[Design] Why random rolls?

[Kyle Schuant]

Random rolls are necessary, as you said, so that things are never arbitrary or certain. Each thing we call a "game" has certain amounts of both choice, and chance. Even in games like chess which appear to be all "choice", chance arises by the simple fact of the many many choices available. Between skilled players, one chooses the opening, the other responds, and the next five or so moves are just about scripted; they then arrive at the "middle game" and things begin to vary a lot. "Chance" in this respect simply means, "uncertainty of outcome, apparent randomness in the situation."
    Plus, players get pissed off or overconfident, in turns, if it's just skill vs skill. 

    You know my view: the abilities of an ordinary person, without any real degree of training, but with some common sense and time to think about it, should vary between completely useless, and the performance of someone with a degree in that subject, 2-4 years' training. Those are the extremes; the normal performance should be about that "ordinary" level. 
    Results like this are obtained by having numbers around some middle value, with the higher and lower numbers appearing less frequently. To achieve this, you can have either a logarithmic scale with a linear die roll adding to the skill, or a linear scale with two or more dice adding to the skill, or rolling under or over it. Doubtless there are other ways, but those are the ones that've appeared in games so far and I've heard of.

Cheers,
Kyle
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