I was thinking of waking up Yggdrasil again. I still don't have my original notes, so I'll work from what I remember. Maybe it's a good thing. After all I'd like to distil what I had and make something better.

If you want a quick but incomplete overview you can look at the quickstart rules.

Anyway, quick take is that Yggdrasil is a fantasy rpg. A few new things thrown in but the main thought is to leave a lot of the setting for the GM to write. The setting puts the characters as heroes battling monsters and things in a continent torn by war for over a hundred years. Check the Ygg page for a longer story.

Now as far as I can tell, I definitely want the old-fashioned "going from nobodies to heroes", which is kinda' built into the monster-hunting premise. I was long in the dark about my own inspirations, but I think it's a bit clearer to me now.

Basically it's about emulating comics. Not movies, not books, not video games... comics.

So what's the difference? In this case it might illuminating to explain what I'm thinking about.

Comics consists of stills, nice scenes spread out to evoke the atmosphere of the story being told. Anyone reading my other posts about "making good scenes" and being able to have adventures like those represented on rpg covers might have an
"Ah! That's where he's coming from!" feeling here :)

Unlike movies, action scenes are rarely very long [in comic books]. In the movies you can have a car chase going on for a long time just for the "entertainment value" of the car chase itself. Who would like to read a comic with 20 pages of a single car chase? To give an extreme example. Fights should be filled with colour and things happening, if I want to go the comics route. The eventless AD&D style combat or overly detailed Phoenix Command are extreme examples on things what would work horribly bad in a comic.

Comparing with books on the other hand - here you usually get a lot of room to fill out the events with your own imagination. It's something that adds to the plot, not more. In contrast, action scenes in comics are actually a way to define the character's uniqueness, something which just don't happen in books.

Over to something else: Movies usually have something like 2 hours to tell a whole story. Most comics (the ones I think about as inspiration for my game anyway) on the other hand are more like soaps.

The whole thing with experienced characters and younger characters is usually heavily emphasised in movies due to the much shorter span of the story with this imbalance helping to keep up the pace.
In the typical comic superhero group there is very little room for a character significantly more powerful than the others unless it's the mentor of the group as Prof X in X-men (interestingly, a lot of times most stories was either about Xavier being neutralized in some way or they had him removed completely from the storyline).

A powerful device in comics I want to mention before I go on is the retcon (short for retroactive continuity). A classical retcon is to revive a long dead villain saying he never really died when he fell into that vulcano, but only got stronger after being cocooned inside of it for 10 years. A more subtle retcon is to introduce a freshly created character and write in that this character has some common history with an already established character.

Basically the writers originally thought that A happened, but it's rewritten to be B, where B doesn't actually contradict what's earlier been established.


What does this mean for Yggdrasil?

Fighting scenes are should be colourful but short and also help characterizing characters. Another thing comic emulation infers is about "who wins" a fight. This is fairly clear from the outset. The characters have together a certain level of power (or what we want to call it). They won't be able to beat someone more powerful, nor get beaten by someone less powerful unless there's a legitimate plot device that allows this rule to be broken.

For example: Logan would have no problem beating Cameron Hodge one on one, but his healing factor has been removed (the plot device) so it's far from a sure thing.


In any case there is no room in comics for that lucky 00, 97, 98 arrow hit from the level 1 character that kills the Balrog on the spot.

Retcon and Illusionism are related in my book. Not necessarily, but they are similar beasts. Retcon obviously changes facts but can get away with looking like it was there all the time. Illusionism can use such techniques but is wider than retcon, spanning many many different techniques.
In any case, I want to keep this suspension of disbelief. The players can think that fighting scenes and other things are played out as they happen and never expect that there is something beneath that make stories play out like in the comics.

Now how to actually make sure the players can't lose to someone weaker than themselves while keeping the system looking like a traditional one? Well that's the tricky part... More about that later.

People have mentioned that I'm posting too long stuff so maybe this is a good place to break off. I'll discuss my plans on how to implement the things above later as well as bringing up things I'm stumped on.

I hope this posting provides at least a little insight in what I have in mind for Ygg.

/Christoffer

Sounds cool, Christoffer. I'm looking forward to seeing how you implement the comics-style scene/task resolution in Yggdrasil. I'm hoping the mechanics support giving a comic-style feeling to the action and the end results (which are often the same thing in many comics); that is, I hope each die roll results in the action being imagined as a single panel in a comic book. "BAM" "POW" and all that.

Hmm.. I actually didn't think about framing the system firmly in scenes which happen at the same time, but it's an insteresting thought.

The important thing is that the players don't feel locked into a comic-emulating game, but at the same time letting them be delighted burst out: "cool, this is like it could be a scene in a comic book or something!"

Something else I wanted to elaborate on while I'm at it:

Cannon-fodder. Have you been in one of those games where you're making a beginner character and the other players say (although a little less overt) "ok, so he can't fight but we want you to be in this fight anyway to absorb a few hits while the big hitters bang at the monster"?

Basically in AD&D you can do the equation (Total HP of Party x Average Total Damage Per Round Given By Party)=Actual Killing Potential Of Party. This is the reason for henchmen and the likes.

Now look at comics. Do we have henchmen? Yes, for the villains, but their use is only to protagonize the heroes. Do the heroes have henchmen? Do Batman sit back while his servants smack the bad guys? Not really.

What does that mean in terms of a roleplaying game? It means in such a game it shouldn't matter much if I have 20 level 1 henchmen with me or if I go at it alone when I'm facing the big bad boss. The big bad boss is what one could term as "immune" to the henchmen. They can distract him (and this is their common use for villains, distract the heroes so that the villain can finish his plans, or get away, or dastardly attack from behind) but that's all. They don't actually make a difference, unlike in AD&D where every HP counts.
This happens to be why area attacks are relatively uncommon and considered very powerful in most RPGs. Something that can take out the cannon-fodder quickly radically reduces the chances of having enough time to wear down the villain.

Obviously I can't allow Yggdrasil to work like that.

If you wanted to have the Heros with Henchmen. You could specify that their only use is to neutralize an Opponent's Henchmen, thus allowing you to cut directly to the Hero on Villain conflict, with the 'distractions' relegated to the background, and resolved as part of the primary conflict.

So, an elaboration of Bob's idea, as I interpret it:

Goons of whatever type aren't characters in their own right; they're a quality of the character that owns them. It happens that goons are basically only useful in two ways: to neutralize other goons, or as sacrificial shock troops. Either usage will put the goons (temporarily) out of commission immediately after their goal has been accomplished.

But the more interesting concern (to me) is that of emphasizing the uniqueness of characters through action scenes. Chris, can you elaborate on how you plan to do this?

Edited to correct typo.

Actually another thing of having "henchmen" besides the "if I have 9 of them there's only a 10% chance I'll get shot at" is the individual importance of each of them. Will yours act as individuals or as an extension of the player? I mean the difference is clear... one thing is "my guy's start wildly shooting arrows so they can cover me while I move closer to the enemy". Another thing entirely is "Bruno holds the wizard down while Vinnie throws a net on his familiar... the rest try to help me fight the demon that the wizard summoned". Do any henchemen have a special skill? If not do they know they are cannon fodder?

In other words if 10 guy's help me out while I fight some bandits... will they count as a 10 die creature or as 10 +'s and -'s that I can distribute?

I mean the tragedy of the comic book goon is that they have no strategic purpose other than strenght in numbers... but maybe the heroes goons are above that. And I firmly believe a hero should have helpers every once in a while.

Edit: In my minds eye I see guy's throwing spears with ropes at a dragon trying to inmovilize it so mr. Hero can use his enchanted sword on it. Nobility should somehow rub off on heroes goons... the idea of them all being hired to die really turns you into a villain... twice as true in D&D where they die so you can kill and pillage more efficiently.

Before the henchman debate goes out of hand.. Note that Bob said "If you wanted to have heroes with henchmen...". This, I hope I stated clearly, is something I don't want. :)

Shreyas, you bring up a very interesting question: Can I really make combat emphasize the the uniqueness of the characters?

Going to comics and manga, what can one see? Well every character has a significantly different fighting styles (or abilites, or superpowers... whatever) and such, but style and actions are mostly a matter of color rather than actual efficiency (except for when a power is used as a plot devicel).

What I'm suggesting is very simple: Have rules that encourage colour and differentiation in looks and expression of powers but keep them all equally efficient.

To see the opposite, look at 2nd ed AD&D where having a weapon that fit your character's image rather than maxing out damage punishes the player. Doing unconventional moves like trying to knock out the foe etc gives penalties to hit etc etc.

Even games with very detailed fighting rules tend to have penalties for more advanced and interesting looking actions. Complicated or impressive actions usually entail a lot of punishment in terms of efficiency.

I think I've reached the understanding that colour should not only be a thing awarded at very high levels or if you make a lucky enough roll, instead it should be there from the beginning. You tell the story of what your character does, you have the right to make him/her look as cool or as fumbly as you want. You want cool fighting style? You have it!
You want him to fight with a weapon in each hand? Or you have this idea of a weird looking special weapon you saw in movie? You can have it! And you don't have to sacrifice anything for it.

By de-coupling efficiency from colour you can let players do what they want and you still don't need to worry that they unbalance things.

Ideally anyway. This is what I'm working towards. Look at the old quickstart rules for something working towards that goal.

In a sense it is not unlike the ideas in Torchbearer where combat is resolved very abstractly. In Ygg I think of having a round for round combat roll in a very traditional vein. However, the roll is free to be interpreted very concretely or very abstractly. You can treat it as: "you hit and do damage" or "you succeeded with your attack, now describe how it looked". -Which is very important for me as I try to dress it up as a conventional system.

Hope that clears up some questions.

Shout if you disagree, but I think that another important thing in comics is the concept of teamwork. In comics, a team is more valuable than it's parts.

Villains often fail because of their lack of teamwork. Heck the reasons many villains have henchmen is because they're too mean to have any friends to team up with. :)

This was something I highlighted in the recently resurrected thread "Bob made a Goblin". Rules must not only make cooperation easy but also useful.

But doesn't this clash with what I said about hero henchmen and the like? Let me explain why it doesn't:

I think this is best illustrated with an imaginary system where characters are rated with "power ratings". Let's say for this example that a person's power rating is the sum of his fighting abilities and powers. And as soon as a person's power rating is above that of another he/she will definately defeat it. (Same would be 50-50 chance)

Let's put the common comic-book setup as the villain is at power 8 with power-1 goons fighting power-7 heroes.

Let's say 3 power-1 characters equal 1 power-2 character.

So for the villain to have any boost from his henchmen he has to have at least 4000 power-1 henchmen to help him. He himself is about as powerful as 2000 of his own henchmen.

On the other hand, 3 power-7 heroes equals 1 power-8 hero, so a team of a gang of approximately equally skilled heroes quickly increase their combined ability.

Of course if the team decides to fight without teamwork they count as single power-7 characters and as such they are easily vanquished by the villain's power of 8. It's only when they cooperate that they can increase their ability.

Rules with practical results in line with the above would explain why villains don't get more powerful just because they have henchmen, but why heroes teaming up is a good idea while hero henchmen isn't.

Or am I forcing things?

Going a little further on the subject of teamwork and such. People might remember me having rules for it even in an early test-play. I want to try to make it a whole lot more straight forward as well as covering more situations, but first I think I need to establish some ground on how it should look like, and I hope I can get some feedback here.

I want to emulate comics, so keeping that in mind I can think of three different types of teamwork.

First the one where two or more equally skilled fighters together attack a single opponent. This could be something as simple as "I hit high, you go low". Basically cooperating taking someone down. I consider this the most simple situation to handle.

The second one is when two or more person with differing skills together attack an opponent. We have the example as in Bob made a Goblin where actually play had Bob's character throwing clothes at some Ratlings to distract them as his fighter friend finished them off.

The third one is one of combining powers. It might be Ghostbusters combining their beams into one to defeat Gozer the Gozerian or Colossus and Wolverine doing a "Fastball special" in X-men. Basically they have a new power or ability as a team.

What I want to know is if there is something I have left out. Have I covered all bases? Is there some situation in comics I've overlooked here?

(edited for a more polite tone. I agree with you Fang - it sounded very bad and it wasn't meant that way at all)

And while I'm at it I just wanted to say that, Lugaru, you're comments on that Goblin thread was very nice, and I'll pick up a little of that once I have established this thing about what the rules regarding cooperation (ideally) should be able to cover.

Maybe then I can create rules in which such specialized actions as you describe, flows naturally from the actions allowed without need for explicit "skill picks" and the like. I agree very much with your statement about "the need for interaction".

Pale Fire wrote: ...Two or more equally skilled fighters together attack a single opponent.

...Two or more person with differing skills together attack an opponent.

...One of combining powers

What I want to know is if there is something I have left out. I guess you're still tired of Ygg posts, but I hope someone could at least let me know if they think I've covered all bases. Is there some situation in comics I've overlooked here?

Yes (smacks my forehead for forgetting about it), you're right although it could be argued that this would fall into the first category about several fighters with similar skill. However it's good that you bring it up. I've been thinking about this as well.

Aside from the obvious that they should be able to work together, it would be neat (I think) if it's possible to treat them as a single entity as far as the combat system is concerned. I'd like to do that without getting introducing any special "mook rules".

[Maybe I should clarify that stance... I don't like to have different rules for characters singled out to be mooks, I'd like the system appear to work the same for both sides. I think Grant has a nice idea with that sliding scale for the new Slayer of Dragons with it's "Star Power" where mooks simply start with 0 and heroes and important villains have numbers higher than that. Although mooks and unimportant NPCs are easily identified, they aren't treated as exceptions by the system.]

But there's another example you bring to the discussion Fang, and that is the one of heroes taking out mooks easily.

I believe this too is an important comic book convention. If they're just unimportant characters, a hero can easily overcome a bunch in a single attack. And consider the scene with the big villain who assaulted by the hero team defeat them all with an bored gesture of his hand. This is not strictly about teaming but it's important to make it possible to fight against teams as well as the other way around.

Pale Fire wrote:
But there's another example you bring to the discussion Fang, and that is the one of heroes taking out mooks easily.

I believe this too is an important comic book convention. If they're just unimportant characters, a hero can easily overcome a bunch in a single attack. And consider the scene with the big villain who assaulted by the hero team defeat them all with an bored gesture of his hand. This is not strictly about teaming but it's important to make it possible to fight against teams as well as the other way around.

I think I see what you're hinting at John. What I want to see is some kind of "two-way conversion" being possible. I both want to be able to do the "mook -> named character" and "named character -> mook" conversions.

I've talked about something like this before when I was discussing how to make things work "effect first". In those cases I was mainly discussing how to first decide on an effect ("a ghostly hand comes out of the lake trying to pull you out of the boat") and then maybe later working from established effects have easy rules what the stats could be. In this case creating mooks or creating powers should be treated on equal footing.

The reverse is also very useful, for example quickly being able to calculate a difficulty or efficiency when casting a spell against multiple opponents (usually mooks) by treating a group as a single entity.

However, I'm unwilling to treat mooks with special rules. I'd like them to look like characters, or at least being smoothly (on the fly) have the possibility to be turned into conventional characters without their properties changing in the process. For example the "ghost hand" (not a mook but what the heck) should have the same behaviour and strength if the actions are simply narrated as when the ghost hand is given full stats and has success/failure run through the system. Look at old RM for an extreme example of the opposite: as soon as you have to roll for something, you chances of failure go up dramatically. If you'd have to roll for breathing in RM you'd have a good chance of randomly suffocating to death in your early years no matter how high your skill bonus would. In this case narrated, "common sense" rulings is in sharp contrasts to in-system decisions. I don't want any such disparity between system and possible narration.

[I guess this means that the system needs to be loose enough to allow such conversions. You couldn't do it with any system where the system models the details of the events. Incidentally I'd like to mention I believe Andrew Martin has made a lot of progress in this field with some of his games.]

The reason I'm reluctant to have separate mook rules is that feel that moving from mook->character would be a discontinous transition which would, within the constraints of my game, challange the suspension of disbelief.

Hi Christoffer,

Is there any chance at all that the name "Yggdrasil" can be flushed away, forever, and a new name chosen?

This is my inner child post of the day, I think.

Best,
Ron

Is this a subtle way of saying that perhaps you are not totally and fully in love with the name? :)

Actually I've been thinking of maybe changing it since people have been complaining (not that I think it's THAT bad).

But the situation as it stands is that I still don't have my old documents. So I can't make new pdf's nor do any major updates to the website and so on... Basically I'd have to keep explaining to people about a name-change I'm not sure would be permanent anyway (it would just be another label for the project) and I would still have it refered to as Yggdrasil in many places. So... I don't feel a name change would be very practical.

It's really that bad?

Consider a name change. But then only change it when you publish the next major revision. That way people will be able to do searches by the name of the version.

Mike

Are you using the same setting for your original idea, or are you shifting over to a "supers" type setting?

the reason I ask is because I was under the impression that this was a fantasy setting, but most of your examples are from superhero books. Fantasy in comics works a bit differently form superheroes in comics; compare ElfQuest to JLA and you'll see what I mean.

I'm not against it either way, really, but it seems to me that the setting and the system as you describe it seem to clash.

Jay

It's still fantasy, no change.

The reason for using superheroes in examples is that those examples are a lot more accessible to people than comic book fantasy. Especially since I draw a lot of inspiration from japanese, korean and chinese fantasy manga which just isn't available in the US or Europe. I could refer to them but it wouldn't help much because most people wouldn't have read them.

So it's just a matter of convenience. You're right that they're not the same, but they are similar enough IMHO.

Oh, and Elf Quest is a really bad example of what I'm thinking about when I'm saying comic book style fantasy. It's much better to think about a superhero comic with it's conventions. It's a lot closer to what I envision.

Like how BESM handles fantasy?

Mike

Mike, I don't have BESM so I can't tell. I've only read the BESM quickstart.

I also have to profess being a little unclear as to what you mean by "handling fantasy". If you wonder if it's anime-style fantasy, then I can say I'm definately inspired by it, but within anime and manga fantasy we have a lot of variation, so thinking in those terms might be misleading.

There was (is?) an Image comic called Battlechasers which had a feel very similar to what I see for my game if that helps any.

Pale Fire wrote: There was (is?) an Image comic called Battlechasers which had a feel very similar to what I see for my game if that helps any.

Mike Holmes wrote: But then that seems to be the perennial problem that you fall into as well. You want to stay away from metagame, like the mook rule, but you want some sort of "wiggle room" to allow the same effects.

Don't your other rules allow for that wiggle already? Or are we going to get to the point where we're going to be debating wiggle room for Alignments, and everything else under the sun?

Is the game about mooks, or defeating lots of mooks? I thought it was about monster bashing?

You're need to "dress up" your system as Traditional is really troubling. Your target audience gets weirder and weirder each day. If the game is no longer standard fantasy, but some sort of Comic Book Fantasy that's so esoteric that our stabs at trying to define it don't land, how is anyone else going to have a basic affinity for it? Is the game aimed at Japanese D&D gamers?

Hi Palefire, long time no hear...

I've got to agree that I'm not quite entirely sure how to envision play in Ygg after reding this thread. I can get into the comic book fantasy idea, but if this is just a convenient way to explain concepts, you should probably steer clear of it, just to avoid confusion. I see mythic and comic fantasy as quite seperate genres.

On the topic of names, assuming you are sticking with a norse theme, Yggdrasil means literally The Horse (Drasil) or the terrible One (Ygg). Ygg was a common name for Odinn. QED Odinn's horse.

If you wanted to translate into English in a less literal way, i.e. appeal to english speakers, I'd consider changing it to something like Tree of Worlds, or World Tree, or something similar, but also make sure that the Tree of Worlds figures largely in the game. I can imagine a setting in which the Tree of Worlds literally exists, and cities of elves and dwarves have made homes in the huge branches. travelling from world to world might require scaling branches, or going up ancient stairways carved into the tree, or taking rides of flying long-boats. Could be very cool. Does that fit with your demon hunting idea. Or should you just remane the game Demon Hunter?

I've just been looking up some of Snorri's descriptions of Yggdrasil, and am frankly a little bemused. I don't think Snorri had a good grip on what the tree was exactly in a cosmic sense to the norse. I wish someone had written those damned sagas down a good two hundred yars earlier. I am convinced Snorri's stuff is corrupted beyond recognition. That's just me grumbling.

This is kind of good though, becuase if the game is going to revolve around the tree (as the name still suggests), then it gives you a lot of freedom with what exactly it is...

Anyway, I like teh idea that character concept and colour is not impeded by rules. Though mostly i think the easiest way to do this is go for rules light, and then encourage some sort of meta-reward for acting colourful.

Chris

EDIT: To correct a few of the more obvious typos.

Hi Peregrine, long time no see.

Peregrine wrote: I've got to agree that I'm not quite entirely sure how to envision play in Ygg after reding this thread. I can get into the comic book fantasy idea, but if this is just a convenient way to explain concepts, you should probably steer clear of it, just to avoid confusion. I see mythic and comic fantasy as quite seperate genres.

On the topic of names, assuming you are sticking with a norse theme, Yggdrasil means literally The Horse (Drasil) or the terrible One (Ygg). Ygg was a common name for Odinn. QED Odinn's horse.

might require scaling branches, or going up ancient stairways carved into the tree, or taking rides of flying long-boats. Could be very cool. Does that fit with your demon hunting idea. Or should you just remane the game Demon Hunter?

Anyway, I like teh idea that character concept and colour is not impeded by rules. Though mostly i think the easiest way to do this is go for rules light, and then encourage some sort of meta-reward for acting colourful.

Yeah, got to appreciate that Snorri wrote them sagas down at all, but still would've been nice to know what non-christianised icelanders thought of the whole gods thing.

As to the game, surely you could introduce some sort of rewards system based on character concept. Something real simple, like a meta-game reward (be it fate poins, or experience or willpower or whatever), that players get in reward for acting in accordance with the colour of their character.

You could approach this in a more structured way, as Pendragon did, and provide lists of Passions that characters can pursue, or in a far more flexible way and suggest characters have core elements that are rewarded if indluged in. I dunno.

Let's say I create character who I want to...

Be obsessed with finding his lost love.
Is a buckaneer, joking, pirate sort.
Only ever fights with a favourite sword.

You could then allow for the Gm to make subjective or semi-subjective decisions as to when I should be rewarded for pursuing these concepts.

Maybe that is a bit complex.

Another way to do this would simply be to work away from bonuses from environment, tactics yadda yadda, and say simply that skills are everything. Thus if I have a 'fight with frying pan' skill of 20 I'm always going to beat an ogre who owns a big two handed sword and plate armour, but only has a skill of 5. The peripheral stuff a character owns, then becomes image-only. This would also have to mean that any character can own whatever belongings the player wants at the begining of the game.

You want a war horse? Fine. But a character with 'Run really fast' skill of 15 is still going to outpace you.'

You want plate armour. No problem. But a character with 'take the damage like a man' skill of 20 is stil better off. In fact the plate armour does you no real good at all.

It doesn't make a lot of 'real world' sense, but would certainly make the system feel more like a comic book, or even mythic (I'm sort of seeing how these could cross over. The way characters act, and what is important to them is often similar, just the mood feels different)...

In a mythic sense the only thing you'd be missing out on are the McGuffins that mythic characters always have. Odinn's spear, Maui's fish hook, Perseus's mirrored shield and so on. You could treat McGuffins as skills though, I suppose, kind of like Hero Wars. Then having a 'Sword of Dragon Slaying 18' would be better than 'Fight with Sword 15', but maybe not much good against anything other than dragons in which case you fall back on the Fight with Sword skill. Does that make sense?

And as to a name, if the game is not overtly norse, as 'Yggdrasil' suggests, then drop the name like a hot potato. It's only going to confuse players. Go for something simple but evocative. Just my two cents.

Chris

Hi Christoffer,

The game isn't Norse. "Yggdrasil" is a Norse-evocative name. In fact, it's more than that, it is overtly and specifically a central feature in Norse mythology. If you call the game Yggdrasil, and if the game is not specifically and only centered on Norse mythology, you are literally mislabelling the game.

It's pretty straightforward. One of my games is called Trollbabe, because characters must be two-meters-tall women with horns. It's not called "Spirit" or "Tengu" or "Corporate Intrigue" or "Time Travel." Naming your game "Yggdrasil" is just as off-base for your game as "Time Travel" is for Trollbabe.

I think you're simply in the habit of calling the game Yggdrasil in your mind, perhaps with some emotional investment based on your own creative process or sense of ownership of the game. Really - changing the name to something more meaningful is very important. I rarely care about games' names and don't enter into the debates about them very much. In this case I'm making an exception: calling your game "Yggdrasil" is creatively, informatively, and conceptually inappropriate.

Best,
Ron

Like I said, I'll wait with re-labelling it until I have something new to publish otherwise I'm afraid things will just get confusing. It's always been just a convenient label instead of calling it "the game I'm working on" :) "Ygg" was so much shorter.

Thanks for your suggestions Peregrine, I'll keep those in mind.

No problem. Let me know when you get a new verison of the game posted. I'll be keen to have a look through and see how it has progressed.

Chris