[Utility] Collection Analysis

Hey folks,

long time no see, I guess. With the shut down of the web-client (that apparently got reactivated. Or not, or whatever, sorry, what a mess!) I got very lazy/unmotivated to drawing my attention to CH again. So, I knew that a new set was coming out but, honestly, I couldn't care much less at this point. But today, I for once tested the new adventures! And oh boy, at least the story telling from our beloved GMs is spot on. I only finished the first adventure today - I thought it would be fun to stretch this out a bit and not finish them all in one go. How often do we get new adventures, after all.

Regarding the utils: There are four resource files I'm working with, three of them changed with this update. Here is my rough "roadmap" for the near future (whatever "near" here means, I don't know yet when I will be able to work on it, but it's on my list, at least):

The Equipment-file hasn't changed, so the largest chunk of potential work to test/review/bug-fix is prevented. I will always fear the day that an update to the items crashes everything as so many of my assumptions might be wrong to some extend.
The Figures-file has changed but the only tool that uses this file is auto-adapting to this file. Unless there are new Races, new Classes, or new Genders (or new fourth color variations) this tool will just plain work. You can still use this tool to see the free skins that came out a while ago and you can already see the gift skins in their full glory even if you haven't played the new adventures yet.
The Cards-file has changed, but unless I forgot about some aspect, this should be no issue at all. The utils mainly focus on the items, and as all new cards are each on exactly 0 (zero) items, I don't know why the utils should care for this change. Correct me if I'm wrong, but if you want to, then just update to the new Cards-file, no more work should be necessary. Even Quick Draw shouldn't have changed with these new cards.
The biggest problem for me in this update is the new Adventures-file. Not only are there new adventures, but there is a new set of adventures. So, at least the Campaign Badge tool needs some fixes.

Speaking of updates: For those users that still weren't aware of this, if you use the dev-version of the tools in their sau-variant (the "semi automated update" variant, that caches the resource files locally) ( @Stexe , ), you should update the resource files now that they actually changed. On Linux machines this should be as simple as invoking the update script in the resource folder. More on that in the README.txt.

What makes testing not so pleasant at the moment is that I still haven't figured out for me, how to access new account dumps as I run CH in a Win VM while my tool development happens on my bare-metal Linux-machine and the clipboard still isn't shared between the instances. Well, I guess this is my problem.

So, in short, if you use the tools, perhaps you have to update the resource files now (to see the new figures). Except for the Campaign Badge every tool should work just fine with the new resources (but I will check this when I eventually work on the new version of the utils). But even if more tools than just the Campaign Badge need a fix, I see no reason why any tool should crash with the new resources, so updating the resources shouldn't break the utils. The fix for the Badge tool will come as soon as possible.

Have fun slaughtering Harpies in the meantime.

 

Awesome stuff. Let me know when you have updates and I can put them up again. I've been busy with Wildermyth and SNKRX, but want to get back into some Card Hunter shortly.

 

Can't tell how that happened but apparently, I already fixed the Campaign badge. I will not publish it right away, I haven't tested it yet. But here are a few things that came to my mind while working on this:

• It's really inconvenient that for now the new set came with adventures but not with new items. And that there will - so is my understanding - be no new items themed for this expansion at all. This would have been soo easy to just put out some pirate themed items that just were slight modifications to already existing items. There now is a discrepancy between the two badge tools because one knows of a seventh set but the other doesn't. This will become even more of a hack around if we will get an eighth set at some point that will come with items and adventures. Then we will have this gap in one tool but not the other. We had a similar situation with the third expansion, the Aloyso's Arsenal item set. But back then we could declare the CoC levels as a artificial third adventure expansion set and everything lined up again (can't remember anymore whether that was a change that I did or that neoncat already had, but whatever, it is a thing now at least). I don't want to revert the CoC-feature here just to have them line up by total count especially because that would break all the other sets apart, the AI items would then line up with the CM adventures, the CM items would then line up with the new adventures. That wouldn't be better in any way.
  
• I think that it is up to me to "officially" coin the abbreviation/acronym for the new set as I haven't seen anyone else having done this before. So, the new set is called Eastpass Conspiracy as was announced by the Knights. Or now for short EC!! While this is quite straight forward as usual, I wanted to make this explicit because the tools tend to abbreviate those things to save space and in case someone else already defined a differing acronym so that someone can now speak up and I can fix it before releasing it.

 

FWIW internally we were using "EP"

 

Weird, I would have called it EPC... but ultimately I don't think it makes that big of a difference.

 

Yeah, it doesn't

 

While I can see why this was a thing as long as the expansion's (working) title was just "Eastpass" and before someone came up with the second part (the "Conspiracy"), I can't really wholeheartedly support this acronym given the final name. It misses something.

All previous acronyms use one letter per word. Hence, "EPC" (or perhaps more appropriately "EpC") aren't that far off of what I could see working here, "EC" is still the best fit to match the previous expansions.

But I read these replies as confirmation that there is no official acronym yet and I'm (more or less) free to choose what the utils should use. But right now "EC" is the most promising candidate and it is definitely better than "LS2" or "LSII" or similar that would confuse the community more than necessary, given that the official name doesn't mention Lord Stafford at all (while the first teasers focused more on that specific Lord than on the final name). Let's see where the next days are leading me and on what acronym I will finally end.

 

To be completely honest, I'd put this project aside for a few days and then forgot about the new version. So, yeah, I'm a bit late. I hope no-one relied on me being "on time" with this post. If so, sorry for that.

So, what effectively changed was an additional diamond in the campaign badge (and therefore, the colors of the set diamonds changed, but this isn't new, it's just the first time this gets apparent). Everything else stayed the same and should still work. I'm still not done with all EC modules (I'd put them aside, too, if you get what I mean), so I can't finally say that the new badges can show 100% with all modules selected. But why shouldn't they.

If you find bugs, please tell me. In contrast to other software you can't really profit from keeping secret about and abusing any existing bugs, anyway.

As always, the dev version for Stexe and anyone with a working php-environment, the non-dev version is mainly to try this out locally. But by now we have a README that explains this and many other details. So, when in doubt RTFM, and THEN ask if something is still unclear.

I guess I should just add this to the README, but in case this still isn't obvious to everyone: These archives contain scripts that can - if used incorrectly - damage your system (for example but not necessarily limited to deleting files). Use them at your own risk. I'm not liable for anything that happens when using these tools.

 

Hey folks,

is there any demand for these tools to get an upgrade for the next set? I mean, the new set isn't out yet so I won't have to work on them right now. But to be completely blunt with you, I was a bit disappointed that no-one reacted to my most recent post within weeks if not months. And until now there are only two downloads so far (one might even be from me).

So, if there is any demand to keep these tools alive, I can update them as soon as the sets go live and I can test the tools on them. But if the reactions are what they are right now, I can spend my time more productive on other projects.

I don't want to convince you to not need the tools, I just want an honest answer: Should I invest time into these tools anymore?

 

I haven't been using the tools much because I'm lacking only 1 item to complete my set. But with the new items I will most likely be using it more, especially combined with the Weighted Loot Drops.

 

I like the concept of this tool, but haven't ever bothered figuring out how to get it set up. That is the only thing keeping me from using it.

 

The thing is, I personally don't have any options for hosting the utils right now. Therefore, I rely on @Stexe keeping them up-to-date on his site (and he relies on you guys to report to him whether the files seem fine for upload because he doesn't want to host broken files, obviously). But even if they aren't the latest version, there weren't many big changes in the last few revisions. So, his hosting should still be very much usable. But for the new set these files surely would need an update at some point. See: http://stexe.com/CardHunter/ if you have problems using them, then let me/us know so someone can help you figure out how they work and how to improve the guides in them.

For the local usage of the tools, just take the non "-dev" version, extract the archive, and open the index.html file in your browser. I improved the usability of the non-dev version a lot lately. Worst case you have to replace all the files with the next version as soon as it comes out.

 

I have a local copy of the tool that I've been using for some time and fits my needs with the current set. I would certainly use/need an updated tool when the new set becomes live. I'm not sure what tweaks you have implemented since I downloaded my local copy, sorry. But I am certainly appreciative that you are looking after this and hope you find time/energy to continue to do so for a bit longer yet!

 

Yeah, I figured that if you were still around to add the new set when it came out I'll host it. Been working on my own company and our own game, but I do check in every once in a while to see how things are going. Like the new balance changes and overall direction of things so far so I might come back for a bit to check things out.

 

I'm using a local copy that it working fine for me. I appreciate your work, and hope you will update it for the new set.

 

Hey Phoenix,

I'm using your tools and adapting it to get cards a little more like the ones in-game. (Dices ans other icons, illustrations's backgrounds, banners behind card's name etc...)
I'm also doing another generator for items with "mini-cards" on them guided by what you did, it's not finished yet but it's amusing to do.

I just wanted to thank you for your work, i learn a lot in your scripts

 

Hey all,

thanks for reminding me why I'm doing all that! As I said, last time I got more or less zero responses and therefore, I wasn't sure if this work still payed off (one way or another). I won't have a version ready on day one, but I will keep an eye out for the actual release of the set and then check what is to be done.

@exayden strange that I still haven't done them yet but the mini cards were on my todo for literally years by now. Well, apparently I never finished them. I know that I had all the pixel measurements noted down somewhere (yes, this is the degree of accuracy I apply to these utils if I reverse-engineer aspects of the game). But I guess I never finished this for the same reason why you were able to improve the images in the first place: I never even started with doing all those detail work that you seem to enjoy. All the small icons beside the text boxes, the dice, all the set icons, all the other visual elements that don't contribute to the "information" that the cards hold. And without these details, the mini cards don't really look good because they only consist of these details and almost no text. The only time I "drew" something for the utils was the special markings on the badges (the diamond (for treasures), the lock (for locked adventures), ...). Another aspect that you can look into is the text alignment. Because my algorithm doesn't even try to put as much words in one line as possible, it only has a rough metric of characters per line, but clearly some characters are way wider than others. So, here you go, another free tip for you on where to look at.
If you ever get to a point where you are satisfied with the version you created (and are fine with having these improvements available to others, which would be in the spirit of open source, which I technically haven't enforced by license (*), but as I said, in the spirit), I can (at least try to) integrate these improvements into the "official" version.
Regarding learning from my scripts: This hugely depends on your prior knowledge . I guess you already coded before. Otherwise I would have suggested to check out other projects first, because at times I use pretty sophisticated techniques as if they were primitives (though, probably the reason why you said you learnt a lot) and learning coding on my (productive) scripts honestly would be a hell of a ride (even given that this was my first JavaScript/TypeScript project). But if you enjoy digging into them, then I'm really happy to see this work out for you. If you need any help, just dm me (though it might take a few days before I answer, nowadays).

(disclaimer: I know that this footnote makes up almost 50% of my post, but it really is for educational purposes only and no attempt to come after you for anything, I honestly don't mind someone improving the utils, just to make this crystal-clear)
(*) just fyi and for the future: I don't have a problem with you using the code, but TECHNICALLY, whenever there is no license file included in sources, this doesn't mean that there are no limitations on using the code. Instead that means that all code is (legally) copyrighted. So, available code isn't necessarily a sign for open source code with all the typical benefits, it would only be open source in terms of users being able to audit the code. But being confronted with all the available licenses I never was able to pick the "right one" for me. If I really had to choose one today, I'd probably go with AGPL (just so you know where I stand) but the other problem here is that I'm not the sole creator of the utils, so this ultimately wouldn't be my call in the first place. But again, just for the future, if you don't see a license, then better ask to stay on the right side of the law (especially if you attempt to publish, or - as you did here - advertise/disclose your doings). I looked into licenses a lot recently and just thought that I should let you know what I learnt: Some license = read and check what you can or can't do; No license = ask before you do anything. Again, I asked for contributors before so out of the context it should be clear by now that I don't mind someone working on (clones of) the utils. But other developers you might run into might not see it this way and might (try to) sue you for copyright infringement. And I admit, I wasn't familiar with all those license terms myself when I took over the utils. So, it's totally possible that I haven't done everything the right way myself.

 

Thanks for your reply

There is another projet (maybe old?) on this forum called CHBrowser. It contains all icon files, so it was easy to implement on your generated cards. I just cut background illustations and boxes behind card names (copper, silver, gold etc...) to get a more accurated visual.
At first, that was just for print some cards and play with friends, my coding skills are pretty low (like my english xD), what i've done is really ugly but working for what i want :



For items, it's far from finished yet, but that's what i did with a friends :



It was for personal use when i started this, but if others are interested, i will give to @PhoenixTheHunter for the official version.

@PhoenixTheHunter, i admit i haven't done any pixel measurement specially for items, but i will try to follow your advises to upgrade in the future

 

... wut?

 

Hey folks,

quick update on the new expansion. I haven't yet found the the time to update the tools, but I most likely will do it this month. My "excuses" are that I was a bit lazy at first and more recently that I got COVID a few weeks ago. Everything's fine again (mostly). But this definitely delayed my work on the utils further.

That said, is there any interest to put the sources on some public code management site (github, gitlab, etc)? Especially, would there be anyone motivated to react on such major changes to the game and prepare a pull request with the necessary updates? To be honest, with the switch to "only Steam" I played Card Hunter less and less. And I only logged into the game once since the new expansion. Hence, I would still be willing to manage the utils (review and accept pull requests, create a roadmap for features I'd like to see, etc), but if you rely on timely changes to the utils (or, actual feature updates that introduce new functionality), I'm not sure anymore if I'm the right person for that (again, mainly because my main/favorite access point to CH (the browser version) got shut down). As this step would require that I find answers to some essential questions (like for example, the licensing terms: as I elaborated on before, that isn't so clear cut), I would only take this step if there is any benefit for me and the project. Meaning, if there will actually be any collaboration from others that help advance the utils when I'm not able to and take some of the work off my plate. Otherwise, I would stick with the current process (because managing the sources publicly is just another bit of effort on top and also it would mean that collaborators would need external credentials - the same argument I brought up in the Discord discussion). And I wouldn't give any guaranties for when I can update the utils. It's a hobby project after all.

TL;DR: Before this causes any confusion: I'm totally willing to keep this project alive, but for several reasons (some being personal) there is either the way that we collaborate on this to keep every as up-to-date as possible. Or it all remains my responsibility and you accept that the development on the utils might get slower than back when I used to play CH on a daily basis.