4E Module Generator - Portable compendium > Fantasy Grounds

[VegaFontana]

Hello everyone,

This post is about a set of scripts that will allow you to generate Fantasy Grounds modules from the "Portable Compendium" data.


Foreword



What is the Portable Compendium?
For those who never heard about the "Portable Compendium", I was like you a few weeks ago. I personally use an other called the "Offline Compendium".
These two softwares had the same goal, allow people to access DDI Compendium data without internet access.
Nowadays since the online DDI Compendium has been shut down by WotC, these data troves are the only way to access all 4E data.


But as you said, there is several compendium existing, how do I know this module generator will work with my compendium?
There is two compendium hosting 4e data these days. Or at least, two that I am aware of. These module-generating scripts will only work with the one called "Portable Compendium" or "Portable D&D Compendium.exe".
If your compendium looks like this picture below, you are in the right place. If it's not, you might want to check my other thread here https://www.fantasygrounds.com/forum...read.php?60221



How does it work and which modules will I be able to create?
The scripts I bring here will allow you to generate modules sufficient to launch any campaign of the fourth edition in Fantasy Grounds.
These are based of the scripts I originally created for the Offline Compendium and managed adapt for this one. It only create 3 base modules that should be enough to start running.
We're talking about 5000+ NPCs for you DM and for your players of 9000+ Powers and 3000+ Feats ready to drag and drop in their character sheets.


Installation & Usage

Ok so now how can I make it work ?
It should be easy, or I least I tried to make it easy.
First things first you need to download and unzip the module generation scripts here : https://drive.google.com/file/d/1hQQ...Tg9Wruwthup2Es

And follow carefully the detailed steps written below.

1. Copy the ddiFeat.sql, ddiPower.sql and ddiMonster.sql, files from "PathYoYourPortableCompendium/sql/".

2. Then paste them inside the sources folder of the generator located at "4E Module Generator - Portable Compendium/sources/".



3. Execute the "4E Module Generator - Portable Compendium/_run_all.bat" file (double clic should be fine). Then three executable will be launched and three consoles should appear (once per modules generated) with info of the parsing happening.

4. Each consoles will ask you to press enter to close them once finished.



5. Finally you will be able to find the generated modules in the "4E Module Generator - Portable Compendium/export" folder in each specific repositories (i.e. "4e_NPC_PortableCompendium.mod" in "4E Module Generator/export/npc")

6. Just copy these 3 modules from their export folders into your FG modules folder (default should be ".../Fantasy Gounds/Data/modules") and load them in your campain!

7. Don't forget to give access to your players to the basic feats / powers modules to ease character creation.



And voilà you should be done and ready to start creating colorfull characters and dreadfull encounters!



Last notes

What is up with the 5000 monsters when there was only ~2000 in my Portable Compendium?
As @kevininrussia noted it, this seems to be an issue with the b29 version, the b30 should show all ~5000 properly so you should not be surprised.
The Portable Compendium b29 I managed to acquire only shows only 2327 entries when filtered by creatures.
But in fact, in the sql data used to initialize the database of the software, the 5326 are available but a lot of them have invalid html structure.
My guess here would be that because of their "corrupted" nature, the Portable Compendium b29 does not display them to the user.
And it was tricky to get these to work but even if you run with this older version. I managed to pull out a trick that allows to export them properly either way.
So yeah you might end up with more monsters than you could actually see in the Portable Compendium list!

I'm curious, how does it works?
You can learn more about this on the original thread for these generation scripts in the "Last notes" section :
https://www.fantasygrounds.com/forum...read.php?60221

Any known issues?
- Recharge for monsters skills is not tracked, this is due to the source data not storing this info at the same place every time. An upgrade of the npc script should put things back in the right order.


I sincerely hope this can help many of you the way it helped me setting up my last campain!

[kevininrussia]

Thanks for this!

FYI, D&D Compendium (Beta 30) displays all 5326 creatures.

[VegaFontana]

FYI, D&D Compendium (Beta 30) displays all 5326 creatures.

Oh good to know! I did not managed to get this one, I hope this will not cause the scripts to fail.
Have you tried generating modules with your (Beta 30) data?

I want to make sure that it works the same with any version

[kevininrussia]

Oh good to know! I did not managed to get this one, I hope this will not cause the scripts to fail.
Have you tried generating modules with your (Beta 30) data?

I want to make sure that it works the same with any version

I'll test this weekend and report back.

[VegaFontana]

I'll test this weekend and report back.

Thank you very much! Crossing fingers, hope it'll work well

[qunitvineu]

I'm struggling to get this to work. I think it's coming from one or both of two problems. First, my ddi files are not a DBeaver type they're just listed as SQL files. Should I look into changing that? Second and more likely the issue I think, I don't have a modules folder in my fantasy grounds data. It looks like my current modules are located in a "managed" folder and I tried putting the mod files I got from the generator there, but they didn't show up when I booted up FG. Should I make a new folder? Is there something else I can do?

[VegaFontana]

Hi, let's see this through together.

First, my ddi files are not a DBeaver type they're just listed as SQL files. Should I look into changing that?

First I glad to anounce you that this is not an issue. DBeaver is the software I sure to read database and database files (*.sql). That's why it appears like that in my screenshot, the sql files are just the same and if you managed to recover the generated modules, everything should have been just fine.

Second and more likely the issue I think, I don't have a modules folder in my fantasy grounds data. It looks like my current modules are located in a "managed" folder and I tried putting the mod files I got from the generator there, but they didn't show up when I booted up FG. Should I make a new folder? Is there something else I can do?

I think we first need to check where is located you "data" folder because it can be a different place than you Fantasy Grounds software. On the launcher of FG, you can find an folder icon that allows for a quick open of the "data" folder where the "modules" sub folder whould be displayed.

FGU


FGC


It should open your data folder, you can see that mine looks like this (see below).



Can you give me a screenshot of yours?

[qunitvineu]

"On the launcher of FG, you can find an folder icon that allows for a quick open of the "data" folder where the "modules" sub folder whould be displayed."

That worked! Clicking that folder brought me to an entirely different location that I didn't realize existed lol. I put the modules in there and it all works on my FG now! Thank you so much!!! For real, let me know if I can buy you a pizza. This is incredible and I really appreciate you taking the time to not only make this thing but also remake it for the portable compendium, as well as helping us troubleshoot the installation process. You're a class act Vega

[Gurlock]

Thank you so much for the work you've put into this, however I'm having a problem as well.

I've got Beta 29, and followed the instructions through the runall.bat. The three consoles appear on screen, but only 2 of them run through to the Press enter to Close point. The powers one more or less immediately closes.

My export folder only contains the MOD files for the feats and npc. I've tried running it again and the same thing happens.

[VegaFontana]

This is incredible and I really appreciate you taking the time to not only make this thing but also remake it for the portable compendium, as well as helping us troubleshoot the installation process. You're a class act Vega

I'm really glad it worked for you! The gratification of knowing that people can play 4th on FG again with the same ease as my group is all I need

My export folder only contains the MOD files for the feats and npc. I've tried running it again and the same thing happens.

Well this certainly is a bummer! But I'm sure we can fix it through.

First thing, please try and execute (double-click) only the power.exe file which is the one that seems having trouble since npc and feats worked well.
And then tell me if you can see the issue happening (writent in the console). If you can see the issue please screen capture it here so that I can troubleshot it

On a second step to further investigate this issue, I might need your "ddiPower.sql" file as private message to run tests on it and fix the script if needed!