The past few years have been challenging for everyone, and we’ve been no exception here at Lone Wolf, but as we embark on the new year, it seems like an excellent time to celebrate a few victories and peek ahead to our plans for 2022.
Just last month, Hero Lab celebrated its 15th birthday, and we couldn’t be more proud of how far we’ve come! Fifteen years is impressive longevity among software products in general, but it seems even more remarkable for a digital tool in the tabletop gaming arena. Here Lab has endured through significant changes across the RPG industry, and we like to think that, in some small way, it also contributed to that evolution. We’ve been lucky enough over the years to have an incredibly supportive user base who has helped us evolve our product into the must-have tool it is today, and we hope to continue that evolution well into the future.
Our development team has been hard at work the last year, despite the often distressing circumstances of the world around us, improving our product in various ways, and we're proud of them for remaining dedicated to Hero Lab in these trying times. From creating a more seamless user experience and faster response times to making better use of our award-winning validation system, we're taking every advantage of Hero Lab’s ability to handle all the complexities of
character creation. We hope that our users are enjoying the many improvements we implemented before the Holidays, and we can't wait to unveil further enhancements for 2022.
Road Maps and Traffic Jams
Just like our users, and sometimes thanks to them, we have a long list of ideas we’d love to implement. Unfortunately, we don’t have unlimited resources, and the best-laid plans are easily derailed by surprises, which have become commonplace in today’s world.
For context, Hero Lab Online has four distinct subsystems: engine, server, client, and game-specific data files. Each of those subsystems uses completely different technologies. Our team is small, with each team member only having expertise in one or two of those areas. Many of the features we have planned require collaborative work in two, three, and sometimes all four of those subsystems. This often means a feature can only be actively pursued if all the needed team members are available and that occasionally we can’t pursue an item at all. Any surprises that interrupt and/or cause tasks to take longer than expected wreak havoc with our plans.
Out of necessity, we’ve adopted a very fluid process where we pursue features not just out of preference but often based on which team members are available. This keeps us highly productive, but it frequently precludes us from committing to concrete release plans and dates. Nevertheless, we have a fantastic road map full of ideas and features we hope to make available in the weeks and months ahead—please keep in mind that the map itself is prone to traffic jams, and we may need to re-route.
Immediate Future
With the above caveats in mind, let’s take a peek at the upcoming weeks! In terms of game content, Starfinder’s Galactic Magic is available now, and we’re working to steadily get caught up on the various APs that we’ve missed over the course of the pandemic, so we can expect more of those, including the Strengths of Thousands, to become available in February and March.
Next, in the spirit of usability, we’re introducing better content sharing within Hero Lab. We aren’t ready to share all the details just yet, but new options and greater flexibility for content sharing, both through campaigns and for families, will be unveiled in the weeks ahead. We also have significant usability enhancements underway that will be appearing over the next couple months.
There’s one additional item on our shortlist, and it’s a capability we’ve been developing since last spring. Unfortunately, we can’t talk about it publicly yet, but we’re excited to show it off soon. If all goes to plan, we’ll be able to preview it by the end of February. So stay tuned for a glimpse in the upcoming weeks!
Spring and Summer
Once we get into spring and summer, there’s a steady stream of new rulebooks scheduled, and we’ll be releasing the game content for those books in conjunction with the books debuting themselves, as usual. We’ll also be catching up on the Starfinder APs that aren’t yet available during this time.
Usability is an ongoing priority for us and will be a recurring theme over the months ahead. For example, our handling of wealth and experience is a sore spot where we’ve targeted a complete rewrite. Additionally, we plan to resume work enabling everyone to use our premade encounters. Once that effort is complete, all the existing encounters for Pathfinder 1st Edition will become usable, and we’ll be able to begin releasing premade encounters for other games, as well.
The final big feature in our active plan is the Loot Locker™. As the name implies, it’s a convenient and central storage place for all the loot your party has acquired through its adventures. Characters can swap gear in and out of the Loot Locker, making it easy to share virtually any piece of equipment across the entire party. It also means that GMs can pre-create complex items and give them to the party when acquired.
To Infinity and Beyond
We have plenty of features we can’t wait to work on, but without a crystal ball, anything beyond summer is little more than a guess. Our wish list literally numbers in the thousands, ranging from minor refinements to major undertakings, so we obviously can’t tackle it all at once. As the year unfolds, we’ll reassess at various points, determine which features to pursue next, and let users know which roads we’ll be taking. And if your personal favorite feature doesn’t appear over the next few months, there’s a good chance you’ll see it on a future list.
