Does anyone know how to actually add a geas to an adept power in Herolab? I have the option enabled, so that's not the issue. I've searched both here and the Herolab forums and couldn't find anything. Help please?

It was a difficult challenge to solve , but I just picked the Power specific geas quality from the qualities tab.

Huh. How'd I miss that? Now I feel like a retard because I assumed it was somewhere in the Magic tab with the Adept powers. Thanks.

No worries; sometimes, due to how they have to handle stuff "behind the scenes", finding things in HeroLab can be ... "interesting", in the Chinese proverbial sense of the word.

sometimes its not any easier in chummer, just one of those things you tend to get used to.

I prefer Chummer, but my GM has asked me to use HeroLab because it's what he paid for.

And, I'm sure, because he likes the idea of having a central repository for character sheets.

Once you get into actually plying, you'll find that HeroLab continues beyond merely character creatin - it can shift modes, to character advancement. It'll track money, karma, lifestyle costs, everything.

Actually they both have all of those features as well, and while I like Chummer, if the price for the "official" one wasn't so ludicrous, I would probably save up and get it. I mean, come on, $115 is ridiculous for a character generator for a RPG.

He does like having all the characters in one place, yes. Thing is, I did the same thing with Chummer when I was GMing. Honestly he only uses Herolab because he didn't know about Chummer, had shelled out $65 bucks for it (or whatever a license plus the five core books is), the rest of the group had already built characters in Herolab, and he damn well wasn't about to waste the money. Despite the fact that updates for Herolab are few and far between, books cost money, adding custom content is a pain in the ass, there's no real support of house rules, and it's not particularly intuitive.

Well, there is also the fact that most of the other players had licenses for Pathfinder and knew the program, but that's actually a very small reason.

Well. I've tried both, and honestly, I seriously prefer HL's interface. So that may be part of it for him.


Updates happen about every other month overall (one hit just the beginning of this week, in fact). I understand not wanting to pay for the books, but HL comes with actual tech support. Adding custom content can indeed be difficult to figure out, but Matthias is very, VERY helpful on the LoneWolf forums. And I believe they are modifying the base engine of HeroLab, to allow for "house rules" construction. As for the interface ... I find it completely intuitive. Different strokes for different folks, yes?


Ah, yeah. That is most certainly what's going on here: the group at large was already familiar with that rogram. Why relearn something entirely new and different, when you have something you're already familiar with, and which can do the job tolerably well?

Except, that's not the price of HeroLab. That's the price of HeroLab and a whole lot of supplemental stuff. The basic price of Hero Lab is $30.

And then to get the core rules for SR, you have to pay ANOTHER $30, and then pay EVEN MORE after that to have all of the information. Even to have all the core rules, one has to pay the $65 and even that is ridiculous for a character generator. The $30 price tag for getting everything for a particular game would be perfectly fair (I'd actually probably be willing to go to $40). Considering how many games they have it supporting, $30 to $40 per game system would be adequate. Any more is just greed, plain and simple, IMO.

Well, Chummer has its good points & bad points as well I'm sure HeroLab does, but having book content added into the program for free is nice with chummer.

Like I said, my problem isn't having to pay, it's that one has to pay too much. Such pricing is simply not acceptable to me, especially with the state the economy is in.

Dead, absolutely wrong.

It's $30 for the Program and the core rules for the system of your choice.

For some others, possibly, but for SR, the core rules are divided amongst six books, and in order to get the other five one must pay an additional $35, and then another $50 to get the rest. A better model of pricing--more suitable for the current economic situation--would be for a $40 charge (possibly $50 at most--yes I realized I went up from what I said before) to get two FULL SYSTEMS, and then another $40 for each additional FULL SYSTEM.

No, they're not. As much as you (and I) may love Arsenal, Augmentation, Street Magic, Unwired, and the Runners' Companion ...? They aren't core rules. They're supplements. Important ones, yes, but supplements nonetheless.

The core rules is the Big Book, and only that. That's true of every game system ever published, by the by. "Core Rules" is, by definition, "the minimum rules you need to play the game".

Bought Hero Lab, all the pieces, and multiple licenses for my laptop/desktop/wife's laptop that I occasionally steal when mine is dead. Used it for a week. The only plus, imo, is not having to whip open PDF's to double check what a particular spell/piece of cyber/quality do. For what it is, I gotta agree with Guns, the price ought to come down.

I also hate how their sheets print up. So, for me, it was money tossed down the drain.

At the moment I find the layout of the character sheets in Herolab a distinct advantage. I am starting a game where 3 of the the 5 players have never played Shadowrun, and the other 2 only several years ago in a different version and in at least one case a very weird game.
The inclusion of a lot of the explanation for what things mean is going to be for them a big advantage

I'm a huge fan of Herolab. I picked it up for 4e D&D, and I'm actually one of the data file authors for it as well.

You could of course just buy the core rules set for Shadowrun, and then hand-code in everything else yourself. It would take forever, but HL won't stop you.

And once you get a hang of working with the editor, adding your own content is relatively easy and quick.

Not to mention, cryptoknight, that if you get sufficiently good at using the editor, you might be able to finagle a spot as ... yes ... a datafile author. (And I believe you folks are paid, atleast in product, for your work ... yes?).

Some kinds of additions - new gear, etc - are pretty easy right from the get-go. Before it was added via official channels, I had already added the Ballistic Mask, and a few other bits and pieces, myself.

There is compensation for Data File authoring yes. I wouldn't call it funds you can live on, but it would make Christmas presents a bit better for your friends.

Something else I love about Herolab, was what I discovered while I was creating the drugs for SR HL. The ability to tick a box to apply the effects of the drug on your character, and the ability to tick that box off, and to tick a different one in order to apply the crash effects of coming off of the drug.

Very handy.

Ummmmm.... You really should look at the actual books. Right there on the Covers:

Augmentation: Core Medtech Rulebook
Arsenal: Core Gear Rulebook
Runner's Companion: Core Character Rulebook
Street Magic: Core Magic Rulebook
Unwired: Core Matrix Rulebook

So YES, they are CORE RULEBOOKS.

Not quite true. Every edition of D&D has had the Core Rules separated between a Player's Guide (character creation), a Dungeon Master's Guide (character advancement, advanced character generation) and a Monster Manual (things to fight) - and that is, in fact, the minimum rules required to play. Lately, they've been releasing these three beneath the Open Gaming License as the Systems Resource Document with some of the more licensed things (such as Beholders and Illithid) stripped out. There's a number of other systems out there that have separated the "Core Rules" amongst books, as well.

No, they are supplements.

Any role-player with more than a year's experience with the hobby, knows that "core rules" means the minimum rulebook(s) needed to play the game. And for SR4A, that means .... the SR4A book, and only that book. It doesn't matter if the word "core" shows up on the cover or not; including that is only a marketing gimmick.

Unwired, for example, is no more "core rules" for Shadowrun, than .... Ultimate Magic is core for Pathfinder. Or Ultimate Powers is core for Mutants & Masterminds 2E. Or The Complete Psionics Handbook was core for AD&D 2E.

Seriously, think about it. Do you have to buy ALL of:

• SR4A, $45
• Companion, $35
• Unwired, $35
• Arsenal, $35
• Augmentation, $35
• Street Magic, $35

... totalling $250, before you can begin to play the game? OF COURSE NOT. One purchase, just the SR4A core rules, is all you need. The rest is supplemental material.






I never said all games are just one book - I said, the core rules of a game are the minimum needed to play. For SR, that's "the big book". For D&D, that's PH, DMG, and usually the MM (though it's entirely possible to play a game without ever using the MM, at least in 3.XE).

To play Shadowrun, though? You have only ever needed the one Big Book. And that's as true of SR4, as it was of SR1.

In D&D 3.XE terms: Arsenal is like Complete Warrior; Street Magic is like complete Arcane and/or cmplete Mage. They expand upon the mechanics and options of hte core rulebook, but ar enot themselves required for play. They are supplemental rulebooks.

Otherwise, you would be literally unable to make a Mage or Adept, without Street Magic; literally unable to make a hacker or technomancer, without Unwired; literally unable to make a street samurai without both Arsenal and Augmentation.

Since you are able to do all of those things, with only the Big Book? The Big Book is the core rules and all else is supplemental. You don't need Unwired to make a hacker - but using Unwired will let you make a better hacker. You don't need Arsenal to make a samurai - but using Arsenal will let you make a better samurai. And so on.

Then I suppose you need to be a little more clear, Pax.

By listing out prices, you only serve to prove my point. We should not have to pay as much as HeroLab is charging to make use of every source we've purchased. Effectively their pricing is forcing a "double paying" system down people's throats.

Two entirely different companies. So no, it's not "double paying".

And as has already been observed: you are entirely free to learn the editor yourself, and use it to enter any and all content you wish into HeroLab from those supplements without paying a dime to teh company.

Or, you can pay for the convenience of having someone else do it for you.

Or you use the Free Program which already does it for you.

Sure, whichever floats your boat. I've never claimed one was hands-down inferior to the other. I've never even claimed that HeroLab isn't expensive (if you buy everything), either.

Only disputed that it's more than $30 for the core rules, and disputed that it is not worth the money (for those who, like myself, happen to prefer HL's interface, and/or use HeroLab for more than one game system). Heck, I'd love for all the post-core-book packages to be reduced in price by 50%. *shrug* But I'm not going to lose any sleep if they stay the same.

I don't use either, so I do not even have a Horse in this race.

However, the contention that the "CORE" books of Shadowrun are not core is disengenuous. They are the CORE books of the system for a reason. DO you need them explicitely? No, though the System is not complete without them. DO you need them to take advanatge of the System complexity? Absolutely. Anything else (Supplements such as 10 Gangs, Milspec Tech, etc.) is extraneous and neat, but is not necessary for the system. The 5 Core Rulebooks are indeed necessary buys, if you talk to most people. *shrug*