Hi - all your questions here are useful, and will make the next draft better - thank you. In terms of direct answers:
- damage die is supposed to be compulsory - it's dangerous to be around these large clumsy humans
- yes to examples. I'd run low on time but next pass they'll be there.
- number of players! good point. I'd guess 2-5? generally rpg groups suffer if they're bigger than that, right?
- I haven't play tested it as much as I'd like! the idea behind the odds, though, is that you should be able to make a choice between making things easier now or future but not both. That said, I'm more hippy narrative than crunchy odds-calculation in play style.