Attempting to make a few rollers and need help.

[tetsuoh]

I'm looking into making a new roller and remake the old npc generator.

Does anyone know who made the original generator (pic below) or have access to the source code for it?

I have little knowledge on how to make an application but have made a few web based rollers before.

Any knowledge or insight would be appreciated.

STILL currently trying to learn Java

pic of the program I'm talking about.
http://imageshack.com/scaled/large/96/ak1f.jpg

[cheshire]

Oh yeah, gollummen made that years ago. His real name and contact info is in the ReadMe file. I'm not sure if it's still good, though. I think the last time he did an update on the program was sometime in 2007 and he said he'd tweaked it to the point where he was happy with it, and he wasn't going to be doing any more updates past 1.1 or 1.2 or something.

Neat program.

If you're looking for suggestions on die rollers, I'd love to give some input. I have a favorite out there and it isn't terribly popular and I can never figure out why. It had a wonderful option where you could select between adding up the wild die normally or dropping the highest and lowest on a 1. It also automatically tabulated exploding sixes. Handy piece of work.
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Before we take any of this too seriously, just remember that in the middle episode a little rubber puppet moves a spaceship with his mind.

[cheshire]

P.S., I'm about 65% confident I found the guy on facebook. I'll make an inquiry and let you know.

Edit
That's just swell. Facebook just told me that since I'm not friends with him, I can have my message delivered directly to his junk mail box, or pay $1.35 to put it in his inbox.
_________________
__________________________________
Before we take any of this too seriously, just remember that in the middle episode a little rubber puppet moves a spaceship with his mind.

[tetsuoh]

welcome to facebook - honestly i hate the site.

and thank you for that i didnt even think to check the read me since i had gotten rid of it a long time ago - redownloaded and sent him a message - if hes still around anyway.

and the roller - is it the one by adrian?

reminds me i need to talk to mikhael.

my end goal is a tool program that encompasses adrians roller - the npc generator and the astrogation computer each on a different tab.

[Mikael Hasselstein]

[cheshire]

[cheshire]

[gollummen]

Im back baby!

Im glad that people can use my work and I would be more than happy to give you the code. Sadly it is some years and computers since I made the program so the code is forever lost in the void.

If it could help I would make some notes from memory about how the mechanics worked.

[tetsuoh]

awwwwwwwww gollum - sokay - i'm working with what I got. WB

I'm owrking on the prog but its slow - I'm incorporating a searchable galactic map with the nav comp data - which has drawn me in and given me numerous headaches.

[Mojomoe]

I don't know if any of the work is compatible, but maybe we should talk. I'm currently working on a modern NPC generator running in Excel, that takes all of the current species into account and also allows for new species generation on the fly. It's a TON of work, so I'd love to share thoughts on how youre solving some of the algorithms.

[Mojomoe]

I should elaborate, the most challenging thing currently is weighting each of the species and classifications towars current skills so that you get skill distributions that make sense, but still give you occasional outsiders that are interesting, like Dancing and Culinary Arts. I don't want JUST occupation-specific skillsets!

The other thing that I'm battling with currently is finding a GOOD bit of math for deciding on a charatcer's "level," I.E. how many skill dice they get to distribute. I've gotten some WILDLY different numbers from official sources, (we all know about that!), but i am trying to make a character generator that will make characters that follow the current rules as well as make characters that fit with other NPCs.

[tetsuoh]

We went with the levels of experience like previous npc rollers and a couple official sources that simply allocate for dice towards skills.

We planned on 6 levels of npcs so it carries with the d6 system. And allows our system to be rolled instead as well.

Novice - 3d
Beginner - 5d
Standard - 7d
Experienced - 9d
Veteran - 11d
Master - 13d

Standard is the same as starting npc - 7d or 21pips.
Which means the MOST powerful NPC that we roll is slightly less than twice the power of a starting character. Mind you we don't generally use this system for reoccurring villains - though they have come about from rolled npcs. the same is true of Ally NPC's of our players.

We have YET to solve the return algo for java to change pip numbers in dice numbers by dividing by 3 and adding the remainder behind the D.

I don't have our work here as its the wrong computer at the moment. but will pm you when I get the chance.

OH and in terms of balancing species we haven't really gotten to working on that yet but we plan to look at each race and will simply put a cap on or denial on certain skills based on ability by race.

Goo creatures cant really dance per say. Creatures that don't eat have no need to know how to cook. And pacifist creatures really have no place having combat skills other than dodge and parry.

How hard that would be to code in - ain't got a clue. But I know my buddy learned how to code the roller to only allow so many points to go towards any one attribute or skill and the program continue to allocate the rest of the points in the same manner.

ours is a bit off but its cool because atm you can get a COOK who also has 3d+2 in espionage and such lmao. We may have to tweak a couple things but atm its kinda neat.

We're even working on giving a certain lvl of npc generated the ability to put points in advanced skills if it randomly rolled a skill increase to allow with points first. Such as the NPC randomly rolling 5d in first aid and then the program then being allowed to roll for medicine.

evidently that's easy - we simply add in the advanced skills as being able to be rolled and if it rolls an advanced skill it simply looks to see if the output number is set to true before adding the adv skill or it rerolls.

example:
Roll1 adds 7 points to the npcs first aid - sets output number to 7+9 (9 is the characters 3d technical).
Roll2 attempts to add 4 to the advanced skill medicine - advanced skills have the check routine - it searches for the first aid output - its set at 16 which equals true. It adds the advanced skill and continues to roll3.
If first aid has an output number set to false (below 15) it voids the roll and returns to roll2

BUT anyway I'm probably saying that entirely wrong knowing my luck but you may get the point.

*wanders back to mapping the galaxy at large wandering if he could put an encounter system into the astrogation tab linked to the size and use of hyperlanes by using that same system*

[Mojomoe]

Sounds good!

BTW, I'm doing this with spreadsheet math, but it should translate to Java -

*Take the number of pips / 3 to get the D value (ex, 40 pips /3 = 13.333 D)
*Round to nearest whole number (13.333 -> 13)
*Subtract whole number from D number (13.3333 - 13 = .3333)
*IF statement (IF x > .6666, "+2", ELSE IF x > .3333 "+1", ELSE " " (nothing) )
*concatenate D number with your +1/+2 value ("13" + "D" + "+1") to get your final string, 13D+1 from 40 pips.

As long as you do that step last, and perform all your math on the pip value, all will be right with the world. Took me a fair few days of brainbashing to get that!

Good luck, and may the force be with you .