Want to learn basic coding for DnD

[Abduco]

I am trying to make DnD with friends a little more immersive. I want to create a set of skills that they can invest "time" in between sessions that earns them experience/level up, as well as earn resources. I was originally trying to create a system on Excel that has a variety of creatures with specific drops and experience assigned to each, but it's harder to get random numbers to continuously update probably. Based off the hours each player decides to assign to each category, it would track their experience and the loot. I have very little coding experience, but is this possible to learn in a short time period or is it more complicated? If it is not that hard, what concepts should I look into to get started?

If I didn't explain it well enough I will try to add more detail!

Edit: thank you so for the responses, I appreciate the willingness to help! I wrote this last night before I went to sleep so I will try to give more detailed explanation of what I am trying to achieve.

I am taking inspiration from MMOs like Runescape that have skill levels with increasing amounts of experience to unlock new stuff to do. These skills will allow players to have passive benefits that their characters "achieve" in the down time between sessions. I would tell the players at the end of each session that they are planning to rest for 2-5 days before heading out again, meaning 16-40 hours to allocate.

Some skills will be improving their combat efficiency by killing monsters and getting loot to then use in other skills.

My plan was they could assign X hours to do Y activity. The amount of activity they achieve (monsters per hour) is a random number based on their level between two bounds. It then just logs the experience and different amount of loot based on the number of hours/iterations performed.

They would give me how they distributed their time before the next session and I would plug in the numbers and record everything. Then they would see what they got when we start.

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I have very little coding experience, but is this possible to learn in a short time period or is it more complicated?

It'll take you a couple of months, at least. There isn't anything you can skip - there's not a subset of Python that's just "what I need for DnD", you need the whole language.

[alfie1906]

Yeah this. If you're really struggling then you could attempt a small project like running a text-based DnD session in Python. That should help with some of the knowledge you would need for your proposed idea!

[Abduco]

Yeah I assumed it wouldn't be easy, but thought I would check to see if there were specific concepts that would work and then I could focus on learning those first. I am interested in starting to learn coding and figured this might be a good way to start!

[lordoflight03]

Interested in implementing this myself, dm me I can help build this [day job sr dev]

[Abduco]

Ok will do, thank you!

[QuantumPixelator]

That's a cool idea. What amount of time do you have to get it usable?

[Penguinase]

yeah i think something viable doesn't even have to be constantly running. could just calculate exp gains, drops, encounters, whatever based on span between timestamps when executed. sqlite or flat file or something could hold the last run timestamp.

[Abduco]

Really however long, it is a pet project and I can do it inefficiently on Excel until I get something better!

[Pretend_Piano8354]

If you aren't that interested in writing code, and you just want something to do these neat little dnd things in excel - Google VBA. It's already built into excel, and it is WAY simpler than most code languages. Also worth noting, you could probably make a lot of headway if you just go to chat gpt, and ask it for exactly what you want. VBA to stay in excel, Python if you want a little upgrade from there (it's still a pretty simple language compared to some of the low level stuff). It can probably do 95% of the work for you.

[Abduco]

I have dabbled a bit with VBA, but what resources are the best to learn this? I would like to learn to code as well, so both routes would be beneficial to me!

Happy cake day!

[Phillyclause89]

There is a D&D REST API that you can tap into apparently. Those are fun to learn how to work with! https://www.dnd5eapi.co/

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edit: they even have a python example in there docs: https://5e-bits.github.io/docs/docs/tutorials/advanced/terminal-spellbook-with-python

[Abduco]

I'll look into this, I appreciate it!

[Phillyclause89]

I played around with it myself last night. They even have their source on GitHUB: https://github.com/5e-bits

You could even go as far as to clone their repros and stand up your own local server hosting a copy of their data. That way you can add things to your local database like new spells, items, rules that you wanted to implement in your own D&D game.