I grabbed Hero Lab from a Loot ! special for 15$ dollars. I was going to use it for Pathfinder until I noticed that it would cost a mint to grab the books I wanted - so I grabbed the SR core set.

So far I'm digging it. Very slick UI and haven't run into any errors yet. The only limitation is not having all the books yet. I'm guessing the pricing will be in the 10 - 15 range.

For Pathfinder, I recommend PCGen. http://pcgen.sourceforge.net/01_overview.php I've been using it for D&D style gaming for at least 10 years. It's still maintained and updated regularly and it's Free!

Thanks for that bump Fyndhal! We appreciate it.

And I was going to mention that Lone Wolf first talked about getting a SR character builder about 3 years ago IIRC, but somebody already mentioned that it had been in development for a while so that is covered.

I'm checking out the demo right now, it looks really solid so I'm probably going to pick it up. At least until I get my data hacks done so I can make a SR gamemode and datasets for PCGen. It's only been 6 years since I've been working on it, off and on:)

Just bought it. There's a few quirks to it, but on the whole it's pretty solid.

New content due later this month:

Shadowrun Updates

AJC

It looks nice, but I'm a cheap SOB. I'll stick to free stuff. More money for hookers and blo...I mean books. Yeah, books.

I guess we all need to set our priorities.

AJC

$34.99 ? for the 5 books? Yea, I think that's a reasonable price, given the quality of the Pathfinder data sets.

I have it. Its slick. I would say worth it.

Well, can you blame em? The way to do things now is base thing and DLC.

I'll pass, maybe I should send some money to the guy making Chummer instead.

Arsenal, Augmentation and Street Magic just went up for sale for HeroLab.

You and me both. I'm just fine with the various free ones on this site. Work just fine for me!

Any word on whether these are included with the SR package, or do they have to be purchased separately?

Each is a serpate purchase (with some package deals), and they've been up front about that from the start. Can't knock em for that, at least.

Meh, I still like the spreadsheet best. Even though not everything is correct, at least I can make everything work by myself, even house rules. Chummer has a ton, but not those that I use - so... And a commercial program? Hell, actually Catalyst should provide that. For free, WITH their fracking books. Why do I have to pay AGAIN for the same content, just a little more utility? If the generator came with all the full text of the books, then that would be... sort of ok, but to pay more in the range of about half of what the books cost for a thing you don't really NEED is just too much.

Well, I can see a smaller outfit not wanting to pay programmers etc to keep a product up to date.

FASA sure never supplied a generator though, and the ones from the other big sytem have never been all that great either, and if I recall correctly, you had to pay for or have some kind of insider subscription anyway.

But yes, having to purchase modules for each 'core' rule book, much less anything put out after the generator was released is a sore spot for many I'd imagine.

Right. And what exactly is their incentive to do that?

Sorry, a little bitter. Working retail right now and have run into far too many customers who want free stuff.




-k

How about to provide a modern roleplaying system? I mean books are so 2011...

IF they license a commercial program - at least in conjunction with disallowing free, user made ones - it should be provided with the books. As is, I don't really care.

(And right back at you: A little bitter. Been a customer all my life and have run into far too many money grabbing companies that provide barest value for money, and still keep raising prices or blatantly abuse their market position. Yes I know the whole not NEEDING to buy stuff. Guess what, very often I don't, except far too many people still do.)

That would require that Catalyst provide significant compensation to the software developer, as nobody works for free.

I don't know if you realize this, but publishing, especially RPGs, is NOT a very profitable business. Your net profits are very thin.

So, to provide the software with the books, one of two things must happen:

- Either the publisher takes a profit hit, quite possibly to the point where they are LOSING money on each sale. Remember nobody works for free.

or

- Or they have to raise the price of the books.

No business will do something for nothing. Even when you see "free" stuff being added to an offer, it's not really free. It's a calculated risk - the business is betting that the increased sales from the bonus stuff will more than compensate for the added production cost.

In the case of Shadowrun, I would strongly think that including free software with the books would NOT increase sales enough to cover the cost of developing the software. Simple fact is that Shadowrun is a tiny market. The small number of purchasers of this brand would mostly buy with or without the software. Therefore, not enough incentive to include such a freebie.

The third alternative is for the publisher to just allow a third party purchase a license, letting them develop the software as a separate product. In this scenario, regardless of whether the licensee makes money or not, the publisher gets paid.

If you were running this business, which option would be most appealing to you?



-k

As a GM, I just have to say that Hero Lab for Shadowrun is EXTREMELY useful. I'm using this more than any other game supplement.

Hero Lab lets you work out of "Portfolios" which store multiple "Heroes" including those Heroes' minions, vehicles, etc.

So what I've done is develop a "Master" Portfolio for my game which contains the Heroes for all my characters. Then, I create secondary Portfolios for every major "Scene" that the Heroes are going to be in.

For example, there might be a planned scene that takes place in a bar with a Mr. Johnson meet. I'll create a Portfolio for the bar which contains the Bartender, the Bouncers at the door, Mr. Johnson, and Mr. Johnson's security detail, along with anyone else important at the location I think the players will run into.

If the players start trouble, I can import the combat participants from the Bar portfolio into the Master portfolio, and use Hero Lab's combat tracker to track injuries and ammunition for the fight. Then I can save that Master Portfolio, and the stats are all saved up for next playing session. This is GREAT for keeping track of how much Edge my players have used, and their ammunition and injuries between playing sessions.

So far the new supplement books are really well implemented, but some of the more advanced things that you could do aren't there. Like you can't have a Spirit possess someone, etc.

It's $30 for Hero Lab and $35 for the bundle of all the supplement books. Not bad in my opinion, but I'm not sure if I'd buy it if I was only a Player and not a GM.

I bought HL for D&D 4e because Character Builder went online only. I still pay for my insider account, but the character count limit with the online model wasn't enough for me, and I needed something that works when I'm not on the internet too.

I bought SR4 for HL when it was released and posted my post about it here that started this thread.

In January I did a little freelance for Lone Wolf and added some of the Arsenal content. I have since purchased the data compilation package.

Do I think it's worth it as a player? Oh god yes. I'm personally at the point where if I maintain characters for an RPG, they must be maintained digitally. I no longer want to look at my handwriting from last week and pencil and pen marks and whatnot on a hand maintained sheet. I prefer commercial software.

I honestly never though of using it as a GM tool like that. If I ran a home game it would probably work better. Mostly I use it for my missions characters. I've gotten several friends to pick it up. If we just played missions at a home game, I think that would rock for the GM (we rotate that around)

I've known you could do that, but I never thought to try. Awesome.

Here's another really cool thing. I created a "Generic NPC" Portfolio that I can use for unplanned events. I can create quick characters for bar patrons, drug dealers, businessmen, bouncers, random gang members, street toughs, street shamans, etc.

Whenever my players do something weird and unexpected, I have the stats for the relevant NPC right there without having to flip through a book or PDF files. Also, I don't have to re-create the "Ork Security Doorman" everytime I have a bar scene. I can just import the same Ork (or multiple versions of him if there are more than one) from the Portfolio to the scene that I need. If these Orks at this particular club are different somehow from the standard template (let's say they're working at a Yakuza club and I want them to have Katanas) that takes less than a minute to modify.

So basically I have a "Black Book" of NPCs available for any situation I can think of ahead of time.

Oh, and it makes Spirits SOO much easier to deal with now, especially now that Street Magic is implemented. Now when a player or an NPC summons a Spirit, I don't have to look it up in the main rulebook to try and remember what powers it comes with, and what its stats are compared to its Force. I just create it in Hero Lab, and it takes like 5 mouse clicks. Boom, instant Force 5 Spirit of Man with whatever optional power I want for him.

Can those of us using HL get you to put the files up somewhere? I think a lot of us would love to borrow your work

I can probably swing something like that. I spent last night going through some of the ones I've made and fleshing them out a bit. I'm also trying to make sure the "Generic" NPCs don't use anything from Arsenal, since I think they'll be more useful in case people have not chosen to purchase the Supplement books add-on for Hero Lab.

I've customized my Data Set a little bit too so I just have to test and make sure loading them into vanilla Hero Lab won't produce errors.

Most of these NPCs are very on the "light" side. No Knowledge Skills, and only skills that a GM would typically need them to have. Basic equipment is usually left out, other than a Commlink, which I try to make sure to include for everyone, just in case.

Talk to CeaDawg on the HL SR forum, he's trying to assembly a character repo also

http://forums.wolflair.com/showthread.php?t=19035

I just bought this and it is fantastic for GMs! I can highly recommend it.

I've had the program, and every Shadowrun datafile on offer, for about two weeks now. And I love it very, very much.

I broke down and got it. It is fairly sweet. I am not sure I am going to agree with all of their rules interpretations though. Like they say cyber limb armor does not add to your armor it only applies if someone makes a called shot.

I don't think I'd let someone get +2/+2 armor, for only 600 , because one arm is armored, either.

Hey if you want to house rule things that is cool with me, but it clearly states in SR4 that the armor is cumulative with worn armor. It no where even hints that it is only for called shots. And an official character generator should strive to follow the rules. And on the house rule side I find it a bit suspect given the form fitting, helmets etc. all give extra armor for cheap as well, and really it isn't 600, since you need to buy the limb.

So: the software doesn't let you house rule and break rules? (For instance, could I alter the skill list?)

You can alter things and add things. Too what degree I am not sure, tech is no my strong suit. The person who is about to GM a game I will be running in on the other hand is in the tech field and is trying to get his house rules in. I'll wait and see how that pans out.

Nowhere does it say that the armor is body-wide, either. In fact, the Strength o that limb isn't body-wide, so why should anything else be?

And given the lack of definitive statements either way, I - being a veteran of every edition of Shadowrun ever to grace this planet, to date - look to prior editions, where Cyberlimb armor was not an estraordinarily cheap way to layer on more armor.

I would probably be willing to give HALF the limb's armor to your overall armor rating - a little more generous than prioreditions, but SR4 armor ratings are universally higher anyway, so ... *shrug*. Also, at "half", a starting character could have a +1/+1 overall net benefit.

There is an editor that you can adjust the datafiles - or even create your own from scratch (useful, since for example: the German-produced stuff probably won't get an official release from LWD).

Because there are specific rules for uneven Attributes, but Armor is not an attribute. And because a helmet or ballistic vest gives its full bonus despite not covering the whole body...

In addition to stuff like helmets and FFBA, there's also Dermal Sheaths. Rating 1 and Rating 2 explicitly only cover a section of the user's body, but most people would say their armor bonuses apply all the time. There's also the question of what happens if a guy has armor 3 all over. Does it apply all the time then? What if he has no armor on his head? What about if he armors just his limbs?

Helmets cover a specifically-vulnerable part of the metahuman body (the part the brain is in).

Dermal Sheaths start out covering the torso (where several other "must have them to continue being alive" organs are kept), and a ratign 1 system costs 10,000

FFBA, like dermal sheathing, stars out covering the torso.

Even things like the Securetech PPP items, "forearm guards", "arm and leg casings", "shin guards": these items are worn on BOTH limbs, not just one.

...

Anyway: IMO either ruling is simply a matter of "how do you interpret this rule - which was not written to be explicitly clear enough?"

And there's an easy solution to that: post on the LWD forum for HL:Shadowrun, and ask that it at least be made an optional rule to apply some or all of a Cyberlimb's armor to a character's overall body. As I am already registered for that forum, I shall do so myself in just a moment.

There, Feature requested.

Hey, guess what, I'm also "a veteran of every edition of Shadowrun ever to grace this planet, to date". And I see in black and white that the rules definitively state that non-worn armor all stacks, and that armor is not an attribute.

The rules as written have no location-based damage or armoring. A bullet fired at you gets affected by the armor on your helmet or chest or foot or wherever. You don't fire at someone's head, or chest, or foot, you fire at "them". It's abstract. Armor on your arm is treated the same. If you want to aim at a specific part, you use the Called Shot rules, which do indeed allow you to bypass armor.

More importantly, you might argue that this shouldn't be that way, but a third-party licensed product is not the place to do it.

The Hero Lab generator is supposed to follow the rules as written exactly. It's not there to serve as errata or rules correction.

If there is a rules correction that needs to be made, it should be coming from Catalyst, not Lone Wolf.



-k

People can and do die from being hit in the limbs. There isn't a safe place to get hit.

Protecting your groin and thighs can increase your armor value. I can even wear glass wings that give me +1/+1 armor. You make generic called shots to bypass armor that work even if you're completely covered in military armor. Also what happens if I do shell out the nuyen for 4 limbs and a cybertorso with Armor 4? Does the armor now provide complete protection? If so how (average, stacking, or what)? When's the cut-off? Two limbs? The torso?

There are problems about cyberlimb armor is too good, but that's very different from arguing that it works in a way unlike its other armor and cyberware armor counterparts. Not only is Shadowrun not a hit location based system, Hero Labs isn't the place to change how it works.

As for bringing it to the HL forums, I actually was working on a post for this and other topics.

... um ... where did you get the idea I was asking for any such thing?

I asked LWD to change their program, or at least make it optional, so that it could work the way you read it.

Yeah, upon reflection: I will definitely be houseruling Cyberlimb armor to cost more and some Capacity, in my games. It's just too damned good as-is.

Really, I know this is an edge-case, but: Nartaki. Six alpha-grade cyberlimbs, each with 2 points of armor. Alpha grade Orthoskin (3). Armor jcket. Securetech PPP (everything except the helmet). Body 5 (including for the limbs).

Nuyen cost? 293,400 (so he won't have much ELSE, without taking "In Debt" - and has to have "Born Rich" so he can pump more BP into starting ).
Essence? 0.2 left.

Next thing to unkillable, with physical damage at least: 25/25 armor. Heck, with the family jewels flappin' in the breeze, he's got 15/15 ...!!

I recently picked it up as well. I've fiddled with the editor a bit in Pathfinder, and had a reason to use it in Shadowrun, and its pretty easy for equipment and cyber. I've not tried it for rules yet though.

Totally can see why. In our game the GM decided all cyber/bio based armor values are halved before stacking. And he doe snot allow staking from worn armor like form fitting etc. Too cheap and adds to dice pool bloat. As for your armor tank guy, yeah that is extreme. We had a full borg in one of our games at 2 armor per location, he rolled a crap ton of dice to resist damage but he was slower than the other combat guys and magic and toxins still screwed him. Especially since he cheesed it and had a 1 attribute in body, strength, agility saving tons of his 200 for other stats since those would all be cyber. 1 body does not resist toxins very well.

As I posted on JackPoint:

Cost:
... Obvious Armor (Obvious limbs only): Rating * 500 nuyen, Rating * [2] Capacity
... Concealed Armor (All types): Rating * 1,000 nuyen, Rating * [4] Capacity
Availability:
... Obvious Armor (Obvious limbs only): Rating * 4R
... Concealed Armor (All types): Rating * 6R
Rating Limits:
... Hand/Foot: not available
... Half limb: 1 point (each limb)
... Full limb: 2 points (each limb)
... Torso: 3 points
... Skull: 2 points