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Ok so I'm building a wargaming dice-roller app for iPhone and iPod touch.

It's not going to be heavy-duty, but I want it to cover as much ground as possible. So I want to incluse support for as many games as possible. As a member of Dakka for a while now I thought it would be cool to speak to you guys as "the community" to get some ideas of what you'd all want to see in such an app. Market Research if you will.

The DnD part of it is fairly simple, but I'd love to hear of any features you'd like to see in that.
The 40k part will be fairly cool (as it's my game of choice.
Shooting: I want to be able to roll N D6, then see the results on-screen. Added features will be differing-coloured dice for sgt. BS / Plasma weapons etc.
Ones will be highlighted ("get's hot!" for instance) where applicable, and I want to have a feature where the app removes "failed" dice - by the user entering the desired result before rolling.
Wounding: Same as above, but 6s will be highlighted for rending. If the fail removal turns out to take to long for the user, we'll add in a manual swipe feature sp you can remove the failed dice from play.
Leadership: Pretty much roll a d6, display result. 1s and 6s will be highlighted appropriately (IG orders etc.)
Wound allocation/Saves: Coloured dice for complex units, highlight failed saves. Maybe even remove passed saves.

I want to come up with ideas for WHFB as there's a lot more dice action in there, but I want to hear from everyone about other systems (FoW, AT43, BFG, Warmachine/Hordes, LOTR, Epic so on and so forth) so we can encompass as many systems as possible.

If you fancy helping out, then please post on! Credits will be given for your good ideas! Many thanks in advance chaps!

sounds like a good idea thought there area few dice apps already out there

Thanks for the reply Vulk. Whilst there are indeed quite a few dice apps out, that doesn't deter me. Mine will be better!

That said, I don't think there's a dice app out that has the lofty ideas that mine has.

yes yours does have a lot of things that would be very helpful

I'd say specialize in WH40K. There are a ton of general ones out there already. What I'd like is something where you can choose what unit is firing (with modifiers) and get hits, then roll again choosing what weapon is firing at what unit, and have it auto calculate the results.

Did you ever play Vassal 40k just before it got cease and desisted? They had seperate sections for shooting and wounding, and it worked out pretty well. You can't get the program from their site any more, but I'm sure if you google it there'll be a fair few download opportunities still around

Great idea, anyway!

I use Machdice all the time, and its great. Good value for a dollar too. If you could implement the features you have already mentioned, I would buy it for sure. Don't forget aesthetic features like 40k specific backgrounds; could be cool.

Suppose you could have an option where you lay the phone down on the table and have it roll a scatter die too...as that's one thing you'll need if you're trying to go diceless 40k. Could have options for 1d6 scatter (something like Warmachine maybe?), standard 2d6, and an artillery die scatter for WHFB.

In terms of Fantasy applications, they mostly just roll dice. Things like hit and save modifiers don't really need to be in the program. But one thing that would be useful for both FB and War of the Ring is a roll for things that need 6/4+, 6/5+, or 6/6 (as in 6's, then a second roll that needs the second score). Another thing good for fantasy would just be to have an artillery die option.

For additional applications on 40k, you could have a twin-link option or check-box to go ahead and have it reroll failures. Or perhaps (though this is getting a little specialized) the option for BS6+, with the 2+/6, 2+/5+, etc... kind of an extension of the fantasy 6/4+ option.

Selecting amount and color of dice would be nice. I don't know how other apps do it, but throwing 28 dice to simulate 3 different weapons would be required IMO.

I have a die rolling program with all those features includinng a scatter on my droid, and honestly its still much slower then rolling dice by hand. I do use for rolls which require over 20 dice, like a ig gunline or my stealers in cc.

I would love to have a dice app that allows you to customize the colors of the dice to represent weapons of your choice. This would allow the user to fully cusomize each army and have it all saved on your device, ready to use. Including a scatter die+ 2d6 would really have my support of this app. I am tired of losing that damn die and having to pay 5$ for a new dice set, just for one die.

So for 40k, please include the following:
1) customisation of die colors pertaining to weapons. The user could customize colors of dice pertaining to each weapon. Adding in a small Legend/glossary so that both players can see what color dice represent what weapon/ability.

2) adding in the scatter dice and really making it as random as possible (just avoiding the signature look of that Dice so as not to infringe on IP). Maybe just adding the usual arrows and for the "Bullseye", make it just a big red pip should suffice.

I have a couple dice rolling apps, and having one rolled up for the games the OP listed would be great. Please please add in the scatter dice.

Scatter dice would be awesome. Also, automated removal of failed rolls would be great.

This would be really cool. I have used a few dice rolling apps but they always have a fixed number of dice. I like the idea of a scatter die incorporated. I like to be able to choose the number of dice to be rolled. I like the interface to indicate what is needed before the die is rolled. I think the 40K backrounds would be an IP problem and you will recieve a C&D for even thinking about doing it. How about adding sounds like when rolling to hit there is machine gun fire and when rolling to wound there is screaming. Also, an option of which race you are rolling against and the sounds would match that particular race. And of course an option to shut off the sound as it may become annoying after a while. Good luck!

Tek, just to get an idea of things, what kind of iPhone/MacOS X development experience do you have? Form everything I've heard it's not unusually difficult, but the objective-C syntax throws some developers (mainly because it's too verbose) and a lot of the UI stuff is easy to do but hard to do right.