Scripts: thoughts on Vocabulary versus grammar

[Bob G]

I think the toughest part of learning to write eval scripts has been learning how to put 'sentences' together that make sense to the editor. I think I have a basic understanding of the vocabulary needed (I get what tags, fields, macros, things, etc. are), but I think I am still lacking the knowledge of how to put that vocabulary together to make a 'language' that is understandable.

For example, I might know the words in Spanish for 'I', 'eat', 'cookie', and 'want', but if I don't know what order to put them in, the resulting sentence will probably be meaningless. My experience with writing scripts has been very much like this; I know 'words' like 'field' and 'cBbnRage', but writing a 'sentence' like "apply a bonus to damage equal to the character's Intelligence bonus with all firearms" still eludes me.

Is there a tutorial or thread on the forums that teaches the 'grammar' of scripts?