Finding the right mix of a building's programming usually means changing an input, waiting for the estimate to recalculate, changing another, and trying to hold the last few answers in your head. The "Scenario Chart" does that for you: it costs hundreds of combinations of your programming inputs at once and draws them all on one chart, so the trade-off between them is something you can look at rather than remember.
Each input you put on the chart becomes a vertical axis, and each scenario is a line running across all of them. The line's colour tells you what it costs. Nothing on the chart changes your estimate until you choose a scenario and apply it.
To use the "Scenario Chart" follow these steps.
Open an estimate and go to "Budget & Inputs". In the top right corner of the "Inputs" panel, press the chart icon in the group of buttons there. Hovering over it shows "Scenario Chart".
The chart opens as a sheet across almost the full height of the estimate. It starts empty, with "No inputs on the chart yet", because the chart has no meaning until at least one input is on it. Press "Escape" to close it again at any point.
Press "Axes" at the top left of the sheet and tick the inputs you want to chart. The panel is headed "Chart Axes" and counts how many are on, as in "3 of 15 on the chart"; use "Search inputs..." if the list is long. The number beside each input — "now 120 EA" — is what your estimate reads today.
Every ticked input gets a "Min", a "Max" and a "Step", which are how far that axis runs and how far apart the values on it are. They start from the input's own range where it has one, and 20% either side of its current value where it does not. Change any of them by typing in the box. A "Step" left blank uses the greyed-out number shown in it. These three belong to the chart only — they do not change the input's own settings on the estimate.
An input driven by a formula is marked with a green function icon and has no range boxes. It is still drawn as an axis, but the chart does not vary it: it follows the inputs that are being varied, the same way it does in the estimate.
Close the panel and the chart draws. The axes run left to right in the order they appear in the "Inputs" panel, each line is one scenario, and the column on the right is what that scenario costs. Lines run from blue at the cheapest end to red at the dearest, and the cheapest one drawn is picked out in green. The right hand column also gives you the "Max", "Average", "Median" and "Min" of everything on the chart, and the "Spread" between the cheapest and the dearest.
Choose what the chart is measuring with the control after "measured by" in the toolbar. It starts on "Total Cost", and you can change it to a cost per any design field — cost per bed, cost per square foot — so you can chase the cheapest building or the cheapest rate. The control after "drawing" sets how many scenarios are drawn, from 5 to 500, and starts at 250. Below that number the chart draws every combination of your axes; above it, a spread across their ranges.
Narrow the chart by dragging down from the top of an axis, or up from the bottom. Only the lines passing through that band stay drawn, and brushes on several axes compose — pinning the inputs you are sure about narrows what is still possible for the rest. Click an axis without dragging to clear its brush. You can also drag the handles at the very top and bottom of the chart to cut the dearest or cheapest scenarios out. The figures in the right hand column re-measure over whatever is left; the scenarios themselves are not recalculated.
Hover a line to read it. The panel that opens gives the cost at the top and then each axis in turn, showing the estimate's current value, an arrow, and the value in this scenario. A value the chart worked out from a formula is marked "from formula". The panel stays put while you move towards it, so you can reach the two buttons at the bottom.
To make a scenario real, press "Apply to Estimate". The window that opens says how many inputs will be set, what the estimate costs now against what it will cost, and every input that changes. Inputs driven by a formula are listed separately — they move on their own once the rest are applied, and their formulas stay on. Press "Apply to Estimate" again to confirm. This cannot be undone.
To put scenarios in a report instead, press "Add to Report" on each line you want to keep. The button then reads "In Report", and the toolbar button in the top right counts what you have kept, as in "Export 1 Scenario to Report". Press it. If the estimate has more than one report you are asked which, with "New Report" as an option. The report opens on your new "Scenario Chart" block, with the axes and the scenarios listed under "Block Settings", where you can change the values or press "Add Scenario" to add another by hand.
To have an input on the chart from the start on every new estimate, set it on the template. Go to the template's programming items, open an item with "Edit Input Item", and tick "Include In Scenario Chart". As the description under it says, this only offers the input as an axis — it does not change how the input is used in the estimate.
Please note that nothing you do on the chart touches your estimate until you press "Apply to Estimate" and confirm it. Brushing, trimming, changing an axis range and changing what the chart measures only change what is drawn.
Please also note that a report block stores the input values of the scenarios you added rather than their costs, so a printed chart shows what those mixes cost at the time the report is generated rather than what they cost the day you exported them. A block holds up to 25 scenarios; if you have kept more than that, the export asks you to narrow the chart down first.