Before we get into the mechanics behind combat, we first need to explain the numbers we're talking about. Like we said before: we're not going to say what these numbers represent, just what they do, because the game offers several interpretations for them and they might not all be appropriate.

Characters come in three parts. There's their Stats, their Skills, and their Focuses.

Stats

Any character has three stats, which are Might, Magic and Mind. Each of these is usually a number between 1 and 5, though some characters (or NPCs) might go higher, and a character with two or fewer points in a particular stat is very vulnerable to attack.

While Stats don't change except in Very Special Circumstances, each Stat has a Defence Pool associated with it (so each character has a Might defence pool, a Magic defence pool, and a Mind defence pool). The stat determines the maximum level of the pool. Defence Pools serve as "good luck shields"; while a character's defence pool is high, there's very little that can go wrong for him (or her). Once a defence pool is low, it's possible for the character to be harmed. It's important to note that losing points from a defence pool does not represent things going wrong -- it doesn't necessarily even represent the character screwing up but getting lucky. It just means that things aren't going to keep on going right for quite so long.

Skills

Skills are things you roll on. In fact, they're almost the only things you roll on -- doing anything in World of Balance will generally involve you rolling on a skill.

While a character only has three Stats, there is no limit to the number of Skills he can have (besides how many he can afford to buy). Each skill has a name (like "Swordplay", "Negotiation" "Angsty" or "Distracting Cleavage") and a level, which, again, is generally from 1 to 5 but can be higher.

Each skill is also associated with a particular stat. "Swordplay", for example, is probably associated with your Might stat. "Negotiation" is clearly Mind. "Distracting Cleavage" is a bit trickier to place, but probably counts as a Might stat -- it's certainly a physical rather than a mental thing.

Because each skill has a base stat, it is also associated with that stat's defence pool, and it's this defence pool which you can spend points from to make bad rolls on the skill still come off well.

Focuses

Finally, there are Focuses, which are Plot Points; things that are worth fighting for; but most importantly, they are things which the character can lose. Some examples of Focuses might be: My Daughter Marlene, My Sense Of Self, My Sanity, The Locket My Father Gave Me, or My Good Looks. Each focus is ranked with a number between 1 and 8. The higher a Focus's rank, the more plot significance it has (and the more important it is to the character) -- but even a rank-1 Focus is important.

Focuses allow your character to get into fights: in World of Balance, it's impossible to enter into any kind of conflict without staking a Focus that your character might lose in the process. The upside of Focuses is that as you gain XP it's possible to endow them with Cherries, little bonuses that you can activate during comba -- uh, task resolution -- to give yourself an advantage.

That completes the rapid guided tour of your character sheet. Now that we've defined the things on it and given you some idea of what they do, we can explain in detail how combat works.