Hi Ian, Concerning the "chance of success" as a percentage seems to make sense. That is to say, if you are talking about a 1 thru 100 percent range which would be natural and intuitive enough. So if you put, let's say 40 in that flag, then it would equal 40 percent chance of success, do I have that right? You had me at the first three types. Solid numbers we already use. The range, even the 5r10 makes sense. The 2d6 makes sense to anyone who ever played an rpg with real dice. The percentage thing kind of confused me. I guess I never thought in that partiuclar way when involved with rpg like games. I mean, it would be neat to hit a button and hear the percentage of your shields, for example "Shields are down to 31%" and the like, but actually useing it to determine damage and hits and stuff I am not sure how that would work. I guess, if I had to take a guess, that the percentage would always affect the the roll or number it is modifying. So if a health_inlfict_mod=5% it would affect the health inflict of that unit. If damage type is involved, why not leave it as it is, with one as default, and the others listed individualy, or the "all" you mentioned if there is a whole bunch. I think the R is as good as anything else to put between two numbers for randomization, and it does kind of make sense considering the old standard of useing d for dice. Could a skill add or subtract from a chance of success? That would fit that percentage nicely. So if you had a forty percent chance of success to hit a weezil, your special weezil hitting sword could have a bonus of 5% so it would make it forty five percent? Or apply negative numbers? al "The truth will set you free" Jesus Christ of Nazareth 33A.D. ----- Original Message ----- From: Ian Reed To: ian-reeds-games@xxxxxxxxxxxxx Sent: Saturday, January 12, 2013 12:55 AM Subject: [ian-reeds-games] Some thoughts on randomized numbers Hey all, I wanted to throw out a few quick thoughts I have on randomized numbers. First, a chance_of_success= flag seems like it should only take a percentage. Does anyone agree or disagree? I think the cost flags should remain solid numbers. Solid meaining unrandomized. Now for inflict, restore and protect. All of these will work basically the same way they have in the past except there will be 4 different ways of supplying numbers. 1 A solid number like health_inflict=10 2 A range like health_inflict=5-10 3 A dice roll like health_inflict=2d6 The 2 is the number of dice and the 6 is how many siders are on each die. 4 A percentage like health_inflict=30% On inflict and restore this will inflict or restore that percentage of the target's total health points. On protect it will reduce the amount of damage taken by that damage type by that percent. I think that modifier flags such as health_inflict_mod= will also support these 4 types of numbers. There is a question about what the percentage number on a modifier such as health_inflict_mod=5% means. Does it mean that the original inflict amount deals 5% more damage? If so how does that work with damage types since even a health_inflict_mod= flag always requires a damage type. I guess it could just adjust that damage types damage by the 5%. This could be further helped by me adding a keyword of all that can be used in place of a damage type to specify you want it applied to all damage types. Such as health_inflict=5%|all versus health_inflict=5%|magic Or does it mean that the initial damage is dealt and then we add 5% of the target's health to the damage? I'm leaning towards the first option. Cost modifier flags will remain solid numbers. What do you guys think of this idea so far? Also, I have a small issue that for ranges it seems natural to use a dash to indicate a range, but that would make it confusing to supply negative numbers. One would think I could use something like a comma or pipe to separate them but then certain flags are already using those such as inflict that let's you specify multiple numbers and specify damage types for each. So that leaves me with something like using the letter r in the middle. Such as health_inflict=5r10 R makes a bit of sense for range as we are using D for dice. Any thoughts? Ian Reed