• Game Tree

• Tinker with a few premade nodes before trying to make some of your own.

Location:

The game tree is located in the top left of the User Interface as you run the software.

The Basics:

The game tree is your source of storage and information. Think of it as a data organizer. In it you will find housed everything you need to create character sheets, save maps, prepare adventures, or even create aliases. Each game tree is built by the user to fit what he or she needs to game. Over time the tree will shrink or grow as the player needs.

In order to accommodate the user there are several types of nodes and containers for the tree. Each is designed to do something different or unique that the player may need in order to enjoy his or her online gaming. These are all listed below:

• Nodes	Containers	Tools
  Text Box	Folder	Chat Macro
  List Box	Tabber	Alias Library
  Grid	Splitter	Miniature Library
  Web Link	Form
  Web Image

By combining nodes and tools under a container you have what several people call a character sheet or a production node. When you utilize precreated nodes, generally double clicking the node will open it up for you to enter the information. In some cases, you have to manually open certain parts of the nodes by yourself.

Once you enter your information in the node it is "saved" and you may close and open the node as you wish. However, it is important to note that this information is saved locally and you should save the node and/or tree regularly to avoid a loss of information. By default, once you exit the program your tree is saved to a standard file.

• As always we suggest that you save your individual nodes as well as the entire tree regularly to avoid data loss and corruption.

Nodes can be moved by clicking the node you want to move, and while holding down the mouse button, moving it to it's new location. Nodes can also be moved into containers using this technique.

To delete a node highlight the node and press the delete key on your keyboard. You may also use the game tree menu option 'Delete'.

Nodes, containers, and tools can be created by using the OpenRPG Help Node under templates. Simply double click the type of tree function you wish to create and the software will do the rest.

Advancing Beyond the Basics:

There is not much more to the game tree at this point then to discuss the containers, tools, and nodes themselves. However, I have moved that under 'Masterable Techniques' as they really need a full explaination unto themselves.

Right clicking on a node will bring up a menu with the following items:

• Item	Description
  Use	Open node or force action as double click
  Design Editor	menu to change the finer points of node
  Pretty Print	Open node in a pane easier to read
  Send to Player	Send target node to player(s)
  Send to Map	Send target node to map
  Send to Chat	Send target node to chat
  Whisper to Player	Send target node as whisper to player(s)
  Change Icon	Change picture icon for node
  Delete	Remove node from game tree
  Clone	Create exact copy of node at top of game tree
  Node Usefullness	Set usefulness (deters accidental deletion)
  Save Node	Save target node to specific file
  Export as HTML	Save target node as HTML to specific file
  About	Copyright information of target node design (not content)

As you learn more about node design and implementation, you will discover that certain features can only be accessed with the design function. As always there are some built in shortcuts, but for better understanding, you should learn to do things the long way before taking the ease of the shortcut. For all the cases given in the chart above and this paragraph, nodes include containers and tools as well.

A second menu exists for the entire tree itself. This is accessed by right clicking on the top most node in the tree labeled 'Game Tree'. This menu includes the following:

• Insert File	Insert a XML node into the tree from your local hard drive
  Insert URL	Insert a XML node into the tree from a URL location
  Insert Features Node	Insert the OpenRPG Help Node into your tree
  Load New Tree	Open a tree from a local hard drive file
  Save Tree	Save current tree to the standard file name
  Save Tree As	Save current tree to a file name you choose
  Tree Properties	Set game tree properties

Game tree properties include local standard file name, save on exit toggle, and assigned action to a double click. It is suggested that you do not change these properties unless you are very familiar with OpenRPG, so that technical support can be as effective as possible.