FMH : Great Success

Huzzah! On Friday the 28th I hit the 1000 active user mark.

That was a long, tiring trip, and a lot of work. More than I would have expected, and there's still tonnes of stuff to do with the app before I'd even consider it finished.

Thanks for all the kind words / twitter RT's / recommendations on twitter, and the really great reviews on Google Play.

1005 on 30th Sept.

HAPPY CRAIG IS HAPPY \o/

More Android Market Stats for FMH

As of 16th Sept 2012

939! So close to my one thousand mark.

It's weird, it's been 5 days since I released 0.68 and I haven't had any time to write any code for FMH. It's not so bad, it's only been five days right? I've been working on the guts of it for so long, that it feels like I'm taking a 5 day holiday - even though I'm working full time.

I do have a 'to do' list though.

Next up are some bugfixes for Ogres which Mr.Vaughan sent in, and also I'm going to look at including a settings page which the user can choose 'stuff' - like text sizes on all the screens, perhaps a default popped open armies from the unit picker, and some default unit choice(s) from the unit picker.

Other suggestions are welcome! @FantasyMathHamr or email to clockworkcraig [at] gmail.com.

Android Market Stats for FMH

For the record, here's where FMH is at:

The total installs to date, since April 22nd or so.

Total Active installs

Active installs by country

FMH 0.68

"We az got da powah now."

Just released to market, it'll be up there soon.
Get V0.68 here.

Thanks to Aussie Gamer Vaughan Keyburn for all his notes on O&G bugs.

O&G bug fixes listed here.

General:

• Demigryphs armour was  heavy armour, fixed to be full plate armour (and extra point of armour save).
• Derpy Mounts: I implemented mount attacks in combat in v0.50. Unittests showed that they were totally broken, the mounts would act as their parent unit and just use their stat line when attacking i.e. Demigryph knight mounts would use their knights statline when attacking. Fixed.
  Demigryph's (and other mounts) are a lot better now. Sorry about that.
• Cavalry Mounts were receiving supporting attacks. Mounts should not get supporting attacks. Fixed.

Ohiohammer app mention

I was interviewed by the awesome Andrew Sherman, of the Ohiohammer podcast, about Fantasy MathHammer! \o/
It starts about 34 mins in. It's a ten minute segment, in which I almost succeed at not sounding like an idiot.
Get it here: Episode 29.

My thanks to Ohiohammer for having me on the show.

If you're not familiar with Ohiohammer, it's a staple of my Warhammer Fantasy podcast regular listening, I thoroughly recommend it. I was hooked from the hilarious "let's roll" intro sound-byte.

FMH - nights of bugfixing

I've been busy.
A rather decent chap in Australia (how cool is that, someone literally around the world is using my app!) sent me a lengthy email detailing a tonne of bugs with O&G.
I fixed the vast majority of them tonight.
A bunch of facepalm type ones, for some reason I had all cavalry as down as 20mm wide. Seems like they're all 25mm wide, there's no such thing as 20mm cav!

There was an almighty bug in the code which determined how many models could attack units of smaller base sizes, with fewer models. This is now fixed, it took a good 5 hours of work to fix this bloody thing. When I fixed trolls attack count, it broke cavalry attack counts. When I fixed those, it broke larger monster attack counts. Thank fark I started implementing unit tests, else I wouldn't have known I'd broken the attack calculator for other units.

That's me, and the demon is the bugs. RAWR.

CHANGE LOG:
New special rules handled:
- Regeneration
- Thick Skinned
- War Paint
- Swarm
- Unit special rules printed in debug logs at start of each combat log

BUGFIX CENTRAL:

• Mournfang were classed as monstrous cav and on 40mm bases, should have been on 50mm basses. Fixed.
• Default cavalry base size was 20mm, DERP. Fixed to 25mm.
• Terradon's were on cav bases, should have been monstrous cav 40mm. Fixed.
• Demigryphs were on 40mm bases, should have been 50mm (I'm not an Empireplayer!). Fixed.
• Fixed Pegasus knights, they were on 40mm bases and should have been on 50mm. Mounted Yeomen were classifed as infantry, not cavalry. Fixed.
• Added more unit tests for monstrous inf vs inf, caught another bug in mathhammer._how_many_can_hit(attacker, defender). Fixed.
• VC BlackKnights were wrong base size of 20mm, fixed to 25mm.
• Empire units: Knightly orders, Inner circle knights and Reiksguard Knightswere all using a basesize of 20mm, fixed to 25mm.
• Fixed issue with monstrous inf getting too few attacks against inf block frontage.

  Orc Boyz, Orc Boyz big uns, Orc arrer Boyz, Savage orcs,
  Goblin wolf riders: fixed to have 25mm base size
  Savage orc big uns + Orc Boyz big un fixed to have WS 4.

  Savage orcs & Savage orc big uns now get their WAR PAINT
  bonus of 6+ ward save

  Night goblins armour fixed, they were getting light
  armour bonus.

  Forrest Goblin spider riders:
  - 20mm base size, fixed to 25mm
  - Armour was 4+, fixed to 5+ armour and 6+ward (parry)

  Black Orcs
  - 20mm base size, fixed to 25mm
  - note: armed to da teef is not yet implemented.

  Orc Boar boys:
  - 20mm base size, fixed to 25mm
  - had 5+ armour, fixed to 4+ armour
    - light plus 2 for boars THICK SKINNED

  Orc Boar boys big uns
  - 20mm base size, fixed to 25mm
  - WS3 fixed to WS 4
  - had 5+ armour, fixed to 4+ armour
    - light plus 2 for boars THICK SKINNED

  Savage Orc Boar boys
  - 20mm base size, fixed to 25mm
  - Armour fixed from +98! to 5+ armour
    - 2 for boars THICK SKINNED
  - They now have their 6+ ward save

  Savage Orc Boar boys big uns:
  - 20mm base size, fixed to 25mm
  - Armour fixed from +98! to 5+ armour
     - 2 for boars THICK SKINNED
  - They now have their 6+ ward save
  - had WS 3 fixed to WS 4

  Night goblin Squig Hoppers (also check hatred vs dwarfs not yet programmed)
  - armour fixed to 6+
  - added squig attacks, NOTE: these are currently treated as rider + mount, app doesn't yet handle concept of handlers + multiple models/herd

  Snotlings:
  - now crumble like a SWARM should

  Arachnarok
  - fixed from 40mm wide to 100mm
  - number of attacks fixed. Note: poisened attacks and multiple wound attacks not yet handled.
  - Crew now get their 8 attacks s3
  - Fixed armour save from 3+ to 4+
  - NOTE: Thunderstomp not yet implemented.

  River/Stone troll
  - stone troll now gets it's 5+ armour save
  - 4 plus regen is now implemented
  - bug in frontage where only 2 trolls could attack
  - NOTE: river troll doesn't yet have it's -1 to hit bonus

the testing of DOOM & unittests

This is in reference to FantasyMathHammer, it's about boring coding stuff and not warhammer specific.

Still here? Cool.

Up until now I've been feverishly adding new units, and any vital special rules those units need (for instance, undead units really do need unstable), but avoiding the less necessary rules like special weapons - like Halbards (I added those last night btw).

I foolishly didn't write unit tests as I was developing and instead tested it by running the app myself and checking the full debug logs I had already added into the app.
Slowly, and surely, checking and debugging anything with this method started to take more and more time. It's also quite error prone, as you can imagine.

Eventually I reached a place where a few things occurred.

1. Debugging like this was clearly taking more time than if I just wrote a unit test for the same instance. Starting the app, picking the exact units and formations, all took time vs pressing the UP arrow, and enter to run some unittests.
2. There were vast swathes of code, nay, entire plains worth, which I was afraid to touch in case I broke anything. My testing method meant that I couldn't go back and retest everything, I could only test for a specific case or thing which I had just added. Clearly not a good place to be.

I should have known better, I did really, but was attempting to fool myself. No really, I should have known better. WFB is a massive set of rules, all thrown into the same mix and interacting with each other. What did I think was going to happen? That I would construct a massive & intricate spiders web of interconnected code and it would all be fine? 

Yesterday I decided it was time to pay the unittest piper.

The unit tests I've written in 3 hours have already picked up some juicy bugs:

• Derpy Mounts: I implemented mount attacks in combat in v0.50. Unittests showed that they were totally broken, the mounts would act as their parent unit and just use their stat line when attacking i.e. Demigryph knight mounts would use their knights statline when attacking. Fixed.
  Demigryph's (and other mounts) are a lot better now. Sorry about that.
• The Mounts were receiving supporting attacks. Mounts should not get supporting attacks. Fixed.

If you're reading this and aren't a coder of some sort, unittests might sound like some magical easy band aid. They're perfect for my situation. Once they're covering a lot of the app's code it will mean I can add new code, or edit existing code and if I break anything the tests will throw an error in the relevant test case.

The downside is that they're going to be a metric tonne of work and I won't be adding armies or special rules handling while I'm implementing tests. Still, catching bugs like the above ones make it worth while.

MENTAL NOTE:
UNITTEST THE SHIT OUT OF STUFF FROM DAY 1.

Unittests are nice! I like!

Tonight's coding music is

MC Frontalot.



Here's a playlist of his stuff.
Ever play Zork? Then this track is for you.
I like. Now you like.

FMH v0.65 - Beastmen of Gojiranotronia

Version 0.65 is out. Get it here.

Wow, I really wasn't lying in my last post when I said that positive feedback is my development jamba juice.
I spotted this review as I was about to log off and head to bed.
"Currently I give it 5 stars because the UI is lovely and it's really easy and quick to use. Far better than a regular warhammer calculator especially for during games and quick things. If you add Beastmen I will give you 10 million stars."

Dwarven eyes twinkle while imagining TEN MILLION STARS OF WEALTH.

It's now jaysuschristoclock, and I'm off to bed after a productive few hours - the Beastmen are in, and I pushed it to the market place.

I hope I didn't break anything in the app with my frenzied coding and lax testing standards...there is only one of me after all.

FMH v0.6 - TombKings

I've released v0.6. Get it here.
I added the Tomb Kings, cause Steven complimented my app so nicely. Thanks for that Steven, positive feedback is my development jamba juice.

I fixed some other things that reddit folks pointed out, like no Orc & Goblin Big 'Un units in the app at all, and that Choppas didn't work.

I also added Lances while I was at it, as they are so similar to Choppas, I didn't get a chance to implement anything to handle the Brettonian Lance Formation though. Maybe next time, though I'm prioritising getting all of the armies into the app before I start on each and every special rule.

This is the 11th army in FantasyMathHammer. Woo!

Here's the release notes:
v0.6
Added:
- Added TOMB KINGS!
- Tomb Kings work with UNSTABLE special rule.
- support for LANCES for all races (HE/EMPIRE/DE/VC/BRETS).
- O&G CHOPPAs rule support. mmm, choppy.
- Orcs & Goblins GIANT. Not yet handling giant special attacks though, just gave him 4 attacks.
- Empires Inner Circle Knights
- all Orc Big'Un units.
Fixed STEADFAST rank counts, in certain circumstances the
last horde rank wasn't counted when checking for STEADFAST.

Garagehammer App mention

Woo! My app got talked about in today's Garagehammer, Episode 55.
It's about 10 minutes in, and they chat about and around it for a good 10 minutes. Unfortunately being iPhone users they haven't actually used the app (heh!), but they still went and had a look.

Thanks a million guys, much appreciated.

Get my app here.

FantasyMathHammer v0.55 - Brettonians added

FMH - now with 100% more
Brettonian flavour.

Another update, this one adds the Brettonians to the app, bringing the grand total to 10 armies out of 16.

Get it here. The market should have updated with the new version within the hour.

Be warned ye Brett players. The app doesn't yet handle lances on the charge, or 'The Grail Vow' which gives Grail Knights Immune to Psychology. It will in the next update.

I'll get there (to 16 armies that is), but gosh darn it it's a lot of work to add a new army.
Bed time now. nn o/

FantasyMathHammer v0.51 'ColdBlooded Ed.' released

Can now specify a General's higher
leadership  to use for a unit.

Now with added Lizardmen, and a slew of bugfixes.
Get it here.
There are a few big changes which I'd like to highlight:

• Lizardmen!
• Mounts now get attacks. They didn't previously, so if your Demigryph knights seemed underpowered, it's because they were. This required a bunch of work for all existing armies so that their mounts now fight properly (DE/HE/VC/Ogres/Empire).
• The ability to use a "general's" leadership, and override your units leadership. This should be useful for those skaven slave units, or other porridge units which have low leadership.
• UI Guide:
  The app now attempts to guide you through the process. Once you've selected two units, the UI will jump to the next screen to choose unit numbers. If you change the unit size and front rank size of both units, the UI will jump forward to the unit options screen.
• The back button works on all screens now! I'm sure it was amazingly annoying to everyone, that previously the back button quit the app. Sawwwry about that. It should be working hunkey dorey now.

The full change-list:
v0.50
New bits:
- Added Lizardmen
- mounts now get their attacks against enemy units
- use General's leadership
- updated to Kivy version 1.3
- made the unit picker UI text size larger, should be easier to pick units now
- back button now works
- UI guides you through process
- tree node press vibrates
- accordion press vibrates
- scaly skin armour values
- put unit numbers in fight button & result box
- update popup
  - show popup with latest updates list
  - option to never show popup on start up again, but it's accessible via menu screen

Bugfixes:
- hammerers and other units were getting shields (and a ward save) allocated to them by mistake
- stop model numbers buttons from turning off if pressed again
- Phoenix guard get their 4+ ward save now.
- fixed a bug where if the front rank equalled the max num models that could hit in that unit, then the front rank wasn't counted.
- if difference between strength and toughness was MORE than 2, it fell through the if/else check, and defaulted to a roll of 4 to wound.
- limit number of melee rounds to 12
- fixed bug where fear tests only passed if rolled less than leadership. Equal to leadership was a fail.
- impact hits bug - only the top unit got impact hits (if the unit has the impact hits ability)

Tonight's code monkey music is...

FMH : Lizardmen & more

Been working away whenever I have some spare time to put in, knocked the following off the to do list. These haven't been pushed to the market version just yet. I'll release another update once I've finished a few more items on the todo list.
Hooray for progress!

New bits:

• added Lizardmen
• mounts now get their attacks against enemy units
• leadership proxy - is general nearby? allow user to override units default ld and specify a generals ld value to use
• updated to Kivy version 1.3
• back button now works instead of quitting app
• change UI layout for unit numbers
• UI now tries to guide you through the unit choosing 
• tree node press vibrates
• accordion press vibrates
• highlight unit numbers when switch to default unit models tab (20 and 5 for front rank)
• flip both units accordions when 2 units have been chosen
• lizardmen get their scaly skin armour values
• put unit numbers in fight button 
• put unit numbers in result box
• unit log names updated to include their original number of models for easier identification if the user has chosen two units of the same name

Bugfixes:

• stop model numbers buttons from turning off if pressed again
• hammerers and other units were getting shields (and a ward save) allocated to them by mistake
• Phoenix guard get their 4+ ward save now.
• fixed a bug where if the front rank equalled the max num models that could hit in that unit, then the front rank wasn't counted.
• if difference between strength and toughness was MORE than 2, it fell through the if/else check, and defaulted to a roll of 4 to wound.
• limit number of melee rounds to 12
• fixed bug where fear tests only passed if rolled less than leadership. Equal to leadership was a fail.
• impact hits bug - only the top unit got impact hits (if the unit has the impact hits ability)

FMH: the sound of second place

Huzzah! Fantasy MathHammer has moved up two spots to second place. It's like the worlds slowest F1 race. So exciting. 

Get Fantasy MathHammer here.

Fantasy MathHammer: Orcs & Goblins are in

Version 0.35 is up on the market: http://goo.gl/TdNQs

The changelist is:
v0.35
- added Orcs & Goblins
- bugfixes:
-- unstable removed models from unit, but assumed unit passed combat res roll. It can't pass if it has no models left! Fixed.
-- fixed main screen crash when clicking on a tree node that has no elements.

Bit of a doozey there with the handling of unstable (if a unit lost all it's remaining models due to combat res and unstable, the app classed it as a draw), it earned me my first 1 star review, in it's honour I christen this version 0.35 the "Robertson" edition.

I've fixed the 'losing via unstable = a draw' thing he mentions, and the main screen crashes (if that's what he was talking about).

The problem with Google Marketplace is that I have no way to get in touch with reviewers to say: 
"Hey, I fixed all that stuff, could you review your review please?"
Or more importantly:
"Hey, I saw your review and want to fix the issues, but I have no idea what you're talking about. I need more information to debug the problem."

Fantasy MathHammer is 4th!

When I published Fantasy MathHammer(FMH) to Google Play, if you searched for 'warhammer' you'd find FMH about half way down the second page, which means it ranked in about 36th place.

If you search for 'warhammer' in google play now FMH is FOURTH!
Great success. \o/

Fantasy MathHammer: Empire updated to 8th

I've just updated and uploaded v0.30 "RTGamer Edition" to the market. It'll take a wee bit for google to push it live.
I bought the Empire 8th ed rule book this afternoon, and have had a busy last few hours. :)

The Empire now have 8th ed rules.

Do keep in mind though, that the app isn't finished, and doesn't handle _all_ the WFB rules just yet. A big one for the empire is that cavalry mounts don't get attacks yet in the app, so demigryphs might seem under powered.

Fantasy MathHammer: App Market Stats

Fantasy MathHammer has been on the market since April 25th, which makes it nearly a month.
How's it doing? Let's have a look see.

Total number of installs: 538

Total user installs by country

Total active device installs: 316 

Active installs means installs that are still on a mobile phone.

At first glance, you might think I should be disheartened.
"Oh Craig, that's not very many!" 
"Nay I say to thee!"
Why? A few reasons.

First and foremost, THERE ARE THREE HUNDRED AND SIXTEEN people using something I made, and they consider it worth keeping on their phone past the initial try. How awesome is that? Put them all in a room, and 316 is a lot of people. Pretty freaking awesome.

Second: feedback like this blows my mind (thanks Gojira) and makes it all worth while.

Third: I haven't really been advertising it, I've only posted on a few forums about it, and a few kind bloggers have posted about it, thanks!
The Grumpy Stunty
MrSaturdaysMumblings

Fourth: Development had to stop for a few weeks while I had to study/complete some exams - so no updates or armies, or posting about it on forums for the last 4 weeks. Out of 538 installs, 316 people (58%) have kept it on their phones, considering it has but 6 armies out of all the Warhammer armies, that's a good percentage.

By the by, the armies it currently has are:

• Dark Elves
• Dwarfs
• Empire (6th!? updating to 8th is now next on my list)
• High Elves
• Ogres (8th)
• Vampire Counts (8th)

What now?

Orcs and Goblins are up next, along with optional equipment for units (spears, shields etc.).

Onwards and upwards!