Shadowrun Initiative Calculator Options

[Stalker-x]

Hey there!
I’ve been playing around a bit with JavaScript lately and felt that, instead of wasting my time on some of the usual Hello world lorem ipsum perpetual calendar rubbish, I might as well write something useful right away. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/wink.gif) That’s when the Shadowrun Initiative Calculator came into existence, a little application that I’d like to present here. Here’s what it does:

The Shadowrun Initiative Calculator is designed to automatically calculate the initiative results for one or more characters and display them in order. In principle, it does exactly what your gaming group does, i.e. rolling x dice, counting the hits and adding them to the characters' initiative rating for the final result. There are some minor differences, though:
- It enables you to roll the initiative of all NPCs and all SCs at once - just with the click of a button.
- It saves you the pain of keeping tabs on the multitude of different initiative results.
- It saves your group the hassle of rolling several dozens of dice, 2-10% of which roll under the table and have your players look for them instead of looking out for the enemy.
That said, the initiative calculator wants to add to your game by taking care of cumbersome game mechanics, thus giving you more actual playing time.

Feel free to try out either the online version of the SIC or to download it for offline use. Also, if you find any bugs or other things to improve, or if you’d like to contribute to the project, feel free to contact me. My e-mail address is provided along with the help file.
I hope you’ll enjoy it.

[bibliophile20]

(IMG:style_emoticons/default/notworthy.gif) (IMG:style_emoticons/default/notworthy.gif) (IMG:style_emoticons/default/notworthy.gif) (IMG:style_emoticons/default/notworthy.gif) Thanks! This'll save so much time!

[Mantis]

Grabbed it. I played around a little bit. While mousing over the buttons to figure out what they do is ok, I think it should be more obvious from the icons, what each one does. Otherwise, neat.

[Brainpiercing7.6...]

It unfortunately doesn't seem to work for me. Do I need anything special to make it run?

Before allowing with noscript I get a javascript warning, then after allowing I get nothing, an empty grey box. The only thing clickable is the help link.

[Stalker-x]

Hey there!

Thanks to everyone for the feedback!

@Mantis
I admit that the names of the buttons were a bit of a problem for me. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/wink.gif) The “-blank” and “-all” buttons used to have exactly these names written on them, but that would wreck the last bit of layout clarity (which is already on the verge of being cluttered). I’ll give it some more thought, though, and try to come up with more user-friendly alternatives.

@ Brainpiercing7.62mm
That comes to me as a bit of surprise. Since the red error message disappears, that means JavaScript must be up and running. Let’s do the trouble-shooting publicly, anyway, in case anybody runs into the same problem.
From your mentioning of NoScript, I assume you’re using Firefox or Chrome? May I ask you which version and add-ons/extensions are installed? When you start the calculator, does it properly display the language selector (i.e.: does it show a drop-down list for you to select your native language, or will it just give you some text reading “ »Language Selector« ”)? Same question at the bottom of the screen: Does it give you the full (verbose) licence Text and the creative commons image, or does it just read “ »Creative Commons Licence« “?

[Brainpiercing7.6...]

Hey there!

@ Brainpiercing7.62mm
That comes to me as a bit of surprise. Since the red error message disappears, that means JavaScript must be up and running. Let’s do the trouble-shooting publicly, anyway, in case anybody runs into the same problem.
From your mentioning of NoScript, I assume you’re using Firefox or Chrome? May I ask you which version and add-ons/extensions are installed? When you start the calculator, does it properly display the language selector (i.e.: does it show a drop-down list for you to select your native language, or will it just give you some text reading “ »Language Selector« ”)? Same question at the bottom of the screen: Does it give you the full (verbose) licence Text and the creative commons image, or does it just read “ »Creative Commons Licence« “?

Alright, at home I'm using the old firefox, really old in fact. I get all the problems you have described: The pulldown menu isn't there (just text) and the Licence is just a non-clickable piece of text.

And with Firefox 9.01 on this computer it seems to work. Time for an update on my home comp then.

[Stalker-x]

I admit I did not test the SIC on the more pre-historic browser versions, so updating may well resolve issues. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/wink.gif) It appears that on your older browser, the script crashes during the initialisation of the input elements. Mind giving me your browser + version, so I may try to resolve the issue?

[Thanee]

It saves your group the hassle of rolling several dozens of dice, 2-10% of which roll under the table and have your players look for them instead of looking out for the enemy.

(IMG:style_emoticons/default/biggrin.gif)

Alright, at home I'm using the old firefox, really old in fact.

You want to upgrade that one for the fact alone, that otherwise it is an unnecessary security risk. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

Bye
Thanee

[Stalker-x]

You want to upgrade that one for the fact alone, that otherwise it is an unnecessary security risk. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

True, although it leaves me wondering what would qualify as a "necessary security risk"... The user? (IMG:style_emoticons/default/wink.gif)

[Brainpiercing7.6...]

True, although it leaves me wondering what would qualify as a "necessary security risk"... The user? (IMG:style_emoticons/default/wink.gif)

I'll look the version up at home.

Some things I'd love to see, if you are interesting in making this tool even better:

Put in fields for reaction score, so ties can be automatically solved, and the fields sorted automatically again

Put in a quick addition/subtraction buttons on the final initiative scores when these change due to wound mods (just a +1/-1 button which deducts one from total initiative and one from base initiative)

Add a regular dice roller feature with checkboxes for exploding and sorting, so that you can basically keep this page open and use it for most things during combat

Put in a checkbox for full defense, which doesn't actually do anything except mark a character who doesn't get to go in that IP

Alright, actually something like this already exists:
http://www.colugo.org/shadowrun/tools/screen/sr_screen.php
Under the initiative tab. It doesn't do everything I would want it, too, though, and doesn't have a roller on the same page, either.