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 Mordheim Application

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extraman92
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PostSubject: Mordheim Application   Mordheim Application Icon_minitimeTue 5 May 2009 - 17:56

So, I've dabbled into attempting to program a custom Mordheim Roster Builder (and possibly campaign builder) application. Real life or my lack of programming skills have always held me back. Well I'm about to graduate college finally (with a degree in game programming) and I think it might be time to take another shot at it.

So, what things would people want to see out of a Mordheim supplement application? It will, at it's core, be a Roster builder. I want to set it up to where you can create your own custom warband files to import. Yeah, I know that you can do most of this with Army Builder, but personally I don't like the setup. The idea would be to essentially replicate the Mordheim Roster sheet look so you're right at home making warbands on the computer. You would also be able to export your Warband to XML format for displaying any way you choose.

Any feature requests? Specific rules concerns? Can anyone think of any specific warband rules that deviates from the regular rules at all? Possessed Mutations come to mind. Any suggestions on layout/how to set things up would be useful. Would people prefer drop boxes or other types of lists for selecting unit type/weapons/armor/skills?
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PostSubject: Re: Mordheim Application   Mordheim Application Icon_minitimeTue 5 May 2009 - 18:27

Hmmm, interesting. I think with that degree, you should move over to the online mordheim gaiming system setup, instead of roster sheets, lol. C'mon! Everyone here would LOVE to have a chance ot play each other via an online gaming session. 3D and all!

Back to the topic, I actually like the Army Builder, as I can go into the files and edit the settings. Hence, me being able to update the Norse warband with the correct stats on the Wulfen.

Also, you can copy and rename those warband files to new warband entries, allowing modified warbands to be accessible. As for the output, I see where you are going with this. The output files of Army Builder could have been more in line with the Roster Sheets, but they were designed for fluid use for all the gaming systems it supports. Perhaps there is a better way to transfer the html, xml, or other output formats from Army Builder to a Mordheim Roster sheet.

Just a few thoughts and ramblings.
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PostSubject: Re: Mordheim Application   Mordheim Application Icon_minitimeTue 5 May 2009 - 18:46

Actually, a 3D Mordheim video game is something I've been considering doing for a while as well. Smile I'd want to do a direct turn based translation, with animated models and the ability to custom "paint" your warband. Of course, I'd have to look into legalities for something like that... And it would take a long time to build. Also, I'm employed in the video game industry currently and would have to look into how my employment would affect it...

The Mordheim Roster Builder would allow you full control over editing warband entries, including adding your own custom warbands. I think that's pretty necessary with the amount of unofficial warbands and house rules in use. What I don't like about Army Builder is the general layout of the program. It's not all that intuitive to me. Also, I think because it's not built for any specific game it lacks in rules specifics. I haven't used it in a LONG time, but can you even set it up to force specific rules (ie. a Possessed MUST have a mutation) or do you have to remember that stuff on your own?

I was thinking XML for output so people can use them how they want, and maybe making a Mordheim Roster Sheet export as well to export it directly to a file that resembles an actual roster sheet.
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PostSubject: Re: Mordheim Application   Mordheim Application Icon_minitimeTue 5 May 2009 - 18:57

I just looked at Army Builder on a friend's computer... It's a lot better than I remember. Anyone have a good Mordheim data file for Army Builder with any of the unofficial warbands or anything?

Maybe I can just create a campaign tracker program? That was one of the features that I would have liked to get into there, but I'm not fully sure how I'd do it yet.
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PostSubject: Re: Mordheim Application   Mordheim Application Icon_minitimeTue 5 May 2009 - 19:08

I have Army Builder and it's files, although I am at work now... There are plenty of unofficial warbands in there, but the only thing is, you have to have Army Builder or the Editing Piece, which is included with the CD version, to be able to edit all aspects of each individual warband, or each individual character. You have full reign to edit all aspects of the warbands, their equipment, skills, heroes, henchmen, etc.

Now, when you say campaign tracker program, what do you mean? Something that integrates within Army Builder?
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PostSubject: Re: Mordheim Application   Mordheim Application Icon_minitimeTue 5 May 2009 - 19:16

Well, I was going to create a custom Mordheim Roster builder... and then a campaign tracker addition for it that would allow you to track multiple warbands and set up custom campaigns, and maybe even set it up to do things like prompt you for post-game input (walk you through each step, from rolling for injuries to buying upgrades for your units). You would input all the starting warbands, set up whatever options for the campaign (could choose to use a map or just randomly generate battles), and then you could do things like any map movement through the program with it storing it all... maybe it would choose scenarios or match-ups for you. Once a game is completed you return to the program and enter in all the data. It would walk you through the post game process from start to finish, and then update the campaign with all the new data. You tell it that the game is complete, it asks who won, then asks for how much each experience every unit earned, which units were taken out of action, prompts you to roll for injuries and asks for the results (or includes a random number generator to simulate dice rolls if you wanted, but that might remove some of the fun), prompts you for exploration dice rolls, etc etc.

The other cool thing about that would be the stats tracking. Maybe it would allow you to input the results of a game, including options such as which units took out which other units. The result would be insane stats tracking for a full campaign with stuff like how many kills an individual unit has, wins/losses, maybe even like how one hero type matches up with another?

Yeah, I'm a bit of a stats whore so I get excited over that type of stuff, lol.
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PostSubject: Re: Mordheim Application   Mordheim Application Icon_minitimeTue 5 May 2009 - 21:41

There is an guy who is doing his own Army Builder and it is great so far. I will see if I can get him to post here.
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PostSubject: Re: Mordheim Application   Mordheim Application Icon_minitimeWed 6 May 2009 - 2:30

hmmm, campaign builder you say?

From what you describe, you would need to include either a re-roll button, or a way to filter the available scenarios by setting or user preference. We all know there are some scenarios that have rewards that are wayyy to good compared to the original ones... Maybe allow for those scenarios, chosen by you as default to be extra rare of only attainable after certain perquisites are met. The user would then have the option to use your settings or edit them to suit their own ideals.

That's all my ideas at the moment...
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PostSubject: Re: Mordheim Application   Mordheim Application Icon_minitimeWed 6 May 2009 - 4:00

How about the ability to choose which scenarios it will select and give them a priority/set the % chance of getting that scenario? Smile

I definitely want it to be very customizable. I'd like to give the user as much control as possible over all the settings.
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PostSubject: Re: Mordheim Application   Mordheim Application Icon_minitimeThu 7 May 2009 - 9:38

this sounds gr8 and to have my say i would prefer drop down boxes for equipment/ppl/abilities
hope it works for u
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PostSubject: Re: Mordheim Application   Mordheim Application Icon_minitimeThu 7 May 2009 - 20:20

Nice idea to keep track of a campaign in the application. I am doing a Warband Builder application usign Visual C++ and SQL and DaBank told me that you were looking for some ideas. I use drop boxes for unit/equipment selections and fields for the names of the heroes and henchmen given by the user. I stored the info on an SQL database and filter it by queries and programming code depending on the user selections.

As for the warbands that deviate from the rules like the Possessed (Mutation) and Sisters (Misc Equipment), I used a template class for the heroes and the henchmen and inherited from that to only code the differences between the standard warbands and the "special cases". At the moment I have only encountered that the Possessed and the Sisters of Sigmar deviated from the standard and I have already included all the warbands from the rulebook and a few others from the expanded rules.

For the roster sheet, I used a modified version of the one included in the book that was also available from the games workshop site. On top of the roster image, I included the fields for the report generator so that the user could print the roster or save it as .pdf. I did not use the roster as the background of the selection form to be able to manipulate more information in less space. If you are interested I can send you a few screen shots.

Keep up your work and hope to see how it goes with the campaign generator/tracking.
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PostSubject: Re: Mordheim Application   Mordheim Application Icon_minitimeThu 7 May 2009 - 20:26

I would love to see some screenshots of your work. I actually created a semi-working version a long time ago with Visual Basic, but I got to a point where Visual Basic couldn't handle everything I wanted. I've been thinking of using Visual C# since it's very well suited for this type of application.

How is the SQL stuff working for you? Do you have a way of allowing the user to create/modify warbands? I would like to use XML for storing the actual warbands so they can be easily edited/people can create their own for custom warbands.
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PostSubject: Re: Mordheim Application   Mordheim Application Icon_minitimeFri 8 May 2009 - 11:55

I dont have a lot of computer skills, but what I would like to see is a campaign builder with a interactive map (think mighty empires). You can place icons on witch area of mordheim you have concored and you can also see (or maby people can edit this them selves?) witch special rules/ scenario you have to play if you gonna fight over this area. Maby it can be a online application that everybody in the campaign can look at and fill in their scores? I dont know if this is possible but I think it would be a verry handy tool for game clubs.
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PostSubject: Re: Mordheim Application   Mordheim Application Icon_minitimeSat 9 May 2009 - 0:17

SQL is working fine with my application. The user would have to install SQL Express (included in the setup) and this takes some time but after that it runs pretty well.

At the moment I am using only the previously released warbands only (official and the other warbands published later) since I am controlling the options that you can use via program code. For example, if you can use only two units of a specific kind, the application would not let you use a third. These things I have to know them before hand to be able to limit the user to create only valid warbands, so I am not giving options to user created warbands.

For the experienced warbands I would give an option to customize an existing warband with additional equipment, profile upgrades (+WS, +A, +T, etc.), include henchmen units as heroes (Ladz got Talent) and support for hired swords. These customized selections will be stored on a separate SQL table to avoid any alteration to the base stats and options to the original data when starting a warband from scratch.
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PostSubject: Re: Mordheim Application   Mordheim Application Icon_minitimeSat 9 May 2009 - 10:26

gorbag that sounds like u have done a lot of hard work good job thumbsup thumbsup thumbsup
cant wait to see it Sir, yes sir!
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PostSubject: Re: Mordheim Application   Mordheim Application Icon_minitimeSat 9 May 2009 - 22:44

I've never used the army builder, but I know what I'd want from it. It'd be important to me to be able to freely edit every aspect of the character sheet. The most frustrating thing would be not being able to change things freely because of too much automation.
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PostSubject: Re: Mordheim Application   Mordheim Application Icon_minitimeTue 12 May 2009 - 13:48

@Svenn:
What we would really need is a more fluent way to add new warbands to AB. Some kind of thingy with a nice GUI, that gives options that can be selected and so on... ah, wouldn't that be nice?
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