From the Iron Crown Website

This is the tenth of our scheduled Director’s Briefings.

Normally John Seal of Aurigas gets to talk about the business aspects and the cool software tools that have already arrived or are being built to support ICE games, and I focus on upcoming books. So to mix things up a bit, I thought I would say a few words about the business end and about software.

On the business end of things, I am very pleased to report that our accountant has crunched the numbers and Guild Companion Publications Ltd made a reasonable operating profit in 2011. (Of course, I already knew that we had made a profit but the accountant’s job is to ensure that all the numbers are reported in a way that conforms to how the UK taxman wants to read them.) These profits will be and are being ploughed straight back into the business to finance the next waves of new products across multiple game lines. That’s the good news. There isn’t any bad news.

Onto cool software tools and the Rolemaster Classic Fantasy Grounds virtual tabletop. I’ve never used any virtual tabletop software, being fortunate enough still to be a participant in an active local gaming group, so the demo I had of the software in April was a real eye-opener. Prior to the demo, I had downloaded all the necessary software and had a ten-minute go at trying to do something with the trial version, but really hadn’t made significant progress. An hour and a half later in the company of two very experienced users/developers and I could see how it worked and how to use it. This is a fantastic package for running distributed games where the gaming group is scattered across a country. It is also a great package for running a face-to-face game where the GM and the players want the computer to do the legwork. I hope that we’ll see a HARP/HARP SF edition in the future.

Speaking of software for HARP, Aurigas has licensed the creator of AutoHARP to commercialise his character creator and support tools for HARP. We are currently testing AutoHARP to check the character reconstructions for HARP Martial Law. Expect to see a version of AutoHARP that is wholly compliant with the new HARP Fantasy to be released in the near future. This will be sold through our presence in the OneBookShelf network.

And back to news about product development.

HARP Fantasy has now entered its layout phase – we expect to see it emerge in both pdf and print-on-demand versions in a couple of months. We also hope that we’ll be able to put HARP Fantasy into distribution (and hence game stores) via an imprint partner perhaps later this year. A quick reminder about the time-limited discount coupon for the HARP Fantasy pdf – once we release it as pdf, there’ll be announcements via a newsletter and the forums about how to get the discount. Keep watching so you don’t miss out. In terms of its revision, work is underway to make the characters at the back of HARP Martial Law consistent with HARP Fantasy. Once that is complete and that’s all we have to do, then Martial Law will go into the layout queue as its new artwork is already finished. HARP College of Magics and Loot: a Field Guide are next on the revision queue and we will be commissioning a similar enhancement of Cyradon and the new HARP Bestiary.

Last month, we noted that we might speed up the pdf return of some RMSS products where we had secured agreement to rescue them from copyright limbo. Peter Mork’s School of Hard Knocks was duly returned as a searchable scanned pdf in April. With Cyber Europe, we’re simply waiting on confirmation that its author can access his royalties via OneBookShelf.

Rebranding of the Spacemaster: Privateers products continues slowly but surely. As they emerge, we will put them back on sale directly.

The authors working on the seven Rolemaster projects continue to toil away to finalise their drafts. I expect to be talking in detail about some of these projects next month.

The next scheduled Director’s Briefing will be presented in early June.

Best wishes,
Nicholas

Director, Guild Companion Publications Ltd.

I would like that thank both John and Nicholas for the license and I look very forward to the future of AutoHarp with Iron Crown.

Update with Screen Shots!

A frequently asked question has come up asking if AutoHarp will work with Rolemaster. Right now, AutoHarp is only for Harp Fantasy. There are plans to encorporate Harp Sci-Fi but right now there are no plans for Rolemaster unless there is a large response for a Rolemaster version. ICE, according to the forum and newsletter believes that a re-issue of Harp Fantasy will be released in Q2 (April, May, June). It was also mentioned that the database for Autoharp: Character Creator and Combat Tracker might also rollout with this release. Hopefully more news will come as we get closer to the release date. Also, after Harp Fantasy Core Rules has rolled out it has been said that Martial Law Companion and College of Magics is to be released soon after. From what I can tell there are no plans to re-release Bazaar and I do not know if there will be a re-release of the Codex or not. I am planning to have an update for the database for both the Martial Law Companion and College of Magics. 

In the meantime, here are some screenshots of Autoharp: Character Creator and AutoHarp: Combat Tracker.

AutoHarp: Character Creator - Main Page

  

AutoHarp: Character Creator - Editing Skills

AutoHarp: New Level

AutoHarp: Print Preview

AutoHarp: Combat Tracker - Main Screen

AutoHarp: Combat Tracker - Attack window

Blog merge.

I'm going to merge this blog with my other blog for AutoHarp, making the AutoHarp blog the main blog for both applications: Character Manager and Combat Tracker. I will therefore be eliminating this blog in a few weeks. If you have a subscription to this blog please sign up at my other blog site

http://autoharprpg.blogspot.com/

and subscribe. Thanks for your interest in AutoHarp.

We're Back!!

It's been a hellish last year for me, but everything has been stabilized for now and AutoHarp is again back on my plate. This time with an awesome update.

I have submitted the database to ICE and they have approved it. Right now its release it dependent on when Harp Fantasy is released which could be in a couple of months. I'm unsure as to the details of its release but I'm sure as things come together for Harp Fantasy those details will be more clear. It is my hope to have AutoHarp, both the Character Manager and the Combat Tracker ready by then for both Windows and Linux. I also plan to have a manual ready for both which includes help on how to tweek the database and also how to create a custom database if you want. Currently the only rules included in the database are the Core Rules. The rule set for Martial Arts Companion, Codex, Bazaar and College of Magics will be released over time in conjunction I believe with ICE schedule of releases.

The database includes just about everything when it comes to the core rules, races, professions, cultures, items, herbs, talents, statistics, movement maneuver, experience, encounter tables and a full combat table for Core Rules only. It is my hope in time when Martial Arts Companion and Bazaar is released to have both Combat Rules sets also a part of the Combat Tracker. 


More to come in the next few months.

Again Sorry for any lack of progress

I am currently in school right now and my time is limited. I am hoping to continue to work on Orc in upcoming months here and have something available this June. It will be an expanded version of Orc to include HARP and Hack and Slash. Until Happy Holidays! Merry Christmas! Happy New Year!

Sorry for the lack of updates

I have completed a Harp Character Generator that can be found at http://harpy-harp.googlecode.com/files/HarpCharGen.exe

I plan to return to Orc here soon with the intent on fixing up the RM side of things and then adding functionality to have it work for Harp and Hack and Slash.

It will be released as Open Source with the XML database being minimal. No critical information at all except table names and for Hack and Slash very little attack information.

Orc Sneek Peak

Main Screen

Attack Screen


Add Player Screen

Here some screen shots of Orc 1.02 which reflects the changes I felt were necessary after some actual play testing a few weekends ago. As you can see I have streamlined a few things and even added some features. Here's a run down:

• Main screen has been streamlined to only include the Character Name, initiative value, Hit points, power points, an action status, bleed and any penalties. The action status tells the user the condition of the player, for example, is the player stunned, down, out, dead, etc. It does not indicate the number of rounds as this is something I feel isn't all that necessary to know on a constant basis however you can get that information from the Critical Detail window if the player asks.
  
• Any action Orc would have taken based on the action status is eliminated in favor of a warning box to remind the user what condition the character is in. Before Orc would not allow you to attack if the player was stunned. Here the user can do anything they want that fits whatever rules they are using for that particular action. Orc leaves the appropriate action to the user.
  
• Weapon selection added to the target area in attack window so user can adjust this value immediately.
  
• Also I have eliminated Use Adrenal Defense and cover selections in favor of user fields.
  
• User Fields allow the player to define specific player values that can be used during melee. You can add four different values per user field: a value for Melee, MissileBolt, AreaBall or a default value. The user field selection window will display the appropriate value based on the attack. If no value exists, the default value is displayed.
  
• Quickness bonus, adrenal bonus, armor bonus and other bonuses have been eliminated in favor of MeleeDB, MissileBoltDB and AreaBallDB. This is to reflect the specific bonus based on each type of attack to the player. This eliminates the specific rules that Rolemaster uses in favor of any house rules that might be in place which calculates these values. These values do not include your shield bonus or your adrenal defense bonus. This is important to remember. The reason for this is because Adrenal Defense is a rare skill and it different per attack and has rules when it can be used. Shields also have different values per attack and have rules on when they can be used.
  
• Adrenal Defense has been removed from the Add Attack tab in the AddPlayer Window. Again this is a user field and is not necessary to define it for an attack. This is something the GM can and should do on his own per house rules.
• I have also added a UserFields.xml file to define the basic userfields for melee such as cover, lighting and positional modifiers. Go ahead and add to this file any other fields you can think of that each player should have. These fields will display for all players. The userfields you define PER player in the AddPlayer window is displayed ONLY for that player.
  
• Cleaned up main window to remove values that are zero. Therefore only values that have meaning display on the main window.
• Clicking Done on the attack windows saves and closes the window. Save and Attack will save and clear all values for another attack. Use this if the player gets another critical, attack, etc. A message box will appear for criticals that get two rolls each for a different table if you click done. The critical information is automatically updated.
  

Things not yet added but I plan to at some point.

• "Player overrides stun" checkbox. User checks this if a maneuver was performed that can override the stun for a round. This tells the program NOT to reduce the stun value by 1.
• I would like to bold the text in the Action Status so that it stands out a bit more.
  
• I would like to add a column so the user can select an action the player is going to perform that round. This allows the user to know who is doing what. This field will be controlled entirely by the user as it should.
  
• Calculating experience points for the whole melee when finished.
  
• Keeping track of exhaustion points however how many people really want this?
  

Things not changed

• I have not changed the Spell Casting window or Maneuver windows. (exception: I added a default value of 5 to the maneuver window for the Feet per Hex value.
  
• You can still add ranks to the critical in order to get a spread of criticals you can scroll through.

I am hoping I can make Orc available soon. I have and continue to use this program and I think it is a pretty solid application. Used in conjunction with Battlegrounds makes for a rather fun experience. In fact I now run ALL my combats using Battlegrounds and Orc.