I have complete revised some of the additions to my code and the game itself. I have added a new area called the "Shadow Plane", which contains a different kind of monster called the demon. They are more numerous than goblins and are 6 hp stronger, but they give 6 gold when defeat them. You must have a magic level of 3 in order to travel there. I like the idea because it gives a player a quick 5-minute goal to reach :). To see the final version, refer to my scratchpad. I have added a catch all to make sure the program doesn't just die when someone enters something besides a specified number (at least in "freedale" anyway), but I can't figure out how to account for someone pushing enter without entering anything. Any suggestions would be helpful. P.S. - I have also added a cheat sub (so I could quickly access Shadow Plane and do some testing) but I like the idea so I'm keeping it there. please forgive the code errors that you find in the modified code. im only an initiate here at the forums and a novice at perl