Army List Checking

[bddbrown]

I am about halfway through army list checking and it is taking a lot longer than I had hoped - about 15 minutes per army list. The real problem is checking the points for each element is quite time-consuming whether it is done on paper or in a spreadsheet. At the moment I am checking by copying army lists into my own spreadsheet.

Even worse, only 5 out of 18 lists so far have been correct (I got mine wrong as well). All the others have had either minor or in some cases major issues. This includes more than one of the rules writers (assuming I got my calculations correct) - so things cannot be that easy to calculate.

A common problem is forgetting the extra for drilled troops and a lot of the new players are submitting lists with odd size BGs (the need for even BGs needs to be made more clearly).

A competition with 100+ entries or a double list it would be next to impossible to list check inside 2 weeks. I am not sure that people would have the time or the patience.

Something must be done - some ideas
a) Include points in the lists. This would help somewhat but you still have to manually calculate the totals. It also means updating the points is going to mean updating the army lists. Not a good idea.
b) Enforce a format for entry. This way it can be copied into a ready made spreadsheet. Solves the problem, assuming someone fills in the sheet correctly, but a bit off-putting for new players?
c) Enforce penalty points for incorrect lists. This is very stick based and likely to put people off but would force people to double check lists.
d) Provide software. Make software available to calculate the lists for people and allow them to save it in a format that can be automatically checked.

What do people think?

Cheers,

Bruce.

[rbodleyscott]

My experience of running DBM tournaments is that for the first few years well over half the army lists submitted were incorrect, despite the fact that the rules had been out for 2 years before I started running the tournament.

It is hardly surprising that people who have in some cases not even played 1 game of AoW will get their lists wrong. I don't think we should be too worried.

[jdm]

I think we have to take this one on the nose, funny we were only talking about it earlier.

Not sure what the solution is other than the blank column we discussed?

Ian

[plewis66]

I've started work on a piece of software that would eventually make this task a whole lot easier.
I originally asked JDM if it was ok for me to do this on the basis of it being entirely for my own use, and he ok'd it.
At the moment it's progressing quite slowly, for two reasons. Firstly because I had other priorities, and secondly because I am using it as a learning exercise for using a particular technology platform.But if the rules writers want, I could put more time into constructing something for general use. Maybe there are other developers around who might be interested in joining in?
Maybe the publishers might even be interested in sponsoring an open source effort?

[bddbrown]

I've given the topic some thought myself.

What sort of technology are you looking at?

[neilhammond]

I am about halfway through army list checking and it is taking a lot longer than I had hoped - about 15 minutes per army list. A common problem is forgetting the extra for drilled troops and a lot of the new players are submitting lists with odd size BGs (the need for even BGs needs to be made more clearly).

Something must be done - some ideas
a) Include points in the lists. This would help somewhat but you still have to manually calculate the totals. It also means updating the points is going to mean updating the army lists. Not a good idea.
b) Enforce a format for entry. This way it can be copied into a ready made spreadsheet. Solves the problem, assuming someone fills in the sheet correctly, but a bit off-putting for new players?
c) Enforce penalty points for incorrect lists. This is very stick based and likely to put people off but would force people to double check lists.
d) Provide software. Make software available to calculate the lists for people and allow them to save it in a format that can be automatically checked.
What do people think?

Having written the DBMw2.exe program and DBMv31.exe I've got some views:

You need a system that automated the points calculation based on the unit's parameters, and also check that BGs are even. This means that people don't ever have to calculate the points or army totals themselves which is where errors start to get made. Even better, you can set up a column that indicates min and max BG size and check that as well. It also means that you don't need to publish points in the army lists.

You can get someone to write a bespoke program (I've not really got the time or inclination to modify the DBMw2 program for AoW) or, probably better, you can get a finance whizz to write something up in excel and then provide that as a free download. Excel will have pivot tables, lookups, protected cells, and/or macros, etc to validate the list and calculate points. Some thought will have to go into the layout of the worksheet as you'll want to include valid terrain types, pre-initiative modifiers, etc.

List checkers can ask for the list to be submitted in a given format and then cut and paste it into a master (or just check the original if they're confident that people don't tamper with the base data).

Neil

[plewis66]

The Eclipse Rich Client Platform. It's a little tricky to get into, but gives a lot of benefit in the end.
At the momnent I'm just still going hrough tutorials for the RCP, but I have the points structure defined in XML, a sample list defined in XML, and some Java code for models representing the fundamental model classes, and some fairly na??ve parsing code to construct the models from the XML.

If we were to do this as a real project, I'd recommend Java, the Eclipse RCP and XML.

I'd also recommend an agile, iterative development approach, with early delivery of basic functionality.

What are your thoughts?

If there is enough interest, and with the provisional blessing of the design team, next weekend could be goog time to talk, perhaps?

[plewis66]

Yeah, excel would be a serious contender as a more sensibled alternative, but I know nothing about that, and it's much less exciting to me than coding

[paulcummins]

ive almost finsihed a spreadsheet to do those calculations
Ill post it somewhere as soon as ive got it working

[paulcummins]

OK - Ive got a sheet that does all the calculations - its not perfect, and could do with some prettying up, but could be useful - anybody want it?

[plewis66]

Me please!

ta

[jdm]

Keep this going guys we can evaluate along the way

REgards
JDM

[paulcummins]

My sheet still needs a bit more work - but I could do with some feedback (oooh im beta testing )
is it ok (from NDA type POV) to post the sheet so anybody can pull it apart?

[jdm]

So long as its in the beta testers forum

Regards
JDM

[petedalby]

Tim Porter produced a very good Army List Checker for DBR.

It works on an Xcel spreadsheet.

The benefits are that army lists are produced in a standard format and it is impossible to get the points wrong as they protected in a separate Data tab. Troop type descriptions are linked to the data tab, so as you specify the troop type the points are auto-completed.

I would have thought a similar system would work well for AOW.

Tim are you out there?

Pete

[paulcummins]

OK V3 or my sheet is now available - still looking for feedback on it

email me on

paul dot cummins at sky dot com

if you would like to try it out

I havent got it sorted for checking totals properly when there are loads of different options for a BG - but the basic stuff works and is now all lovely and macro free