New program to help set up VASL scenarios

Neal

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So it's a graphical representation of overall rolls, actual vs. expected, with extra weight given to rolls below 7? Or something like that...

BTW, I'm Bob in these datasets...which is funny, because that happens to be my father's name. :LOL:
 

Pacman Ghost

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So it's a graphical representation of overall rolls, actual vs. expected, with extra weight given to rolls below 7?
Sort of. The hotness score is just a single number, but it's shown in a bar chart to make it easier to compare the 2 numbers.

It doesn't make any difference how many 7's you roll, they score 0.
If you roll more 6's than expected, you score a few points. How many points you score depends on how far above the expected value you were.
If you roll more 5's than expected, you score points, but more than for 6's.
If you roll more 4's than expected, you score points, but more than for 5's.
...etc...

So, you need to roll a lot of extra 6's to score the same number of points as rolling a few extra 2's.

OTOH, if you roll less than the expected number of 6's, you lose some points, etc.

And it's symmetrical, but inverted, on the other side of curve: if you roll more than the expected number of 8-12's, you lose points, fewer gains you points.

For the mathematically-minded, it's a slightly modified version of a weighted chi-squared i.e. it tries to gauge how far what you actually rolled deviates from what was expected, but giving more weight to lower/higher roll values.
 
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Orphan76

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when I try to update the VASL scenario I am getting an error window that says "Unable to find a matching set of capabilities" ?
 

Maurizizio

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Average is one metric for assessing how good your dice were, hotness is just another. For average, the difference between rolling a 6 instead of a 7 is the same as that of a 2 instead of a 3, but for hotness, the latter is considered much better. If you roll exactly the expected number of each DR value (2 thru 12), the hotness score will be 0. Positive scores mean your dice were hot, negative means not so hot. The purpose of this feature is to give me some sort of pseudo-scientific basis for blaming the dice when I lose :rolleyes:

A few more examples, from the log files you sent me.

View attachment 14423
In this one, Alice rolled more 2's than expected (7, expected 3.9), which bumps the hotness score up. 3's and 4's and 5's were almost exactly as expected, and so don't affect the score, but there were more 6's than expected (25, expected 19.5), which will increase the score (but not by as much as the 2's, since 6's are considered less important than 2's). There were also less 8's, 10's and 12's than expected, which also increases the score. More 9's were rolled than expected, so this reduces the score by a bit. Final score +0.7, so somewhat hot.

Likewise, Bob rolled fewer 2's, 4's and 5's than expected, so his score goes down by quite a bit. He rolled fewer 8's, but more 9's, so they just about cancel each other out. His 10 thru 12's were almost exactly as expected, so have no effect on the score. Final score -0.3, so his dice weren't particularly good, but not tragically so.

This one is even more dramatic:
View attachment 14424

Bob rolled a crazy amount of 3's (14, expected 4.5) and his 2's were pretty good as well (5, expected 2.2). These increased his score by a lot, and while his 4's and 5's were low, they don't reduce his score by as much because 2's and 3's are considered to be more important than 4's and 5's. On the other side, he rolled fewer 8's, 11's and 12's than expected, which increased his score by even more. He rolled more 10's than expected, which will decrease his score, but overall, he scored +6.2, which is pretty damn hot.
This is FANTASTIC! I am doing something similar (but without moving average) on my excel for PBEM matches. I would love to have it!!!
 

Pacman Ghost

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when I try to update the VASL scenario I am getting an error window that says "Unable to find a matching set of capabilities" ?
This is the screenshot you sent me:
14462

As you suspected, it has something to do with the webdriver.

I think the most likely cause is that you have the 64-bit version of Firefox, but 32-bit version of geckodriver, or vice-versa.
 

Jplott94

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In case I haven't offered one, please accept a huge THANK YOU for conceiving, coding, and supporting this application! Any thing to do with this hobby is a labor of love, and you have really shown how you feel about the game and the community!

Thanks Again!
 

Pacman Ghost

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In case I haven't offered one, please accept a huge THANK YOU for conceiving, coding, and supporting this application! Any thing to do with this hobby is a labor of love, and you have really shown how you feel about the game and the community!
No worries, and thanks for the kind words. The dice analysis feature just finished was a bit of slog, and the thing I'm working on now is as well (although not as bad), so it's always nice to get some good feedback.

But yeah, I love coding, and love this game, just have to find some time to actually play it... :rolleyes:
 

Orphan76

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This is the screenshot you sent me:
View attachment 14462

As you suspected, it has something to do with the webdriver.

I think the most likely cause is that you have the 64-bit version of Firefox, but 32-bit version of geckodriver, or vice-versa.
That fixed it . Thanks for your help. Now I just have to figure out the vehicle info.
 

Pacman Ghost

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The next beta of vasl-templates is now available. Please PM me if you'd like to take it for a spin.

The main feature in this release is integration with the ASL Scenario Archive. Dave Ramsey has kindly provided access to his database, and it is a very rich, high-quality dataset. You can search for scenarios, and use them to get your VASL setups started.

14675

The old OBA black/red chit table has been moved to this section of the program, as has the ROAR balance, which sits alongside the Scenario Archive's balance. A particularly helpful feature is that the scenario cards list any special rules and errata, and many of them have screenshots of what the board should look like, which will help make sure your scenarios are set up correctly:
14676

Note that you may have to wait a minute or two the first time you run this version before the feature becomes available in the program (it has to download the scenario information).

There are more integrations coming in the next release, as well, once I get out from under the pile of work that's suddenly appeared on top of me :-/

This release also has a few changes to the log file analysis feature from the previous beta:
  • custom labels can now be added to the X-axis of the time-plot chart by entering a message of the form "!!vt-label XYZ" in the VASL control window during the course of the game (i.e. this will add a label "XYZ").
  • the weights for the dice hotness algorithm have been adjusted to be a bit more even.
Other minor changes:
  • Syntax errors in the logging config file are now handled.
  • Scenarios are now saved as formatted JSON.
 
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Pacman Ghost

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Some produce ASL. Some play ASL. Some collect ASL. Some make electrons depict ASL. Thanks for all your work on the latter. It’s impressive!
Thanks, but honestly, the kudos should be going to Dave. What's in his database is extraordinarily high-quality, almost certainly hand-curated, data. I just grab it and display it. Sure, it looks pretty, but if the data was crap, then it wouldn't be of much use to anyone.
 

von Marwitz

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Thanks, but honestly, the kudos should be going to Dave. What's in his database is extraordinarily high-quality, almost certainly hand-curated, data. I just grab it and display it. Sure, it looks pretty, but if the data was crap, then it wouldn't be of much use to anyone.
As ever so often, it is teamwork that makes big things happen:

BigAl737 is certainly one that towers among the code gnomes being supported by a number of others, Dave Ramsey has set up (and recently updated) the ASL Scenario Archive website which is diligently fed with information by hoxon and others. Pacman Ghost has created this VASL-Setup-Creation gadget that is getting better and better. And all of them draw on the efforts provided by the other for the greater good of the commuity. My very humble part in this is merely to give out some very well deserved praise for the whole lot of them!

Cheers,
von Marwitz
 

TopT

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As ever so often, it is teamwork that makes big things happen:

BigAl737 is certainly one that towers among the code gnomes being supported by a number of others, Dave Ramsey has set up (and recently updated) the ASL Scenario Archive website which is diligently fed with information by hoxon and others. Pacman Ghost has created this VASL-Setup-Creation gadget that is getting better and better. And all of them draw on the efforts provided by the other for the greater good of the commuity. My very humble part in this is merely to give out some very well deserved praise for the whole lot of them!

Cheers,
von Marwitz
Heck, Yes! All of these efforts do nothing but help out make this an even better experience playing ASL.
 

Pacman Ghost

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Dave Ramsey has set up (and recently updated) the ASL Scenario Archive website which is diligently fed with information by hoxon and others.
I wasn't aware of these other people working behind the scenes, so a big shout-out to them as well. The data really is quite nice :)

One of the things I mentioned to Dave when we were setting this up is a hope that the people working on ASL stuff work together and start building on top of each others' stuff. If someone else is building something that involves scenarios (e.g. the new AREA), they too can get access to this data and use it in their program.
 
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