Wargame App that tranparenty templates ontop of vassal NO DING GJK!

[gameleaper]

Wargame App that tranparenty displays templates ontop of vassal etc... you can use it to play miniatures to measuse things, its resizable and rotatable. free for PC

when you play vassal, would it not be nice to measure and calculate damage areas while running vassal, like you would on a proper tabletop, this app can display rotate and resize a template, and then use it ontop of the desktop display transparently and different shapes. game like carwars that use a turn key or Warhammer to see an area of effect after a cannon shot, but my fav is minatures in vassal

http://limeyyankgames.co.uk/resources/pbem-template-app

[GJK]

Neat idea and it could definitely be useful but is there any way to give it an "always on top" attribute so that if I click somewhere in VASSAL it doesn't go behind and thus can't be seen?  Otherwise, I'd just add a piece layer in VASSAL that stays persistent until I delete/hide the piece.  I did this for my Blood Bowl module where I wanted to be able to use the measuring ruler for passes- you can rotate it, etc and I made it transparent like the real one.  www.garykrockover.com/BB in case you want to check that out.

[gameleaper]

Hi GJK thanks for trying it out, I will look at your BB in a miniate, as for staying on top I will definatly look into it, but I think Its no meant to be as its windows your suggesting I change, I think Microsoft would not allow control of how windows works but you never know.

The idea is for games that don't have this sort of thing yet, so ordinary people who cant create a vassal mod or want to play miniatures can do it.

here is Andy loakes one he made

[gameleaper]

I like your BB ruler,can it be rotated at differrent speeds? I have a setting for different speeds, also you need to move your ruler around the board, where mine is independent and you can have many templates running , so a fast set of templates and they can be different shapes etc... Maybe you could pop into this app aswell and have both :)  imagine finding a vassal mod with no play aides and having a fast method of adding one without altering the mod, and you have controls on mine how fast to rotate, and how big etc.. but yours does the trick if your a vassal maker. I did it for any virtual tabletop like DnD, and minatures,

[GJK]

There should be something that can be set to "always remain on top".  If you use Irfanview image viewer, it has an option for that (which I LOVE). 


I did see that post by Andy and I agree, this could be very functional.


As for the ruler in my module, you can click and set the pivot point on one end and then click and hold the ruler to rotate it around that pivot point so it will spin around as fast as you can move your mouse.

[gameleaper]

Ive updated, so it has 9 templates you can hot switch by pressing 1..9
Ive added rotate speed hot switch, so you can speedup or slow down rotation

still looking into window on top, but I think, it would block the use of windows behind like vassal, a windows focus can only be on one window I think, you can display them ontop of each other, but, when you click on one it becomes the focus , I shall continue looking at this.

[gameleaper]

GJK I put you in the credits, because what you asked for improved this app so much, it now stays ontop. thankyou GJK I mean it, its great now

[GJK]

Excellent!  I'll go download the latest.  There's definitely lots of uses for this- good job!  O0

[GJK]

Ok, some suggestions and hopefully some easy fixes...we want perfection, right? 


1) I would use the left-right arrow to rotate the template....left or right.   Up-down was counter-intuitive.
2) It "dings" (activates windows ding) when rotating but only when pressing the Up arrow (at least for me).  I could see some use for the ding (to let you know that it was moved) but it should be consistent for both directions.  Maybe try disabling the ding me thinks.


A couple of requests (and I don't know how feasible these are but I sense that you love the challenge  :) ):


1) Is there any way to display (perhaps up in a top corner and not too much of a distraction) what degree of angle the template is currently rotated?  (+/- degrees).  This would be GREAT for miniatures.


2) Any way to allow the user to adjust the size of each rotation?  Some may want it to rotate in 45 degree angles or some 60 (for hexes) or even 90 or some may want it in tiny, tiny micro increments. 


I'll mess around with it some more - if I can think of anything else, I'll let you know!

[gameleaper]

Ok added degrees, and step display, also changed cursor keys , and I hope got rid of the ding, I don't know about the ding its not happening on my PC , but I think I may of found the cause.

[GJK]

Well that was too easy!  Good job again, works like a charm!  Mine still dings but that could be because I have the "ding" attached to some event, who knows.  It's not terribly annoying.

[gameleaper]

small fix, degrees reset when at zero, now you can step past zero both ways

[gameleaper]

Mine dinginging, I will look again,

[gameleaper]

Ok , that fixed the ding, I didn't even know I had my sound on zero, again thx, weve made an app worth having :)

I'm thinking you could keep charts on the screen too, upto 9 switchable, they would stay ontop aswell like ASL with tigers on the hunt, or rules for a game, then shrink the window or close it when not needed,

It was easy to do took me 2 days, but it was exceptional technical code, I never did windows app before, so a new horizon.

[gameleaper]

added an enter key to reset rotation to zero, in case you want a chart with text to be read