Let's say that votes can range from 0 to 10. For simplicity of explanation, I'm going to convert this to -5 to +5. (it could still be 0 - 10 on the ballot)
After voting, your vote is normalized such that the sum of the absolute values of the votes will always be 5.
This way, if you want one candidate to get a "maximum impact" vote of 5 (or -5), the rest will have to get a vote of 0.
If you want to specify a favorite as well as a "most disliked" candidate, one could get a vote of - 2.5, and the other a vote of 2.5. (if you gave one a 5 and one a -5, this is what it would get normalized to)
Or, you could give 3 candidates a 1 and 2 candidates a -1. (this is what would happen if you gave 3 a 5 and 2 a -5).
If you gave one a 5 and one a -2, after normalization one would get a 3.57 and one a -1.43.
Unlike the way I have seen range voting described, this way would have to average in a "zero" for those that you have no opinion on (assuming you vote at all on this particular candidate set).
To me this approach would solve the massive glaring "gamability" problem with Range Voting, which is that everyone's best strategy would be to simply give all candidates either a minimum or maximum score.
-rob
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