Need a mercenary company?

[Leitz]

Leitz said: "As to stat spreads, you are right. Totally linear. What would you think about 'Roll 2d6, if below MINIMUM then STAT = MINIMUM'? So no re-rolling, just minimum assignment."

To which Aramis replied: "That is probably a good way to do it."

And to which Leitz responds: "Done for both MINIMUM and MAXIMUM."

 

[Leitz]

This looks great, but has a couple of hiccups.

The fire teams for me seem to be 3 in the first and 4 in the second.

Fixed. The default units are 9 person squads. Squads have 4 per fire team, to include fire team leader. One squad NCO and 1st squad in each platoon has a medic.

Probably need some platoon HQ staff but I'm not sure what. The company has a full HQ squad, called a platoon, with slightly elevated ranks. That way they can commandeer a ranker who isn't busy and supplement their task.

 

[samuelvss]

It seems the first squad in each platoon has a batman with the squad leader.

I would move him with the platoon leader, then a senior (the senior) NCO in the Platoon between them. OTW, looks golden. Thanks for this!

 

[MCEvans]

Is it possible to determine specialization of unit i.e. Commando, Engineer, Artillery or Armor.

 

[Leitz]

It seems the first squad in each platoon has a batman with the squad leader.

That's the platoon medic, nominally attached to 1st Squad.

Is it possible to determine specialization of unit i.e. Commando, Engineer, Artillery or Armor.

Yes, once I have TOE layouts that people want and get a copy of either CT or Mong T Mercenary. The skills table used here combines pretty much everything from Army listings. I'm either going to scrape up the money for a couple of CT CDs from Marc or start writing my own tables. The former action is preferable as it supports Marc.

 

[samuelvss]

That's the platoon medic, nominally attached to 1st Squad.)

I'd put the medic with the Platoon Sergeant.

We would have a radio operator, Forward Observer and his radio operator also in the platoon HQ. I think the radio operators would be redundant above TL8 or so, but having a dedicated FO is a good thing. Even when the Platoon Leader is fully capable of doing it himself, he's got other things to worry about

My Platoon HQ would then look something like:

PL
PSG
FO
Medic

A nicer (more complicated) option would involved checking the boxes for what positions to have in the PLT HQ, and even in the HQ PLT.

Also, a title in front of the Rank:

"Medic: LCPL Iwann A. Transfer.."

And then, I want it to play Ride of the Valkyrie....

 

[Leitz]

And then, I want it to play Ride of the Valkyrie....

Yeah, but it's gonna end like this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V0kbC0hQHRg

I'm working on the logic of the program to clean it up a bit and open the way for customized units. Also have to figure out if I want to make to version compatible (CT, MgT, T5) or just pick a middle ground and go with that. Per the Far Future Fair Use Policy I can use their stuff more easily than MgT and there's no intention of making this a commercial effort.

There will be unit customization needed unless I make it Tech Level aware. That's doable but unless someone wants to extend this to generate non-mercenary groups like a church choir, the local PTA, or a mega-corp assassin teams things might stay a bit limited.

 

[samuelvss]

Yeah, but it's gonna end like this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V0kbC0hQHRg
That's doable but unless someone wants to extend this to generate non-mercenary groups like a church choir, the local PTA, or a mega-corp assassin teams things might stay a bit limited.

Keep to the scope you have, IMHO: a mercenary company. If I want a battalion, I just put my companies together. If I want more than that, then I need some serious counseling....

I would keep it evocative of Bk 2/5; the one I did was a Bk 2+, basically using Signal GK's Bk 2 Chargen, then dumping them into MS Word, and doing Find/Replace to get some of the skills I needed in the group (e.g: Instruction, recruiting).

If I get a merc company that looks any closer to exactly generated from a rule set, then I can take a couple minutes word processing, or I can wait in line behind the guy would wanted to generate a roster for a division for counseling!


Good job on this!

 

[MCEvans]

I'm working on the logic of the program to clean it up a bit and open the way for customized units. Also have to figure out if I want to make to version compatible (CT, MgT, T5) or just pick a middle ground and go with that. Per the Far Future Fair Use Policy I can use their stuff more easily than MgT and there's no intention of making this a commercial effort.

There will be unit customization needed unless I make it Tech Level aware. That's doable but unless someone wants to extend this to generate non-mercenary groups like a church choir, the local PTA, or a mega-corp assassin teams things might stay a bit limited.

Hate to make this more of a chore but again, options.
I would like CT, MT & T5. And a TL range 9-18 (I like some Paranoia Press stuff and they have that range)

 

[whartung]

Leitz said: "As to stat spreads, you are right. Totally linear. What would you think about 'Roll 2d6, if below MINIMUM then STAT = MINIMUM'? So no re-rolling, just minimum assignment."

To which Aramis replied: "That is probably a good way to do it."

And to which Leitz responds: "Done for both MINIMUM and MAXIMUM."

This is a bad idea, you really shouldn't do this.

If you do this you'll skew to the low end, since anyone with the lowest stats qualifies and is instantly promoted.

It's really a lot better to simply put the stat gen in a loop, and run until you get an entire character that qualifies based on all of the criteria. You'll get a better distribution outright rejecting the unqualified than promoting them artificially, and it's not like it's actually difficult to do.

 

[Shonner]

Per the Far Future Fair Use Policy I can use their stuff more easily than MgT

I'm glad you mentioned this. My code is based off the Mongoose rules. So I'll probably just be using it for my own personal use and not make a web app for it.

 

[Leitz]

I'm glad you mentioned this. My code is based off the Mongoose rules. So I'll probably just be using it for my own personal use and not make a web app for it.

I've been thinking of how to make the skills and stuff use database storage. That would allow for CT/MgT/T5 separation as well as the ability to make groups from different races.

 

[Leitz]

One of my programmer friends suggested moving everything to Python.

 

[Shonner]

One of my programmer friends suggested moving everything to Python.

Not to COBOL? I say use whatever language works. What was their reasoning?

 

[Leitz]

Not to COBOL? I say use whatever language works. What was their reasoning?

Mostly that I'm building my developer skills and they felt Python was more desirable as a skill.

 

[aramis]

Mostly that I'm building my developer skills and they felt Python was more desirable as a skill.

From a programmatic standpoint, Python's untyped variables and slice notation make character generation for Traveller much easier to write.

 

[Leitz]

From a programmatic standpoint, Python's untyped variables and slice notation make character generation for Traveller much easier to write.

I've done a little Python before but nothing to print("Home") about.

 

[Shonner]

I've done a little Python before but nothing to print("Home") about.

My Python code for character generation is 19321 lines of code now. A bit over the top.

From a programmatic standpoint, Python's untyped variables and slice notation make character generation for Traveller much easier to write.

Yep. No compiling. So it's faster to debug and run. No more typing of ";" or "{}" either.

 

[Leitz]

Shonner, if you're interested, 10Gen has a MongoDB class on-line for a few weeks. It's for developers and they are using Python as the web and interaction front end. MongoDB is a cool NoSQL database that has a lot of interesting uses.

https://education.10gen.com/courses/10gen/M101P/2013_Spring/about

Leitz

 

[Leitz]

I have to relocate the mercenary generator due to job change. Will post when it's back up publicaly.