Cory, great initial feedback and my immediate response is, "what have I got myself into?!"
Let's take things one at a time...
Just throwing stuff at the wall here...
Glad you said that, because some of it will stick, some won't.
Programming every spell potentially usable into Minion would be horrid (and probably not a great idea from an IP standpoint) so is there a way to:
- Input the spell name/tag at the time cast.
Yes, that's the way I see it. Perhaps in the future a comma delimited field could be added to each character which lists their commonly used spells. The GM could then select from a list
or type in a spell name. Version 1 will be type in only.
- Have it show up next to the target of the spell (which could include yourself)
I wasn't going to include a target in the first instance, but I may rethink this. It may not be too difficult. Once in the spell 'dialogue', targets could be chosen from the PC and NPC grids on the main screen just like attackers/defenders are chosen. (Note that many spells with duration will have no target - illusion, globe, sphere, cloud, fog, wall, barrier, etc.)
I envisage a brand new panel on the main screen labelled "Spells in Effect" or "Current Spells", probably above the NPC grid. The panel would list all current spells with caster, spell name, duration and target(s):
Juliense -> Bless III (concentration) -> Juliense, Elharni, Snarkel cancel spellDark Mage -> Fly II (30/30 rnds) -> Dark Archer Adept cancel spell- Have a drop down that would indicate and therefore automatically adjust (or have a new column that gives base DB and adjusted DB for example)...
- Additional DB
- Additional OB
- Additional Hits
And so on...
Heh, complexity just increased tenfold. This would no doubt be ideal, but I think this type of complexity would need to be left until a later iteration of the software.
Maybe have an option to potentially give a spell it's own initiative slot so that you remember to do things like... roll that A holy crit the foe is possibly taking cause you've cast a spell on it that does an 'A' Holy Crit every round it's in melee with you (technically I could see doing this in a make-shift way right now by naming a combatant "Holy crit" giving it X hit points and having it take one bleed per round until it expires).
A spell with an initiative slot I didn't think of. Again a good idea but probably needs to be left until a future iteration.
As to how the UI changes for all of this, still up in the air, but perhaps extra buttons next to the "Attack" button, the main being "Base Spell" and I think a "Prep" button could be added which counts down prep rounds too.
This is just one idea of how it could work... everyone please feel free to jump in with alternative/better ideas. Cheers.