Well.. actually I worked last night so - here I am. I'll be up all day too. 

But I'm not going to lie. Yesterday, I was being kind of a dick. I was tired. I was dealing with one very whiny baby, and I'm not going to lie - four year olds make me understand Casey Anthony just a little better. So for that I apologize. On any accord, let me readdress your concerns regarding the dice rolls.

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[*] Let me say this - generally speaking, I've always used the idea that every round of combat is about 6 seconds worth of time. You post, I post, six seconds of character time has passed. Of course, this is altered for those storybuilding posts that I personally enjoy writing. By with that being said, clearing distance weighed down by his armor he would move at about 20 ft every six seconds. I think I've beaten that one enough. 
[*]You would be correct in your assumption. These rolls for me are determining actions in which I turn into a coherent story. I would like to think the rolls might provide guidance. Should you decide that your character has been hit, the result might be this. I agree - if someone takes a fatal blow then it will kill them - but especially between skilled combatants landing that fatal blow is quite difficult. I'll address the ratio's below.
[*]So as I have previously mentioned, the way the dice rolls work is a D20 is rolled with some modifiers added or subtracted depending on circumstances. So let's take the 65% success rate of the shield bash. All this is suggestion is that while there is a 65% chance that I was successful with my attack, there is also a 35% chance that you could avoid it. My percentages don't take into account anything you might do only what I do. How you play it out is up to you. It could be an evasion, a block, lose of priority as you put it. I certainly can't put actions to your character. If I would have rolled a 20 on the die, I would say there is a 100% chance of hit. Which you could accept or play around with as you will. It is merely a suggestion. 
[*]Then there is the damage roll. Once again a suggestion that if you should take the hit, it would do 100% of the damage capable of being dealt by the weapon. What does that mean? Well that is open for interpreation. If I were to respond to a shield bash that dealt 100% damage I would conclude that I was caught off guard, pushed back (as shield bashes often do) and left my defenses open. The physical damage portion to the body would be limited due to the armor. But once, how you take that is up to you. 
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Essentially, at least currently, I find dice rolling a) more enjoyable for myself but also b) it allow me to focus on the writing aspect more thoroughly rather than having to quivel about strategy, advantage, et cetera. I know what the results will be because I rolled it up. How do I get my character there in the most vivid and epic way possible. But that is just me. I won't be able to force you to accept my rolls as anything more and that is okay. But if you use them to keep things interesting, even better. 

On any accord I look forward to your next post. I was a little worried you wouldn't be posting given your absence last night. No need to go into any details but I'm off until Friday evening in roughly 58 hours or so. So I am hoping to get a lot of shield and sword in.