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Hello,

Ok, the best Army Builder you have used in the last couple of years, (include any that have been axed by GW):

For Me:

#1. The 40k Army List Builder - The best builder I have ever seen! It had all of the data and none of the hideous look of Battlescribe, (Too bad GW canned it!)
#2. HQ - Solid ease of use with some issues here and there
#3. Battlescribe - solid on the data, but clunky and ugly as hell!

Opinions?

I'm hoping that the official one will be great. But I'm not gonna hold my breath...

Battlescribe is only "ugly" if you don't bother customising it. It's perfectly fine once you know how to use it mod edit: let's not take swipes at other people when they're not here to defend themselves. motyak

 fraser1191 wrote:
I'm hoping that the official one will be great. But I'm not gonna hold my breath...

Official one? I didn't know they were planning on releasing their own, I even suggested it in the Community Survey and barring that, a partnership with Battlescribe to at least fix it's problems and make it with official data.

Crack open a book and a calculator?. I still prefer to do it manually.

 Anotherguardsman wrote:

 fraser1191 wrote:
I'm hoping that the official one will be great. But I'm not gonna hold my breath...

Official one? I didn't know they were planning on releasing their own, I even suggested it in the Community Survey and barring that, a partnership with Battlescribe to at least fix it's problems and make it with official data.

There even is an official one already on the Warhammer Community Page however, it only has powerlevels and no profiles / special rules with it so it's very basic. But they said they'll expand it.

 BaconCatBug wrote:
Battlescribe is only "ugly" if you don't bother customising it. It's perfectly fine once you know how to use it mod edit: let's not take swipes at other people when they're not here to defend themselves. motyak

as you mention customizing:
is there an easy way to do that? Or some good tutorials?
I'd like to get the whole mileage out of it

 BaconCatBug wrote:
Battlescribe is only "ugly" if you don't bother customising it. It's perfectly fine once you know how to use it mod edit: let's not take swipes at other people when they're not here to defend themselves. motyak

How do you customize it then? Put on colourful sunglasses ;P

I wonder about the customizing as well.

Any UX expert would sign that BattleScribe's UI is terrible to use though. " It's perfectly fine once you know how to use it" is just an euphemism for "terrible UI".
A mine fields is a perfectly fine road if you know where the mines are.

I find battlescribe UI to be quite comfortable, and I had zero clue that you could even customize it until now.

I don't think, that the GUI is that bad.
I'm very comfortable with using it...

So I just tried to customize a roster that was saved as *.html file. Didn't think of that, to be honest.
It's an easy way to reduce the amount of pages that need to be printed.
Just remove three of your four dedicated Transport entrys, add a "three times ***" to the remaining entry and, there you go just saved three pages.

Maybe you can go further, if you add notes an use the fields for exact clarification...

Seems pretty nice. Need to play a bit more with this...

Edit: I fear, that wasn't the kind of customization that was meant...

Hq builder is the most easy one and best I have used

I'm still using Wolf Lair's Army Builder. I'm so out of it...

I do find Battlescribe unappealing to use. There's something about it's interface that I just can't get used to. My second choice is pen-and-paper.

Battlescribe on mobile and on PC are vastly different things in terms of interface. I find the mobile one isn't that bad.

The desktop program agreeably is not very friendly to the eye and the fingers and the mice.

I only wish the author would open source it so the community could come in and help improve it.

What's so terrible about Battlescribe's UI?

I like it a lot. It's visually clear what I have on what, everything collapses down neatly if I don't need to look at it; and it's easy to look at for a while since it's black and white.

My only issue is that it's trying to be more helpful than it needs to be since I can calculated my CP without it telling me I forgot to choose detach CP and therefore my roster is incomplete [and the mobile version is obnoxious to set unit loadouts on, but most things mobile suck anyway]

as somebody who does work with making programs easier to use... battle scribe is not great. a UI is lot like a joke. if you have to explain it then it is not very good.

I use it, I understand why it is the way it is, but more uniformity in data loads (user uploaded i know, but setting up standards or reorganizing data seems like it would be ok). The screen to screen for small things liek choosing game, army, detachment should basically be one screen handled with drop downs, then that adds the detachment to another tab to see what has been added... boom simpler, cleaner, faster.

OpenCalc.

I still use the WolfLair Army Builder too but I wonder how long data file support will continue for that.

Battlescribe is OK, I'm not a huge fan of the printed layout - I would rather it look more like Army Builder's does but it is useful enough to have on PCs where I don't have an Army Builder license.

Big fan of battlescribe on mobile. Never had an issue with it and personally I find it clear and easy.

I really like Army Builder, but I can't use it to include Index options, so it's pretty much useless to me right now : /

 filbert wrote:
I still use the WolfLair Army Builder too but I wonder how long data file support will continue for that.

Battlescribe is OK, I'm not a huge fan of the printed layout - I would rather it look more like Army Builder's does but it is useful enough to have on PCs where I don't have an Army Builder license.

I've just been using it to build lists, then writing the lists out in a format I like better later. For tournaments especially, I'll write out the list like a worksheet, with checkboxes for relic choices and pregame stratagems, since those can change on a game by game basis.

By far the best Army building software I've ever used is:
Opening my Codex, using a calculator and having extensive and accurate knowledge of how detachments and unit entry datasheets work, including all up to date FAQs that may affect my Faction

Has never failed me yet.
There is just too much content out there now to rely on any third party program that "might" have up-to-date info

-

 Galef wrote:
By far the best Army building software I've ever used is:
Opening my Codex, using a calculator and having extensive and accurate knowledge of how detachments and unit entry datasheets work, including all up to date FAQs that may affect my Faction

Has never failed me yet.
There is just too much content out there now to rely on any third party program that "might" have up-to-date info

-

I trust Battlescribe to be more accurate than I would be with paper and pencil.

 Horst wrote:


I trust Battlescribe to be more accurate than I would be with paper and pencil.

Indeed. It also fits on my mobile devices and has a save feature. Plus handwriting I can actually read.

Sterling191 wrote:

 Horst wrote:


I trust Battlescribe to be more accurate than I would be with paper and pencil.

Indeed. It also fits on my mobile devices and has a save feature. Plus handwriting I can actually read.

... And it has the current point costs of my units and upgrades after numerous FAQs and erratas.

Sterling191 wrote:

 Horst wrote:


I trust Battlescribe to be more accurate than I would be with paper and pencil.

Indeed. It also fits on my mobile devices and has a save feature. Plus handwriting I can actually read.

All fair points. And is the beauty of this topic. No one is forced to use any particular method.

I just don't want to really on a program that has to constantly be updated and can have some...lag...when new rule come out and the programmers have to update it.
I also do not hand write my lists, but type them in Word, so readability is not an issue. And I find formatting the list in Word much easy than messing with Battlescribe.
Just my personal preference informed by over a decade of list building.

I'm sure the tech has improved since I last tried it several years ago, but since my method works for me, I have zero reason to alter it.
As long as I am up to date with my faction's rules and FAQs, there is little room for error.

torblind wrote:
... And it has the current point costs of my units and upgrades after numerous FAQs and erratas.

They do now, but if the Big FAQ drops say...today... and has some points adjustments, how soon would Battlescribe be updated? I'd be impressed if it was instantly, because that's how fast "my" method updates.

And just to be clear on where my bias comes from, in addition to beind resistance to new tech, I have actually called out a player that was using Battle Scribe to make their list and is hadn't updated with a change (can't remember the specifics as this was a few years ago), but he was playing with over 100pts more than what was legal because BS had not updated with a recent Codex released a few days prior.
Being "cheated" like that left a bad taste in my mouth for Battlescribe

-

I use paper.

 Galef wrote:

torblind wrote:
... And it has the current point costs of my units and upgrades after numerous FAQs and erratas.

They do now, but if the Big FAQ drops say...today... and has some points adjustments, how soon would Battlescribe be updated? I'd be impressed if it was instantly, because that's how fast "my" method updates.

If an FAQ drops today that makes my Dire Avenger Exarchs +10ppm upgrades, then it's on me to build a 1970 point list in BattleScribe, knowing that I'm also paying for 3 upgrades that are not there.

I'll sometimes do two seperate lists in BattleScribe if my, say, Harlies are helping out Asurman And Company.

It's on the player to ensure they are not over on points. For pugs, "Battlescribe says this" is good enough, most of the time. But in the corner cases (known issue on points, FAQ just changed them, or whatever), even in a PuG, the player is responsible.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
More generally, I trust BattleScribe not to make a mistake more readily than the average player.

But I don't doublecheck either (outside I think two extreme exceptions in my entire history with this game). If I can't trust the other guy to follow the rules in his list, I don't think I'm going to enjoy a game against him.

 Galef wrote:

Being "cheated" like that left a bad taste in my mouth for Battlescribe

-

That had everything to do with the player misusing a tool, not the tool itself. If you play an army, its a pretty safe bet you're gonna know when the codex drops. Which then puts the onus on you to confirm that your list is legal.

This is why you check the release and version notes, and have a conversation with your match companion about any possibility of discrepancies.

TL;DR - Use your tools responsibly and you'll be fine.

Sterling191 wrote:

 Galef wrote:

Being "cheated" like that left a bad taste in my mouth for Battlescribe

-

That had everything to do with the player misusing a tool, not the tool itself. If you play an army, its a pretty safe bet you're gonna know when the codex drops. Which then puts the onus on you to confirm that your list is legal.

This is why you check the release and version notes, and have a conversation with your match companion about any possibility of discrepancies.

TL;DR - Use your tools responsibly and you'll be fine.

I think I've actually seen this scenario more with those who don't use BS (or another app) than without; they weren't cheating, they just hadn't rebuilt their list using the new codex. As long as they weren't using any rules from the new codex, that's just an outdated army - I'd rather play a game and have them learn the new codex later than sit around while they learn the new codex.

Some people (not me) build their lists long before games - possibly even more than 3 days before the game. Some people even consider it cheating to not have built your list before you show up.