Improving the GCA5 GURPS 4e Official Character Sheet

[Armin]

Originally Posted by Phil Masters

...Aaaand now it's showing up just fine. Huh. Turning it off and on again, I guess.

Good deal. GCA has to 'print' the image from memory onto the page, so if there are memory issues, or if the graphics driver has a hiccup, things can go awry seemingly randomly.

Originally Posted by johndallman

Yes, exactly so. Sorry, I forgot the correct term.

Okie doke. I think I'm using fixed colors, just lighter shades, rather than any actual opacity. I should be able to offer an opacity setting as well.

[johndallman]

Originally Posted by Armin

The Official sheet is a pre-printed 'best fit for most users' design that I am required to mimic.

Makes sense. I have not used pre-printed character sheets for GURPS since about ... 1990? I did quite a few 3e characters in Excel, and a few 4e characters in plain text files, before getting GCA4 and Phoenix.

So a character sheet that collapses to something close to the official one with a simple enough character has to be a different sheet.

[Stormcrow]

I actually like using a handwriting font for the data on a sheet. Nothing too stylized. Makes it clear what is form and what is data.

Unfortunately, GCA seems to have a bit of trouble printing larger fonts on the official character sheet — often, the bottom half of the writing is cut off. Recentering where the font lies might be needed.

[Farmer]

Originally Posted by Stormcrow

I actually like using a handwriting font for the data on a sheet. Nothing too stylized. Makes it clear what is form and what is data.

I haven't done this, but I like the concept and I'm going to give it a try. Thanks for sharing this idea.

[Armin]

Originally Posted by Stormcrow

I actually like using a handwriting font for the data on a sheet. Nothing too stylized. Makes it clear what is form and what is data.

Unfortunately, GCA seems to have a bit of trouble printing larger fonts on the official character sheet — often, the bottom half of the writing is cut off. Recentering where the font lies might be needed.

Originally Posted by Farmer

I haven't done this, but I like the concept and I'm going to give it a try. Thanks for sharing this idea.

This is pretty much *why* I use two different fonts (and why I make the User font blue by default). I had to rely on using a second font I could be sure pretty much everyone has, that was obviously different from the form font. I was going to use Comic Sans, but people really seem to hate that one for some reason, so I used Arial. (I wanted to use Arial for the form font, but SJGames used a serif font, so there we are.)

As for larger fonts fitting into the spaces: that's a big downside of the fixed nature of the official sheet. In order to make the boxes fit where the boxes are supposed to be, there's limited room.

Note: When I get the time to rewrite the sheet to be more block oriented, rather than fixed position oriented, I'll try to address this. It'll allow for letting what are currently fixed size sections (like the header) grow more, at the possible expense of other sections. If I manage to do it all as I hope to, it'll still allow for a sheet that approximates the printed SJGames form when using normal fonts, but without slavishly adhering to those dimensions.

[Farmer]

Originally Posted by Armin

This is pretty much *why* I use two different fonts (and why I make the User font blue by default). I had to rely on using a second font I could be sure pretty much everyone has, that was obviously different from the form font. I was going to use Comic Sans, but people really seem to hate that one for some reason, so I used Arial. (I wanted to use Arial for the form font, but SJGames used a serif font, so there we are.)

Yep, the colour variation is great. The serif font, I assume, is a hang over from DTP norms when SJG first created the sheet, as well as a different common aesthetic decades ago (it's been that long...). 72dpi was a thing then (because of the resolution of a Mac monitor back in the day and its physical size) and serifs still had some utility and looked so much better than monospace screen fonts and reflected the norm for printing. And, yes, choosing defaults that represent standard installations can be challenging.

Arial Black is a good choice for "headings" when used with Arial regular for text, but in a mono environment it's less distinctive. Specifically designed for use in Headings on Windows is "Impact", so that's probably worth considering (you don't need to support MacOS or *nix with GCA). It's distinctive in mono and also works well in black with the text in another colour (such as your blue, which I think is an excellent choice).

Comic Sans has a bad rep, I think mostly born of how many times it was used as an "alternative" font when it was released and people just got tired of it. It has a semi-script style with the soft, rounded format. It does tend to annoy me because I dislike the kerning, but honestly it's not as bad a choice as some people would suggest with their reaction to it.

[Jareth Valar]

Having a couple of issues with the default sheet.

1) The paper doll is having problems keeping the floating DR boxes in the same position they were moved to from the Protection sub-menu. Not that the paper doll is all that attractive, but it's nice to have the boxes where they're supposed to be.

2) Worn armor isn't showing up in the DR box, though natural bought DR is. Unless there is an option I'm missing somewhere

[Armin]

Originally Posted by Jareth Valar

1) The paper doll is having problems keeping the floating DR boxes in the same position they were moved to from the Protection sub-menu. Not that the paper doll is all that attractive, but it's nice to have the boxes where they're supposed to be.

Please make sure you're using version 5.0.176 of GCA5.

I'm not able to reproduce the issue with the boxes not going where you set them. There *was* a problem when GCA5 was first released, but that was later fixed. If it continues to be an issue for you, and you're using the current version, please provide some steps I can take to reproduce it, because when I drag the boxes elsewhere, they move there on the sheet. (Although I did want to adjust the code for sizing the boxes so they're not taller than they actually need to be. Still need to do that.)

Also, you can use an image you like better, if you want.

Originally Posted by Jareth Valar

2) Worn armor isn't showing up in the DR box, though natural bought DR is. Unless there is an option I'm missing somewhere

Yes, something seems to have been broken there. It should be showing Torso DR, at the least, and I'm not seeing that either.

I'll look into it.

[Stormcrow]

Originally Posted by Armin

Also, you can use an image you like better, if you want.

You can change the paper doll image?! I had no idea! I'll need to reconsider using it...

[Armin]

Originally Posted by Stormcrow

You can change the paper doll image?! I had no idea! I'll need to reconsider using it...

Yes, per loadout, on the Body & Locations tab.