not 14 as indicated by the sheet).
6b) Using the (mods) base item listing it grants a whopping 0 total mods allowed, resulting in an error when mods are added...

Not having read the rules, I was setting the limit at Ballistic + Impact (3rd Edition rules). Changed SUM(H,I) to MAX(6,ROUNDUP(MAX(H,I)*1.5,0))).
6b: As it seems you have guessed, (mods) is there to give you the option of having 6 or 9 mods on one piece of armor. Made the slots/MAX cell blank when mods was selected. If you are going to use more than 3 mods to one piece of armor, this facilitates that but you will have to track the slots yourself.

7) Manuevers have a limit to the number you can know ("Only two maneuvers may be learned/purchased per level (5 BP) of the [Martial Arts] quality") Arsenel page 158

Fixed.

(IMG:style_emoticons/default/cool.gif) Additional Clip may have a rounding error, when I did the math on paper (extended clip and additional clip, extended is explicitly rounded up) I got 48, the sheet says 47. Arsenel doesn't say if Additional clip rounds up or down, but.... For SMGs that last 1 bullet does make it an even 3 for burst firing, so.... Arsenel page 149 and 150

It was set to ROUND, which should round up on .5, but changed to ROUNDUP just to be certain.

9) (minor and annoying--not checked for this post) Some comment boxes aren't large enough or are oddly shaped:
a) Type of Awakened on Magic sheet (too narrow, words broken across multiple lines).
b) Earned after char gen checkbox on Contacts on Main Sheet (both), also Qualities "earned after"
c) Karma System on Optional rules.
d) Languages (last word cut on unseen line).
e) Base Magic square (last line and a half unseen).
f) Max bound spirits
g) Adepts powers (both boxes--comment box seems to have been shrunk horizontally to 0 pixels)
10) Fixed

d,e-Fixed in 8. Rest... I must have fixed these in a prior version.

11) Negative Qualities doesn't complain if you go over (under?) the maximum of -35 points (in normal games the limit is 35, this 800 BP...thread doubled everything, so we're using 70, which is why I ran across it).

Conditional formatting was referring to row 8 instead of 9. Fixed.

12) Paid (under the debt) could maybe use a comment indicating that this is where you put money that has been put towards paying off the debt. Up to you, I just saw it and went "I think I know what that's for, but..."

Fantific suggestion. Done.

[Draco18s]

Add Sign Language to languages. It's the only one a drake could use in dracoform (only oriental, probably), which is why I found it was missing.

And great on the fixes.
6b: yeah, you'll have to do it yourself, I figured as much, but at least it's not throwing meaningless errors. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/nyahnyah.gif)
3b: Ah! There it is. I scoured all over for it and kept missing it.

Thought I had another thought. Guess not.

[Ehleric]

I just had a thought, not exactly sure how complicated this would be though... I've been using this sheet to make up NPCs; notable people, other runners my players might run into to either run along side of or against, etc. It would be kinda cool to have another sheet in here somewhere that would list out common dice pools. Things like Dodge, perception, melee and ranged attacks. Just so you wouldn't have to keep adding the attribute and skill together every time their turn came up. You'd just have the sheet open, and there you go. They need to dodge? Roll 20 dice and keep on going (IMG:style_emoticons/default/wink.gif)