Version 1.3.1 Released, and Now an ENnie Award Nominee!

Written by admin on July 15, 2014 in Wild Card Creator - Comments Off

Wild Card Creator has just been updated to version 1.3.1, providing a number of bug fixes for the Super Powers Companion and issues with saving characters. Next update will be adding support for 3 new settings!

Also, I’m really pleased to announce that Wild Card Creator has been nominated for an ENnie Award! The ENnie Awards are an event held at GenCon every year to recognize the best products in the roleplaying game industry in a variety of categories, including Best Adventure, Best Supplement, Best Game, and Best Software (the category that Wild Card Creator is in). A panel of judges narrows down the submissions to 5 per category and then gamers like you vote for their favorites to determine which ones will actually win an ENnie Award.

It’s really an honor to be recognized in this way, especially since it is a work of love by one person. Thanks to everyone who has purchased Wild Card Creator and provided feedback to make it the awesome product it is today!

Public voting begins on July 20th and will continue through July 30th. When that happens, please vote for Wild Card Creator and your favorites from the other categories!

Sci-Fi and Super Powers Companions Added!

Written by admin on July 1, 2014 in Wild Card Creator - Comments Off

Wild Card Creator 1.3 has been released! The changelog is short, but that one line says a whole lot:

Pinnacle’s Super Powers Companion (Second Edition) and Science Fiction Companion are now supported.

Two of the most requested PDFs are now added to Wild Card Creator! Go ahead and download the update and give it a spin. These two settings are pretty complex and offer a lot of new functionality for Wild Card Creator, so as always, if you spot a bug or have some feedback, contact us and tell us how we can make it even better!

Next up on the list of things to do is making a huge dent in that setting support list (with some help from several contributors). Also in the near future is the ability to add custom content on the fly, allowing you to give your character that Edge that your GM just invented for your character specifically. A bit farther in the future, is support for creating the custom content found in the Science Fiction Companion, such as custom starships. And then there are other things planned as well!

Enjoy Wild Card Creator!

Wild Card Creator 1.2 Released

Written by admin on June 5, 2014 in Wild Card Creator - Comments Off

It’s been a while since the last update, but that doesn’t mean that Journeyman Games hasn’t been hard at work. This new update adds:

Support for Pinnacle’s 50 Fathoms and GRAmel’s Beasts & Barbarians
Augments and Occupations for Gun Metal Games’ Interface Zero 2.0
A whole bunch of improvements and new features for the homebrew editor
Auto-downloading updates; no need to revisit this website every time an update comes out!
Lots of under the hood improvements and bug fixes

Check out the full changelog for all the new features and fixes that have come out over the last several betas

Later this month we’ll be releasing an update that adds support for the Super Powers Companion 2.0 and Sci-fi Companion! And after that, we’ll be adding support for new settings at a much faster pace. Enjoy!

What’s Next for Wild Card Creator?

Written by admin on May 1, 2014 in Wild Card Creator - 2 Comments

Looks like Pinnacle got a bit excited by this post and wrote a headline from the future on their website! The Super Powers Companion & Sci-fi Companion will be coming some time in June, with many of the other features listed below in a May update. That said, I’m glad that everybody is getting really excited over this! Stay tuned!

Over the last several months, a number of updates have been released for Wild Card Creator, adding support for more settings and introducing a number of exciting new features. But we’re not done yet! We’ve got many new things planned for future releases that our beta testers have been hard at work hammering out. Here are a couple of the things you can expect to see:

Auto-downloading updates: Starting with version 1.1.1, you will no longer have to go to JourneymanGames.net to download a new version of Wild Card Creator; it will download it for you!
Expanded homebrew setting options: You’ll now be able to homebrew new Special Abilities, vehicles, setting rules, and other content. You’ll also have more options for restricting content, such as “all Futuristic gear from core Savage Worlds”.
Character-specific homebrew: Did your GM give out some unique gear or allow you to create an Edge just for your character? Now you’ll be able to add them directly to your character alone without needing to create a homebrew setting!
Character power sheet: Want a printout of the spell descriptions for your wizard? Now you can add one!
Optional Rules for Published Settings: Want to play Shaintar with the optional 25 XP per rank rule? Weird Wars Rome with the additional character options in the War Master’s section? Interface Zero 2.0 with the optional Athletics skill rule? You’ll be able to enable these and more for the characters you create.
Support for Super Powers Companion, 2nd Edition and the Sci-fi Companion: We’re already supporting the Fantasy Companion and Horror Companion, so it should come as no surprise that we’re eager to support the two most recent Companion books in Wild Card Creator!
Even more settings: Although much of the recent focus has been on the under the hood changes in Wild Card Creator, we’re getting back into full swing for supporting more settings and have enlisted some help in making this possible. We’re confident about meeting our goal of support for all the published settings in Savage Worlds by Autumn 2014. Check out our progress here.
Lots of little things: We’re making a bunch of minor improvements to the entire user experience, making the app as a whole more easy and fun to use!

Wild Card Creator has a lot planned for the next several releases and we hope you are as excited as we are for what the future has in store!

And if you’re really eager and are interested in beta testing for the next version, contact us and we’ll see what we can do!

Download Codes Sent

Written by admin on September 18, 2013 in Wild Card Creator - Comments Off

I’ve sent all 529 download code e-mails to backers (Kickstarter and PayPal). Inside, you should have have received instructions for downloading versions of Wild Card Creator along with a unique download code so that you can get it from the new Journeyman Games online store for free (since you already paid for it. If you haven’t received one or you have any problems downloading it, let me know.

I had a few questions about how tough it was to send out 529 e-mails and if I had any sanity left. To answer that question, I’ve decided to recount the process to you via the Savage Worlds Deluxe Dramatic Task rules. This happened in the “Life” campaign I’m in (we meet every day).

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Will Herrmann: Woohoo! I finished Wild Card Creator 1.0!

GM of Life: Great, you’ll get extra XP for accomplishing a lot this session. But first, we need to have to do a Dramatic Task.

Will: For what?

GM: You remember. Last session you set up the online store so that people could purchase and download Wild Card Creator instantly. And then I alluded to the fact that you’d have to convert people over to the new system to make things easier for everyone?

Will: Oh yeah… Aren’t Dramatic Tasks supposed to be done during combat or ticking timebombs or something?

GM: Why do you want a ticking time bomb?

Will: Nope, that’s okay.

GM: This will be a standard five round dramatic task to get 529 download code e-mails to backers for both Kickstarter and PayPal. If you don’t get it out in time, you’ll suffer the wrath of the backers and take a penalty to Charisma for your lost reputation. Make a Spirit roll to get through the monotony of copy-pasting that many e-mails.

Will: I’ve got a better idea. Can I substitute Knowledge (Computer Programming)? It’s a decent stat after my last Advance. I want to write a script that can generate these e-mails for me.

GM: Sounds reasonable. Make an Investigation roll to see if you can learn how.

Will: [rolls] I got a 6. Looks like my Google-fu is strong.

GM: You’ve found some code online that gives you the general idea. We’ll call that a success. Now make that Knowledge (Computer Programming) roll.

Will: [rolls] It exploded! I got an 11, so a success and a raise.

GM: Not only are you able to get it to work the way you want it to, but you also got it to generate some files you’ll need to get your website to recognize the discount codes.

Will: Awesome! Over half way there!

GM: Ah, but you drew a Club on your Action Card and that means a complication. You suddenly get 46 new e-mails in your inbox. It seems that your e-mail service will only let you send 150 each hour before it cuts you off, so you’ve just had a bunch of e-mails bounce back. And furthermore, you don’t see a pattern for which e-mails bounced back, so you’re not sure who didn’t get one. You’ll be at a –2 to your next Knowledge (Computers) roll and if you fail, you’ll face the wrath of backers who didn’t get their download codes.

Will: Aw man…hey wait, I’ve got an idea. How about I use my knowledge of regular expressions that I’ve learned from creating importers for Savage Worlds settings and pull out all the e-mail addresses and backer codes.

GM: Roll it.

Will: [rolls] Shucks, rolled a 3…Oh, I’ve got a Benny, I’ll spend that…There we go, I rolled a 5. I gather the codes and the e-mails and resend them through my script.

GM: Crisis narrowly avoided. Looks like nobody is going to miss out on their download codes. But you’ve taken a while to do this and now you’ve got some backers writing glib comments on your last Kickstarter update saying they are “somewhat patient, somewhat not :-)”

Will: Alright, I’ll just try write a quick comment to them in response and continue with my script, doing the e-mails in sets so that I don’t hit that limit. [rolls] And there we are, a 4 on the Wild Die! I’ve successfully delivered all 529 e-mails, each with a unique license code, and with no Sanity loss! I’ll just write a Kickstarter update saying that I’ve done it and let people know to contact me directly if they didn’t get it or had any problems.

…Wait a second, I’m writing that Kickstarter update right now. Woah, that’s so meta.

GM: Hey, no meta-gaming!

Will: Sorry!

GM: Now, let’s give another run at that “day job” subsystem I’ve written as a setting rule…

Wild Card Creator 1.0 Released!

Written by admin on September 15, 2013 in Wild Card Creator - Comments Off

Over a year and a half ago, I decided to begin a very ambitious project: I wasn’t satisfied with the other Savage Worlds character creators out there and I decided to make my own. More than that, I wanted it to be built from the ground up to support supplementary content from published settings and homebrew settings. And I wanted it to be able to add content from purchased PDFs for free.

After I’d worked on it for about 6 months, I had a prototype ready. I showed it to some friends and they were very impressed by it, encouraging me to publish it so that other gamers could use it. I started a Kickstarter drive for Wild Card Creator in order to raise the money I would need to work on it. I set a goal of $4,000.

The response was overwhelming! Over the course of 30 days, 375 backers pledged $10,000 to make Wild Card Creator a reality, with even more pledging through PayPal! I was floored by the response and I was glad that I struck a chord with Savage Worlds gamers everywhere. I created Wild Card Creator because it was what I wanted to see, and others wanted to see it too.

Over the last year, I’ve put many, many hours into Wild Card Creator. I ran it through a series of closed betas for several months and then at the end of May, it was finally released to backers. I received a lot of great feedback and many, many bugs were fixed. Along the way, I steadily started adding more settings and more features. And now:

Wild Card Creator 1.0 is released!

This my friends is a proud step of the journey: I’m at a point where I feel that Wild Card Creator is “ready” for the real world. Highlights for this release:

Support for Deadlands Noir, Agents of Oblivion, and Shaintar: Legends Arise
Homebrew Arcane Backgrounds
Special Abilities
Improved character sheet output
More character art from Cheyenne Wright
Output to the newly released Fantasy Companion Character Sheet
See the changelog for a full list

And because it took a bit longer to get this out to you than I’d wanted, I’ve decided to add another thing to make up for it:

Support for Weird Wars Rome!

That’s right, Pinnacle’s newest setting that was recently Kickstarted and released to backers about 2 weeks ago is now supported by Wild Card Creator (with the most recent errata). This will begin a tradition of many newly released settings being supported almost immediately after their release, with some being supported the day of the release.

How Do I Get It?

The backer downloads webpage we’ve been using to distribute Wild Card Creator is going to be retired. Journeyman Games now has a proper web store on its site where Wild Card Creator can be downloaded from. All backers will receive a coupon code to download Wild Card Creator 1.0 for free from the store. This will also be how you will receive updates from now on. The whole system is a lot nicer and more professional than what we have been using. Because I have to send the codes individually, this will take some time to do over the next few days. I’ll post an update when I’ve sent out a code to everyone.

What’s Next?

Just because we’re at a 1.0 release doesn’t mean that work is done. Within the next week or so, a supplemental download will be available containing the Heroic and Legendary Tier characters from backers. If you are a Seasoned or Veteran tier backer, I will be getting in touch with you with instructions for submitting your character. I’m gathering a few more pieces of artwork from our artists and then you will also have a supplemental download for artwork from Cheyenne Wright and Storn Cook for use as character portraits, as part of the stretch goals you achieved.

The next big step in Wild Card Creator development is Super Powers Companion/Necessary Evil support. This will join the Fantasy Companion and Horror Companion, along with seven other settings that you can import if you own the PDF. Today also marks the start of the one year guarantee: within one year from today every Savage Worlds setting from the 23 companies that have pledged their support to Wild Card Creator (and hopefully a few more!) will be supported. Check out the Setting Support List for an ETA on each product.

Work will also begin on support for Savage Worlds Showdown (the $6,000 stretch goal), which will most likely be spun off into its own app (free of course for all backers). I’ll also be starting work on the iPad and Android Tablet ports of Wild Card Creator. I do not have an estimated release date for either project at this time (I’ve learned the wisdom that Pinnacle has shown in just saying “when it’s done” or having Joel Kinstle give an ambiguous reply).

At any rate, you all have helped me reach this point. Thank you for helping me to make my dream come true!

Improved Printing and Other Features

Written by admin on August 1, 2013 in Wild Card Creator - Comments Off

Last night, Wild Card Creator Public Beta 1 was released. As the previous update promised, custom character sheets, better printing, and the simple ability to take Edges like New Power multiple times were added.

Character Output

By popular demand, you can now export to the official Savage Worlds character sheet, which is included with Wild Card Creator. It’s the Explorer’s Edition one, not the Deluxe one unfortunately. I’d love to add the Deluxe one, but unfortunately Pinnacle has never released a form-fillable version of it. As soon as they do, I’ll add support to it.

You can now print in much more interesting ways, and use a print preview to see it before you print. The basic, no-frills stat block now lets you include a character portrait on the left or right side for a basic stat block. But if you want to create something more fancy, you can use HTML and CSS to create some interesting character sheets, or use one of the character sheets provided. Below is an example of “Tables”, a character sheet that I created (named such because of its heavy reliance on HTML tables), which is included with Wild Card Creator:

I’m sure others could do better, but this gives you an idea of what can be done with these custom sheets. If anybody makes a sheet that they’d like to share, I’m willing to host or link to it.

If you would rather just use an existing form-fillable PDF rather than making a custom HTML/CSS file, you can now add those too. The processes for both are currently experimental and you’re going to need to go under the hood to do it (for the form-fillable PDF, this involves creating a mapping file that allows Wild Card Creator know what to put in each field). I’ve documented the process for adding them here. If you are feeling adventurous and want to try it out, give it a go and please give me feedback on how I can make it better.

Roadmap

I’d like to lay out the road map for Wild Card Creator. The version has changed from “Backer Beta” to “Public Beta.” This name change means two things: first, Kickstarter backer levels are no longer available through PayPal on JourneymanGames.net. Second, this is the point where I really feel like Wild Card Creator is just about ready for the public. It’s still a beta and there are (increasingly fewer) rough spots, so I’ve sold it for a cheaper price than I will when it is released. All of you of course will be getting the final version for free.

The Public Beta period is going to be a relatively short one. The focus will be less on adding new features and more on getting settings added (expect core books for Deadlands Noir, Agents of Oblivion, Hellfrost, and Shaintar in the next update). My goal that I’m shooting for is to have Wild Card Creator “go public” by GenCon (I’ll be there for the weekend by the way, say hi to me if we meet). At that point, Wild Card Creator will be considered a complete product, although I will certainly be adding settings, fixing bugs, and adding features as I see fit.

Once the final version is out (and a we’re sure the big bugs are squashed), I’ll start burning CDs for those who ordered one. Speaking of which, you may have noticed that I haven’t collected addresses for those yet. I realize people move and, had I collected addresses several months ago, I would have probably sent things to the wrong spot. The Wild Card Creator CD will include a final version of Wild Card Creator, all of the artwork and NPCs, and maybe a few extras on there.

NPCs from backers are going to start being distributed with Wild Card Creator (potentially as a secondary download). If you submitted a character info sheet to me way back when (mostly Heroic and Legendary backers), I should be able to take care of it and I’ll contact you if I have any issues building your character. If you did not need to submit a character info sheet to me (mostly Seasoned and Veteran backers), you’ll just need to create a character in Wild Card Creator and e-mail it to me. Instructions for that will be forthcoming.

Anyway, that’s enough of an update: go download the latest version of Wild Card Creator!

Finalizing Wild Card Creator

Written by admin on July 15, 2013 in Wild Card Creator - Comments Off

Given that it’s been over a month since the last update, I figured I’d let you know how things are going with Wild Card Creator development. Backer Beta 3 was released several weeks ago with some major changes. One of the most important changes was eliminating the bug that required opening Wild Card Creator with “Run as Administrator” under certain Windows configurations.

The next release has unfortunately been very slow coming, due to some real-life stuff that has come up. That’s not to say that work has not been progressing. Oh no! Here are a few things that I’ve been working on :

Custom Character Sheets (and Better Printing)

Printing in Backer Beta 3 could use a lot of improvement. You can print out in a standard stat block or expanded stat block, but you can’t even print out a character sheet with an image on it.

To improve that, I’ve been working on a method of generating character sheets via HTML and CSS with special syntax to denote concepts for a Savage Worlds character (e.g. what their attributes are). The reason I chose those formats is because the learning curve is relatively easy (compared to some alternative formats, like XSLT) and it allows for a lot of flexibility in creating detailed character sheets that work for a variety of paper sizes. After all, I want to make sure that the users in the United States can make character sheets for those printing on A4 over in Europe!

If you’d like to take a sneak peak at the instructions for creating a custom character sheet, you can check it out here.

Taking an Edge or Hindrance Multiple Times

I’m somewhat embarrassed that this has taken so long to implement, but being able to take Edges and Hindrances multiple times is something very important that will be in the next release. This will allow you to take New Power more than once and multiple Phobias.

More Settings

For Backer Beta 3, I created a list of all the Savage Worlds settings and their estimated time to inclusion for Wild Card Creator. Those of you who have seen the Shaintar: Legends Unleashed Kickstarter may have caught an announcement that the earlier book, Shaintar: Legends Arise will be supported by the end of the month. Other settings will be implemented roughly according to the list linked to above.

So What’s Next?

Next release, you’ll notice that the terminology of Wild Card Creator has changed a bit. Instead of being a “Backer Beta”, it will now be a “Public Beta.” This mostly means that the Kickstarter pledge levels are no longer available to purchase on JourneymanGames.net, but you can still purchase Wild Card Creator for $20, just like on the Kickstarter.

The term “beta” is still being used in the sense that Google uses the term: it’s a product that works, but there are still a few rough spots. The goal is to have a “final 1.0” version by GenCon of this year. What this means is that the price will be raised to $25 and it will (hopefully) be submitted to the Mac App Store and possibly the Windows 8 App Store for wider distribution. And in case you are wondering, I’ll be willing to provide free product keys for any Kickstarter backers wanting to download Wild Card Creator from one of those app stores.

At that point, Wild Card Creator will be considered a feature complete product with most of the improvements from there on out being bug fixes and including more settings. Work will also begin at this point on an iPad and Android Tablet version. Those of you who pledged for a CD copy add-on will get it mailed to you after it’s clear that there aren’t any major bugs in the final 1.0 release.

I’d like to thank you all profusely for your patience as I’ve been developing Wild Card Creator. I’ve heard a lot of great feedback from you all and I’m glad to have made a Savage Worlds product that you all enjoy!

Wild Card Creator Backer Beta Released!

Written by admin on May 31, 2013 in Wild Card Creator - Comments Off

It’s Here!

Faithful Wild Card Creator Backers! I’m incredibly pleased to announce that you can now get your hands on Wild Card Creator! All backers via Kickstarter and PayPal have been given instructions for how to download Wild Card Creator. Please contact me if you have trouble accessing it.

Backer Release Party!

If you’d like to celebrate the backer release of Wild Card Creator, join us for a Release Party over Google Hangout. It will be Saturday, June 1st from 4-6pm EDT (UTC –4 hours). If you’re the forgetful type, you can download this .ics file to have it automatically added to whatever calendar you use.

What Next?

This is a beta release for all backers. It works great, but there are definitely some bugs lurking about and some features that ought to be improved (and a small handful of things that still need to be added). So there will be improvements made.

The bundled artwork for characters and stuff are missing. The esteemed, three-time Hugo award winning Cheyenne Wright has been working overtime on a secret project for Pinnacle, so not all of his artwork for Wild Card Creator is in yet. In the mean time, I’m working out the logistics of getting the images to you without increasing the download size by 50 MB or so. Also, the icon for the program is temporary. It’s based on one of Storn Cook’s pieces of art, but it’s not going to stay.

Most importantly, what’s next is that you try out Wild Card Creator. Let me know what you like. Let me know what you don’t like. Let me know what new things you want. Let me know how this can be made better for all of us.

I’m extremely grateful for all 476 of you for enabling me to create this program for a roleplaying game that means so much to me. Now get gaming and enjoy Wild Card Creator!

Wild Card Creator Backer Release & Party

Written by admin on May 22, 2013 in Wild Card Creator - Comments Off

After many months of arduous work, Wild Card Creator is finally ready to be released as a public beta to backers! It will be made available to download for all Kickstarter and PayPal backers who pledged $20 or more on Friday, May 31st! You’ll receive download instructions then where you can download a backer-only beta for Mac, Windows, and Linux.

To celebrate, I’ve decided to have a Wild Card Creator Release Party via Google Hangout. Feel free to video chat, type, or just lurk about. The hangout will happen on Saturday, June 1st from 4-6pm EDT (UTC –4 hours). Click here to see the event. If you sign up for the Google Event, you can be reminded of it via e-mail, or you can download this .ics file to have it automatically added to whatever calendar you use.

Now for the important part. I strongly believe that all parties should have cake. I mean, who wouldn’t want a delicious piece of cake to commemorate an important event? I know I do! Unfortunately, I’m in St. Paul, Minnesota and just about all of you are elsewhere, so this party is BYOC: Bring Your Own Cake!

I hope you’re all as excited to try out Wild Card Creator as I have been to make it! Enjoy Wild Card Creator and then join us for a release party on Google Hangout. And remember, it’s Bring Your Own Cake!

Wild Card Creator