A Guide to COMP CON = Pilot Roster
The Pilot Roster is the primary tool that most players and GMs will use together. Here you can create pilots and manage them and their skills, talents, equipment, and associated mech frames and loadouts. You can also manage existing pilots, group them, import pilots, or delete existing pilots. Pilots can then be set to "active" to allow you an overview of the pilot during gameplay, or shared with your GM for game sessions.
GMs will use the Pilot Roster to manage the players in their game, keep data synchronized between the players and the GM, and help run the game through the Encounter Toolkit.
- Overview
- Managing Pilots
- Creating a Pilot
- The Pilot View
- Creating a Mech
The Pilot Roster is where the player is going to spend most of their time managing and creating their pilots and mechs. GMs will also want to be familiar with this section of COMP/CON so that they can assist players with any questions they may have during pilot management.
Individual pilot pages contain all relevant game information about the pilot, such as background, skills, talents, license levels, HASE stats, equipment, and so forth. It can also contain flavor text and notes input by the player about their pilot. For each pilot you can then create and customize any number of mech ideas that fit that pilot's skillset and license levels.
It is important to note that mechs are associated and managed within individual pilots. You must create a pilot first before you can assign and create mechs for that pilot!
IMPORTANT While you do not need to be logged into an account on COMP/CON to use the Pilot Roster, it is highly recommended in order to ensure your data is synchronized to COMP/CON cloud storage. If you do not sign in, all COMP/CON data is only stored locally in the browser you are using to view COMP/CON. If the browser storage is ever cleared or corrupted, you will lose all data in the Pilot Roster that is not stored in the cloud or has not been manually exported and saved. Use caution!
For GMs, the Pilot Roster is used to import the data for all of your players, and keep it synchronized with you inside of COMP/CON. The Player Roster then is later utilized in the Encounter Toolkit, which automates much of the gameplay flow for encounters, turns, actions, damage, ability cooldowns, and so forth.
By having a synchronized copy of each pilot, you are able to keep your local information up-to-date as players level up their pilots and add new custom mechs.
IMPORTANT Sharing of pilot and mech data between players and GM is most easily done if everyone is signed into an account on COMP/CON, which will allow you to generate a share code for you GM. You can also alternatively export and share the pilot data files manually, but they will not automatically synchronize when changes are made. This process will be explained later in this guide.
The Pilot Roster home page shows all created pilots by assigned groups. Clicking [v EXPAND ALL] on the upper right of the page will expand all group lists. Similarly, clicking [^ COLLAPSE ALL] will close all group lists. The layout of the pilots can be changed to a Detailed List, Large Icons, or Small Icons layout. These layouts can be toggled using the icons next to the page title.
In the Detailed List layout, you will see the image and callsign for your pilot, followed by their name, status, license level (LL), and Hull / Agility / Systems / Engineering (HASE) stats. This layout also allows you additional options via the gear icon on the right hand side. See the Individual Pilot Options section below for additional info.
In the Large Icons layout, you will see large icons for your pilots with their callsign, image, and license level (LL). Hovering your mouse over the icon will also display the pilot's name, background, status, Hull / Agility / Systems / Engineering (HASE) stats, and current talents.
In the Small Icons layout, you will see smaller icons for your pilots with just their callsign and license level (LL).
From the Pilot Roster, you can sort and organize your pilots into various groups. For individual pilots you can make print ready character sheets, clone a pilot, generate a statblock, get a share code, create an export, or delete pilots that you no longer want or need on your roster.
By default, all newly created pilots are placed in the "UNGROUPED" group.
A player can create new arbitrary groups by clicking the [ADD GROUP] button. This will open a small modal window where the new group name can be entered. You can optionally click on the dice icon to randomly generate a group name. Once satisfied with the name, click [ADD GROUP NAME] to create the group.
Pilots are assigned to groups by simply dragging and placing them in their respective groups. In the same way, pilots can be sorted within groups. This can be performed in any of the three Pilot Roster views.
Groups can be sorted by clicking and dragging on the group name into any desired sort order.
NOTE The "UNGROUPED" group will always default to being last in the list when the page is revisited, no matter where it is sorted.
Group names can always be changed by clicking on the pencil icon to the right of the group name.
Groups can be deleted by clicking on the trash can icon to the right of the group name. All pilots that are in a group when it is deleted will automatically be placed back in the default "UNGROUPED" group.
NOTE Clicking the delete icon immediately deletes the group with no warning. Please use caution to avoid accidentally deleting groups!
From the List View, you can click on the gear icon to the right side of the pilot. This will open a small drop down menu with the following options:
- Print - Formats and presents a ready-to-print character sheet for tabletop gameplay. Useful if you will be gaming where you will not have access to COMP/CON, or if you just prefer to use character sheets!
By default, the print layout will only include pilot data. You can also select whether to include mech data on the printout using the dropdown select option. Clicking on [Print] will display the print preview for that pilot and mechs if selected.
In the lower part of the screen you can [X Close Preview] to exit this view, select [Options] for arranging the layout (still experimental as of this writing), and lastly [Print] the page.
Lastly, there is a [Print Blank Character Sheets] button that will generate a blank character sheet with the same options on the preview page.
- Clone - Creates a duplicate or flash clone of the selected character. Duplicating pilots is useful when you have templates or want to generate a new pilot similar to an existing one without having to create the pilot from scratch. Flash cloning replicates the in-game "flash-cloning" process, and adds a random quirk to the pilot character sheet. See pp 83-84 of the LANCER Core Rulebook for more information on flash-cloning and quirks.
Click [Duplicate Pilot] to create a duplicate in your roster, or [Flash Clone Pilot] to create a flash clone with a random quirk.
- Generate Statblock - Creates a concise plaintext representation of the pilot and/or mech stats and abilities. This is useful for sharing a shortened version of character data with other people, especially in online forums or chat platforms like Discord.
In the statblock window, you can select an applicable mech to display stats for. On the "Generate" line, you can select Mech Build, Pilot, or Full to display the stats for either or both the selected mech and/or pilot. The checkbox will generate emoji for the PilotNET Discord in the output.
Below these options is the generated output, which you can manually copy, or click the [Copy to Clipboard] button.
- Get Share Code (only available when logged into a COMP/CON cloud account) - Generates a share code that you can send to your GM or other players, which allows them to import and sync the character into their COMP/CON account.
- Export Pilot - Allows you to download a pilot's to your computer as a
.JSONfile. You can also copy the JSON data to your clipboard to paste into another location. This data can be later imported back into COMP/CON. Useful for creating backups of your pilots, or sharing the data with others.
Clicking [Export Pilot Data File] will download a PILOT_NAME.JSON file to your computer, which you can then upload later. If this pilot has a cloud save record, it will retain the connection to the record when imported again.
Clicking [Copy Pilot Data to Clipboard] will copy the .JSON data to the clipboard to be pasted elsewhere.
- Delete Pilot - This will completely delete a pilot from your roster. A confirmation box will appear when performing this action. Click
[Confirm]to delete the selected pilot.
IMPORTANT Deleted pilots and their associated mech data are NOT recoverable! Make sure you either have a back up or export of a pilot if you do not want to lose data.
Because the process of creating a new pilot is an involved process, it has been placed in its own page at Creating a Pilot.