Battle Report Builder - Comments & Feedback Wanted!

[cadianshock]

The is now live and can be found at http://malifaux.battle.directory/

 

 

Original Post...

 

Hello
 
Here the latest version of my work in progress Battle Report Builder web application. The example images are 40K, but Malifaux can certainly be added! The main reason is that its not been asked for, so is this something of interest to you guys? Would it be used? Could it be used? Thoughts and suggestions very welcome!
 
You can view screen shots here http://imgur.com/a/X1s61
 
​Current game systems are Warmachine, Hordes, 40K, 30K, Warhammer Fantasy and x-Wing.

• Anyone can create beautiful Battle Reports that are mobile friendly and standardised - for free!
• Select from different layout modes to suit your style or writing and play style; - each turn (1, 2, 3, 4, etc) - top & bottom of each turn - start, middle, end
• Allows Battle Report readers to view Battle Reports in three readable modes to suit the level of detail they wish to get from a Battle Report; - full - summary - gallery and presentation
• Import army lists from Battlescribe and Army Builder to easily showcase your lists.
• Upload up to 12 photos per turn in your Battle Reports to showcase your battlefield in all its glory.
• Overlay text, boxes and arrows onto images to clearly show the flow of the battle.
• Search for other reports by game system, army, winning army, points value, number of turns and mission type.
• Gain achievements and badges for adding your Battle Reports.
• Have your Battle Reports commented on and rated by other users.
• Share your reports easily to Facebook and Twitter.
• Export summary reports to Wordpress, Blogspot and forum formats.

I have a closed beta at the moment if people want access, its just not ready yet for the full force of the mini wargaming community!
 
Thanks
Jake (Cadian Shock)

[Abbazabba]

I think this has the makings for a powerful tool for those who don't want to record things and I appreciate your efforts! Can't wait to try it out! Would also hopefully be a bit more clear than straight text or the recollections of someone post turn.

[MasterDisaster]

It's definitely something many would be interested in using. Especially now whilst the beta testing is open again. Adapting it for Malifaux would make it a valuable tool, heck even after the Beta people would probably use something like this often. Anything to make the drudgery of typing out reams of paper reports would make life much easier. 

[cadianshock]

Thanks for looking! have you any ideas/suggestions that are Malifaux specific?

 

At the moment the initial create report form needs a points value for the battle and a mission name, plus the armies/forces can be selected later on that are taking part.

 

Do those concepts fit into the way Malifaux plays?

[dancater]

The first things which spring to my mind is you'd need:

 

1. A section to detail the Scheme and Strategies available and then which Strategies each player selected and if they are declared or secret.

 

2. A method to account for the card deck and cheats during duels, including soul stone use.

 

Those are the two most important and uniquely Malifaux aspects of the game in my opinion.

[cadianshock]

Dancater, would you be able to look at the beta for me and assist in making the changes needed to house these Malifaux requirements?

[entropolous]

It would also be nice to have faction and master as two separate fields in the match setup form.

[cadianshock]

Entropolous, are these listed somewhere?

[MasterDisaster]

Entropolous, are these listed somewhere?

 

http://pullmyfinger.wikispaces.com/

 

This is a fan made, fan run Wiki that lists all 7 Factions and all 7 Masters within said Factions. It should also list all the models available to date. Also note that certain masters are Dual Faction so you may need to take this into account. For example 6 out of 7 Ten Thunders Masters are Dual Faction as is Zoraida, Miskai and Tara. Probably one or two others but as well but that's most of them. 

 

The Malifaux Crew Creator is also a good place to find a lot of information about Crews, Hiring Pools, Available Totems / Mercs etc. 

 

http://wyrd-games.net/community/page/malifaux_2e_crew.html

[cadianshock]

http://pullmyfinger.wikispaces.com/

 

This is a fan made, fan run Wiki that lists all 7 Factions and all 7 Masters within said Factions. It should also list all the models available to date. Also note that certain masters are Dual Faction so you may need to take this into account. For example 6 out of 7 Ten Thunders Masters are Dual Faction as is Zoraida, Miskai and Tara. Probably one or two others but as well but that's most of them. 

 

The Malifaux Crew Creator is also a good place to find a lot of information about Crews, Hiring Pools, Available Totems / Mercs etc. 

 

http://wyrd-games.net/community/page/malifaux_2e_crew.html

 

Superb thank you. As a summary of what I have learnt, because I need to if I am to implement Malifaux...

 

Their are 7 factions, each has 7 masters - the masters are kind of leaders? Presumably you must take at least one during a game?

 

You then have your crew, which is your main force.

 

Strategies are your main/primary objectives there are 5, this is shared by both players. Schemes are minor/secondary objectives that are unique to each player.

 

Are the schemes specific to each strategy? 

[MasterDisaster]

You are pretty much spot on but a few clarifications for you. I'll only refer to Standard Games as Story Encounters can be a little different. 

 

Each Faction of which there are 7 has 7 Masters. In a standard sized game which is 50 Soulstones (basically points) the Master is the leader, they are often accompanied by a Totem which is usually representation of their power, theme or play style (they are of course optional) and a Henchman which is their right hand man (sort of like a lesser Master, they are kind of like a Journeyman Warcaster from Warmachine). At 40 Soulstones or less a Henchman can be the leader of the crew. 

 

The crew is a term given to the force each player uses which is either lead by a Master or Henchman depending on the size of the game. The crew can be comprised of a Master, a Totem, Henchmen, Enforcers, Minions or Peons. Crews are generated by setting a Soulstone limit for the game. After the Objectives have been randomly determined the players will choose a leader (usually a Master) who is effectively free. Each Master or Henchman will have their own personal cache of Soulstones which they bring into the game (Kind of similar  to a Warbeast / Warjack Allowance in Warmahordes). They then spend their Soulstones hiring other models and upgrades to the value of the limit set. Any remaining Soulstones are added to the Leaders Cache (to a Maximum of 7 Soulstones) which will then form the Soulstone Pool which can be spent as an in game resource for various in game effects. 

 

Additionally there are 4 different types of Deployment which are again randomly determined, it's worth looking into them. (Standard, Close, Flank & Corner if I recall)

 

The Strategy is the primary objective which both players are aiming to achieve Victory Points for. There are 5 main ones in the rulebook and an additional 5 in the Gaining Grounds pack which is kind like a Tournament Pack of sorts I guess (I've never used it). A player can  score a maximum of 4 VP from the Strategy. 

 

Schemes are sort of like secondary objectives. Each game will have 5 Available which are randomly determined. The Scheme "A Line in the Sand" is always available and the other 4 are determined by flipping 2 cards, the numerical value and suit of the cards determines the remaining schemes. Each player picks two of these Schemes and can then choose to hide or reveal them for varying benefits. These have no relation to the Strategy. Players can only ever score 3 VP per Scheme although depending on whether or not it has been hidden / revealed determines whether or not the full 3 VP per Scheme can actually be achieved depending on the scheme in question.  Sometimes Revealing a Scheme will allow a player to score 3 VP. Sometimes hiding it will make it harder to score the full 3 VP or even prevent the full 3 VP from being scored at all. 

 

I appreciate this may be a fair amount of information to take in but hopefully it clears things up a little and makes some sort of sense!

[Bengt]

The application wont actually validate the crew, will it? So you don't need to know all that much about crewbuilding. Fields for Faction (one of the seven), Leader (any Master or Henchman available to said faction) and soulstone limit should be enough I think. There didn't seem to be any army list details in the screenshots so I guess if you want that in your battle report you add it as plain text?

[cadianshock]

Thanks MasterDister, thats all really helpful. I am slowly getting there with this.

 

No BenGT, it won't validate the crew. You can upload a "list" of your crew as a plain text file. There is support for Army Builder and Battlescribe which are used for Warhammer 40K. Is there an app for builder Malifaux lists that I could support perhaps?

 

I just want these details for the search, so if you want to find a report between faction X and Y, where X is using the master B then you can do. Its so that other players of faction X can easily find reports relating to master B so they can see how battle play out and learn. This is something I am keen for this web application to solve, I want it to be the place to find battle reports for players looking to learn. Get me?

[entropolous]

I would venture to guess that more people will by searching for master than for faction, having that capability will be good.

 

There is a web based crew builder available:

http://wyrd-games.net/community/page/malifaux_2e_crew.html

It has the capability of spitting out a text list or a list in BBCode, or provide a link to the crew.

 

There are also a couple of mobile apps that have crew builders, "The Breach" and "Malifaux Companion".

[MasterDisaster]

There is an App called The Breach which was developed by Crouching Moose I believe. It's pretty useful and might be worth taking a look at. 

[Arli]

I would be interested in trying this out.  Also, is there a way to upload pictures?  Also, is there a way to give turn by turn commentary?  Sorry if these are obvious answers.

 

Never mind, I found the answer.  I would like to try this out for sure.

[cadianshock]

Is there any concept of Alliances in Malifaux? I ask because the following mechanic is built into the web site already for 40K, if this doesn't exist in Malifaux then I should perhaps strip it out as not to confuse people.

 

In 40K you have Team A and Team B. Usually each team contains a single player, but its not uncommon for players to double up with two different armies and ally together. For example Space Marines and Imperial Guard, these are both "human" and so often ally. This means you can have Team A with a Player A and a Player B, and then the same for Team B.

 

Things get more complex too because a player can field a primary and a secondary detachment. You may play a 2,000 points game and bring 1,500 points of Space Marines as your primary detachment and 500 points of Imperial Guard as a secondary detachment. Then you would have Team A, Player A Primary Detachment and Player A Secondary Detachment.

 

Yeah, it really is that crazy. Of course then Player B from Team A can do the same, as well as both players from Team B. 

 

Does anything, even if its  a lot simpler than this occur in Malifaux?

[Tuttleboy]

There are certain models that are dual faction as well as certain masters that can hire out of their faction, either with an upgrade or naturally. An example of naturally hiring cross faction would be Zoraida, who can hire any model who's willpower is 4 or lower. An example of needing an upgrade would be Hoffman who needs the Arcanist Assets upgrade to hire up to 4 M&SU models.

[Arli]

No.  In Malifaux, some models can be dual faction and take models from either of the two Factions they represent or both.  Some models may hire other faction's models by paying an additional amount as well.  The crew does not usually change faction though.  

 

The only thing close to that would be if players are in a doubles tournament.  Then, depending on the rules, they may have separate faction that has joined the team. 

[entropolous]

Not really, there are a few master that can hire select models cross faction, but that will be implied with the master choice, so there wouldn't me a reason to make note of it.

Though, there is one new official format that allows for a crew from one faction lead by henchman from a different faction.  

 

This brings up another point.  In small point games, crews are lead by Henchman, not Masters.  (There are 5 model stations in the game, Master, Henchman, Enforcer, Minion, Peon  each with progressively reduced access to soul stones and upgrades)  Because of this it might be worthwhile initially to make the leader field a free form field rather than a dropdown or orther smart field.

 

There are a couple of 3-4 player encounters (encounter being the Malifaux term for a game)  is this something that your currently capable of?

[cadianshock]

Thanks for all that people, great responses as usual!

 

It sounds like as long as we account for players doubling up we are OK - any other things can be taken be care of within the text of the mission.

 

E.g. "I took Zoraida and therefore I was able to take these guys too as they are willpower 3......."

[cadianshock]

For those that want to be beta testers please PM me ..... its ready.....

[entropolous]

The 2015 strategies need to be added to the drop down list:

Extraction, Guard the Stash, Headhunter, Interference, and Collect the Bounty.

It would also be nice to be able to do direct input of crew lists instead of only be able to import files.

[cadianshock]

Thanks, those 5 missions are now added.

 

By direct input, do you mean a plain text field?

[entropolous]

Yes, the crew creators for Malifaux typically don't spit out a file, just text to copy. As it stands now, I have to copy the text save it a txt file using notepad, then load the txt file.