There's no way to filter "you absolutely shouldn't have this" and "this is uncommon so there should be a reason to have this." Thus, the filter only helps if you are making choice limited to common, and can cause you to search fruitlessly for legitimate options the rules do support. It also hides all uncommon things, inherently using the rarity aspect. For example, there is an option to hide "unavailable" features, which should hide feats or spells your character doesn't qualify for. Worse, if a character has a lot of options, such as if they have a large spell-book, the number of options available seem to cause some non-linear increase in the time you must wait for it to load. If you want to browse through spells and pick them, get ready to spend even more time waiting for the spell's text to populate the window. So that will be 15 minutes for your level 1 wizard if you already know what you want. To put some empiric numbers on that, today at 1 PM CST, adding a spell to a spellbook requires 5 clicks and 1 minute, 2 seconds, almost all the time spent waiting on the server. For every time you want to delete a used consumable (Sarenrae help the Alchemists). For every little item you are picking up in your gear. For every spell you're adding to the spellbook. That's for every skill you are clicking to pick as trained. It's gotten better it's now about 10-15 seconds of wait time per click. They assured me in an email that they have the problem under control, but the roll-out was still plagued with having the product hang for minutes at a time because it couldn't get a reply from Lone Wolf's server. When it rolled out, the server-side connections were abysmally slow. This has several implications, such as you can no longer work when not connected, you can no longer save a creation and send it to someone else to review or edit, you can no longer customize how character sheets print and look, you can no longer take your character and use them in HeroLab without a connection, and you can no easily make custom content.
Your ability to download your creations is limited to downloading PDFs of the characters you've created. This means it must always contact the Lone Wolf servers to do anything. The program is now browser-based and always requires a connection. If you want the product after that, they want you to pay again. This gives you access to the content for 6 months. If you want just the Core Rulebook in Pathfinder, it will cost you $35 USD.
Let me be clear you pay to temporarily license content. With a diminished, but still favorable, view of Hero Lab, I tried HLO. It certainly was a negative when I was considering purchasing it, but it wasn't enough to make me turn back. I hope that knowledge alone turns people off. Yes, this means you will pay and pay again for content that you already paid for. They are following the monetization model of a live service.
Within hours of checking out HeroLab Online, all positive feelings were lost.įirst, the new model is a recurring subscription. I state that in the preface because I want to say I went into HeroLab online with a generally positive opinion of Lone Wolf. And when you bought the product, you *purchased* it with your license, and didn't have a recurrent cost. I did it gladly, because HeroLab Classic was a slightly confusing, absolutely useful tool that could do just about anything you needed.
(The review is in my profile, but the HeroLab Classic product page is memory-holed.) Thirty dollars bought you Core 1e, and you would spend a lot more for the PF1e full experience. As a matter of fact, when it was on, I did, giving it four stars but quickly noting the pricing was deceptive. I would have been quick to recommend HeroLab Classic for PF1e. Perhaps someday this product shall worth purchasing, but I will tell you what has happened since I picked it up on August 1st, 2019. My goal in writing is to alert you before your money leaves your wallet, so you can make an informed choice. I can't call it a review because the thing doesn't work yet. Gentlepersons, I submit for you a "first impressions" and "user experience" for HeroLab Online.