Baseline D&D Combat Simulator

For my final post of 2018, I am posting a link to a DnD combat simulator.

DnD Combat Simulator

While having two combatant whack at each other until one of them is dead is not very realistic in terms what goes on in a campaign. It is a useful baseline to have while designing a combat system.

The source code for this can be downloaded from.

DnD Combat Simulator Source Code

I developed a similar utility to use with a Majestic Wilderlands RPG based on Fudge and confirmed the feedback I got from my players that a +1 advantage seems to tilt the odds by a lot. No matter how I tweaked the combat procedure the steepness of the bell curve of 4DF dominates how bonuses work.

Ironically it wasn't until two years later I found d6-d6 fixes the issue as the bell curve is now the same as rolling 2d6.

With this utility one get a rough idea of how the changes over various DnD editions effected combat by plugging the various numbers as they existed in ODnD, ODnD+Greyhawk, ADnD and so on.

Hope this proves useful for your campaigns and I wish everybody a Happy New Year!

Some bad news about Google Plus

Google Plus was Google's answer to facebook. It never got widespread adoption but among specific niches of internet it was heavily used compared to facebook. One of those niches is the OSR.

And now it appears the Google is shutting it down or at the least radically changing it.

Damn it. I really despise the Facebook interface and because of that I have not kept my Facebook account as clean as my Google Plus setup. I guess my wife, Kelly Anne will be happy as facebook is her primary home on social media.

Well it was good while it lasted.

The link to the annoucement

Computer Crash

Generally I do my own assembly of the computers I use. Starting in 1989 I had a succession of computer that I upgraded with bit and pieces over the years. One thing I learned is to do is store my creative stuff on multiple hard drives along with off-line backups. First Floppies, then CDs, USB Flash Drives and now I added a 100 GB of Google Drive into the mix.

Well last week the hard drive where I store all my programs died. I tweak my setup to work the way I want it to work so I hate when this happens. I have to reinstall everything and dig out serial numbers and passwords and so forth and so on. The only silver lining is that my working folders are on a separate hard drive and my games are on a third hard drive. And with Steam I already have everything downloaded so the first time I run a game it will install what it needs and I am off playing!

Well I decided this was a good time to do the upgrade to Windows 10. It was quick and easy. Has the fastest boot time I seen of any windows version to date. It also seems to be able to do this to the point where it actually connected to the network. Windows 7 got you to the login quickly but sometime it took a few minutes to finalize your network connection.

All my old drivers work including some off-beat one I use for my Wacom Tablet and 3D Mouse. For those who are interested the Table I use when I do maps and want to draw rivers, coasts, and roads. It has absolute positioning so it wrote more like a pen on paper than a mouse on a screen. The 3D mouse I use for when I run Orbiter Space Simulator or the Kerbal Space Program. I have a Logitech Joystic for attitude control. I use the 3D mouse for translation as it has not only up and down, left and right, but push in and pull out. (And twist, and it tilts four ways but I don't normally use those).

One thing I really liked about Windows 10 is that you can have two different images for dual monitors. I have one normal monitor. The other monitor is rotated 90 degrees into portrait mode. I can write or edit and see a full page at a time. 

Here what the new background looks like.

What you do is copy all the images you want to C:\Windows\Web\Wallpaper\Windows
Do a multi-select by selecting one of the images and then select the other while holding down the CTRL key.
Then right click and select Set as desktop Background.
Then will have multiple images for multiple monitors.

The Gold Box series is back!

At Good Old Games.

Don't know what the Gold Box series is? It is the first computer game I played that faithfully replicated the first edition rules of ADnD. Playing out Pool of Radiance was the first time +Dwayne Gillingham, +Tim Shorts and myself actually played ADnD together. Since it was turn base we could switch playing our individual characters during combat along with the deciding what the best course of action for the rest of the game.

I have one word for you

Glass

Imagine one of those tabletop glass displays used for gaming

The iPad

Thanks to Kelly Anne, and my family I got a iPad for Christmas. It was literally my only present but what a present it is. The two things I want to use the iPad is for entertainment (Netflix, etc) and to use to organize my notes at the table.

First off I recommend reading this excellent thread on digital readers over on the SJ Games Forums. PDF releases are a big part of the GURPS Product lines now and with the advent of e-book readers and tablets people are interested in how to effectively use them. Then there is this page on Enworld with a good list of useful RPG utilities for these devices.

I am excited about using the iPad as my experience with computers suggests that touchscreens combined with the right software are the way to go.

I bought Goodreader to handle PDFs on the iPad. It has a tabbed interface for multiple PDFs and a handy customizable bookmark list. It also nice that I can organize everything into folders.  So on the second day of owning the iPad, I downloaded my copies of GURP Core campaign book (has all the rules) and my copy of Swords and Wizardry and spent some time bookmarking them.

GURPS Core Rules Campaigns

Swords and Wizardry

The bookmarks are chosen on the basis on my experience on what I looked up the most during a session. I will working on the Swords and Wizardry Monster Book and a couple more of my GURPS pdfs. One nice thing about the Core Book on other GURPS PDFs is that they have a nice table of contents already built in.

Computers, Rolplaying, iPads and all that

I program for a living, creating interfaces for metal cutting machines, and at home I am a computer hobbyist in addition to my tabletop roleplaying. In the 25 odd years since my family got a Radio Shack Model I, my main interest with computer has been how to make a better machine for tabletop roleplaying. 

From my first word proccessor, CorelDRAW for mapping, to writing utilities to cranks Traveller Sectors I fiddle with my machines to make running my campaign easier. I never liked using a computer at the table as it was too clunky and in the way. Instead I tried to figure out how to produce really good play aids for myself and my player keeping to paper on the table. Heck when somebody tried to use a iPad for dice rolling, I told him to put it away and gave him one of my spare sets to use in it's place.

I am not against the use of computers at the table. It great to have DM Genie and Nbos' the Keep running while I am using Fantasy Grounds., but it has to be the right setup before I starting using at a normal tabletop session.

For two years I finally found it and it was the iPad and similar tablets. The reason is not in using a utility but rather as a means of organizing the books and reams of notes I use during the game. Lying flat with a touch interface with well bookmarked PDFs would be exactly what I need. While I appreciate the open Android platform, I learned with my experience with the Kindle is that it is really worth the extra money to get the best when things are so unsettled. For now, the best in tablets means the iPad.

And I got one for Christmas. It was my one and only Christmas present this year given to me by my entire family.  My wife Kelly Anne organized the effort and I can't thank her enough. Tomorrow I will post some details on how I am going to set it up and what I am going to use the other computers I have for.