Building a Google Docs Fillable Charactersheet with Calculations

By whazlewo, in Star Wars: Edge of the Empire RPG

Has anyone looked into making a google docs based character sheet that works like the form fillable PDFs? I was going to start seeing if it is possible to get dice pool icons and all that working, but just wanted to check before I get started.

This makes me think it might be possible:

https://developers.google.com/apps-script/guides/docs

I generally don't care for calculating character sheets. Like a piece of paper, I prefer to have more control over what I write. For example, my Force sensitive mechanic has talents that give her boosts to Perception and Vigilance checks. But I might also have gear that adds to this, and I prefer to have those listed in my pool.

But what if those boosts are only conditional and don't appear all the time? This means the calculation needs to do a lot of extra work, which is ultimately probably going to be wrong. I have this form letter at work that I can use to put together proposal documents for clients. But the info isn't always up to date and I have no way to override it, meaning that the calculations and autofilling it does are sometimes wrong. Instead of quickly tossing together a nice looking proposal for a client, I have to spend 20 minutes explaining additional corrections and annotations explaining what calculations and autofills are off. For me, character sheets that do calculations for me are just like this.

Further, I once played with a player who was using a calculating character sheet, and he had no idea how to build a dice pool. Like, literally no idea. A complete deer in headlights that brought the game to a dead stop while we had to, a dozen sessions into play, stop the game and explain the rules like it was day one. Here, the character sheet became a crutch the prevented the player from learning how to play the game. I played in a WEG demo that made heavy use of macros and other calculations that hide a lot of the rules from us. Again, this made it easy to play, but meant that we really didn't actually learn how to play.

Now, everyone has different play styles, and there are those that might like a calculating character sheet. I just caution that the reduced audience may not make it worth the effort to make one that works without flaw, and to actively update it as things change and new products are released.