You need to be careful with that. If guess_count is zero before the post-decrement the statement will have an exit code of 1. If you have set -e in effect thi

You need to be careful with that. If guess_count is zero before the post-decrement the statement will have an exit code of 1. If you have set -e in effect this will kill your script. Depending on the circumstances it might be better to use pre-decrement. (( --guess_count ))