A new version Virtual Combat Cards has been release to fix a problem that appeared on the capture of data using Firefox 3.6. It also works with older Firefox versions.

On December 18, Virtual Combat Cards was one year old. During this year a lot has changed and the application has evolved a lot. We are really happy with all the progress and community support. Many features are under planning and we will continue to work to make Virtual Combat Cards the best free tracker out there. We would like to thank all the people that use it, those who tried, and mostly those that have posted comments and helped out testing, spreading the news and just saying good things.

We are very proud to announce Virtual Combat Cards version 1.1.0. With good creative winds on our coding sails, we managed to pull a very important release with several great improvements in the layout of the main window. Using Info Node Docking Windows the entire screen was redesigned into docking panel, that can be moved, resized, and stacked. Reorganize the screen to fit your needs and save you layout. New combatant selection logic and initiative panel reduce the amount of clicking significantly.

We are very proud to announce the release of Virtual Combat Cards Version 1.0.0! This version is the first to encompass all of the goals originally set out when we started this journey. It now allows the DM to focus on the key aspects of the game, providing invaluable information directly on his screen (namely the full combat card for each combatant).

This is the result of a lot of work and includes some wonderful new features:

• The ability to import monsters from the D&D Insider compendium website;
• The ability to use and re-use imported and user-created monsters again and again in a new Virtual Combat Cards compendium library;
• A Firefox plug-in that enables the capture of monsters from the D&D Insider compendium website;
• The stat-blocks for imported monsters are identical to the stat-blocks on the Wizards website and in the books (ie, they look great!);
• A new log and error system that will help us iron out any future bugs and issues;
• A strongly built, high quality, multi-platform design that you can rely on to help you game.

This is a quick fix to a single issue:

• #117: Moving combatant around results in deadlock.

Time for a little foreshadowing as works progress on version 1.0. A lot of nice features are on the way, to state a few:

• You can now store your monsters and assemble parties quickly (it even helps you with the XP math). This is due to a completely new file format and data structure.
• D&D Insider Capture: This combines a Firefox plugin with new VCC features that will allow you to automatically get all the relevant information and the stat block into your collection of monsters.
• New interface that shows the stat blocks. Gone are the days of having 3 source books open, or 6 tabs on your browser pointing to different monsters. You can have it all in VCC!

Here is an early screen shot of the progress so far for your delight.

Virtual Combat Cards is now an open source project. Actually the source code has been published for nearly a month now. This short update is just to report to all you VCC fans out there that you can now access the code and volunteer to help. Work progresses on a large change of the data files formats and organization. This is the core feature for version 1.0.

This version includes the following changes:

• #97: Keyboard Shortcuts: add several good short cuts that make it easier to control VCC (see Keyboard Short Cuts);
• Changing the combat sequence will automatically select the first combatant (as was true in older versions).
• Fixed spelling mistakes

I have been giving some careful consideration on what should be the open source license for Virtual Combat Cards, not only that how to share the code and progress with the development. I would like input from anyone with experience in this things. This I intend to release in a week or two, so please be quick.