Or, more accurately perhaps, getting detailed in GCA when your campaign is using detailed armor protection and layering rules. GCA5 will allow you to specify that you want to handle your own layering, and will then show you the armor protection values in layered order.

Not shown here is the dialog that allows you to set your layering, but that lets you adjust the ordering of how your armor is layered, from innermost to outermost layer. That’s as it’s shown on the list at the right side in this image, although I just randomly threw some stuff together when creating the test data being used here.

You’ll notice that each layer shown on the right side also has an icon noting whether that layer is rigid or flexible. The general DR item at the top (innermost layer) is not counted as a layer, so isn’t considered either rigid or flexible–it just is. You could change that if desired.

I’ve been keeping up the gca5.xsd for saved character files, and the current version of that is available here for the curious. There’s also an example character that shows some of that in an actual save file.

This preview is of something a bit more esoteric than the previews we’ve done so far, and also covers two different things that I can show the results of in one image:

Here on the right side, you can see the use of the new displaynameformula() tag to create a custom name for each of the grimoire items, which includes the number of pages contained in that chunk. And the pages are totaled up using the new @totalchildrentag() function, coupled with custom pages() and pages#() tags.

This combination of features allows you to customize things a bit more, although it’s definitely not the easiest of things to do. The data file code for the three items above looks like this:

Grimoire Book, basecost(1000), baseweight(10), pages(0), pages#(me::pages + @totalchildrentag(pages#)), isparent(yes), displaynameformula($val(me::basedisplayname) ($eval(me::pages#) pages))

Grimoire Chapter, basecost(100),baseweight(1), pages(12), pages#(me::pages + @totalchildrentag(pages#)), displaynameformula($val(me::basedisplayname) ($eval(me::pages#) pages))

Grimoire Signature, basecost(50),baseweight(0.5), pages(6), pages#(me::pages + @totalchildrentag(pages#)), displaynameformula($val(me::basedisplayname) ($eval(me::pages#) pages))

The pages() tags include the number of pages each individual item contains.

The pages#() tag is a separate tag from pages(), but is auto-calculated by GCA when referenced (as denoted by the # in the name), and returns the total pages for the chunk and all children.

The displaynameformula() tag defines the display name as the default display name, plus the number of pages in parens after that. It determines the number of pages using the pages#() tag, so that children and nested children will all be included automatically.

As I said, this particular thing isn’t the easiest to deal with, but perhaps we can improve on that in the future.

How loadouts are handled is being seriously upgraded in GCA5, allowing you to change the active loadout and see the changes to encumbrance and protection reflected immediately (see our first post, on Compact View, where you can see the dropdowns for Loadout in the Encumbrance and Protection boxes). This helps make GCA a bit more useful in play, which is something I’m trying to improve.

The big changes in internal handling required the Loadout Manager to be pretty much completely rewritten from scratch, so I took the opportunity to upgrade its features a bit as well.

GCA5’s new Loadout Manager

Now, you can see all your equipment and all your loadouts in one grid, which more easily allows you to assign gear to whatever various loadouts you may want to use. (However, equipment contained inside a parent item is not shown; only the parent will be shown.) You can more easily see which items haven’t been assigned to any loadout yet, and you can sort the various columns of the grid as well.

The new loadouts system is integrated with the protection system, so assigning armor is based on the loadout that contains the armor or shield in question. That’s what those little shield icons in the grid mean—the armor on that row is currently being used to provide protection for that loadout.

So, GCA5 links your protection (armor and shields) to the loadout you’re using. That means you need to be able to assign protection based on loadouts, and that’s what the updated Protection window does.

Protection window

This window is mostly an update from the existing one, although things have been rearranged a bit. Plus, as you can see in the top left corner of the window, you can switch between loadouts and assign the armor and shields you want to use in each.

GCA5 is a bit smarter in trying to parse down and integrate different armor values into simpler numbers, but we still haven’t yet attempted the more advanced armor system we’ve talked about in years past. That’s still up in the air as to whether I’ll be tackling it for the initial release.

And, for those folks who hate loadouts and don’t use them, your basic GCA4 style functionality is still there for All Unassigned Items, if you need it.

So, there’s a quick overview of Loadouts and Protection in GCA5. I hope you like it.

I’ve previously posted a screen shot of the new Compact view in GCA 5, which has all the character traits and important information in a single screen. So, I thought for my first GCA 5 post here on this blog, I’d post an updated shot of Compact view, with some more info boxes being peeked at.

A peek at more blocks.

Maybe I’ll talk about the new Loadout or Protection stuff, later.