madmagician wrote:
Also, I want to try to put this logic into a google spreadsheet. To avoid extraneous work, has anyone done this yet?
I have said in a few places that I am planning to work up an automated spreadsheet for this at some point. There is not much point starting just yet though as the formula may or may not be stable enough to support it. Still, since you have started, I have a few thoughts.
Yours seems to have a few language errors. I cannot tell if it has computation errors or not, as I cannot enter values.
For Example: Under Movement Type you have:
"Instructions: Place a "1" ONLY in the appropriate 'Modifier' column for your unit." This has two problems. First, there is only one column. Second, it seems to be saying that only one choice can be made. People would have to be able to make multiple selections, for example for a Command Skimmer.
The templates listed are not intended to be an exhaustive list of those available. Just a representative sample of the most common ones. Any spreadsheet will have to allow the user to input their template's length and width and calculate the value from that.
Same with Range. While the values given cover all known models in NetEpic Gold, people should not be limited to those values. Increments of 5cm should be available, probably from a pull-down box.
In fact, as a generality, I would suggest making most places where things can be selected into pull-down boxes. At least those things with fixed values. Examples would be: Model Type; Terrain Access; Move rate (2.5cm increments); Armor Save (including entries for Fixed Saves); CAF base value; common Weapons could be created ahead of time and selectable, otherwise all individual weapon stats could use this aside from Weapon Special Abilities; & Morale. The other options would probably be best as checkboxes, rather than a text field where the user has to type a "1" or any other numerical value. Well, aside from things like Wounds where the number of them is actually necessary.
With pull-down boxes, most of the language can be simplified. For example, the first one could be just "What type of Model are you building?" with a pull down with entries for: Infantry; Light Artillery; Cavalry; Walker; Vehicle; Heavy Artillery; Super Heavy Vehicle; Knight; Praetorian; Titan. These should be separated as then certain other options can be made available or unavailable depending on previous selections. An example of that would be that some Knights have the Terrain Access of Infantry, but no existing Super Heavy does, so they should not have access to that option.
I may have other thoughts on this later, but I really wasn't planning on thinking about this topic this much just yet.