When building a character you choose a Species to play as, this acts your genetic make up and grants you certain starting skills. Examples of a Species is an Elf, Dwarf, Devil-kin, Human, and more like this. You also choose a background, which acts as a mechanical function of your character's origins before the story, for example if you were a farmer you would have certain abilities or skills from living a life as a farmer, while a soldier would have a different set of skills of abilities. There are also Linear abilities which will be explained later in this chapter. And a collection of skilltrees as well as classes to choose from. The classes have both skill trees and linear skills that can be gained while levelling up. 

The character builder system is based a lot in skills. 
For example a Species would have a skill based on its genetic buildup, a Devil-kin may have wings, sharp horns, a tail they could use to hold things or whip with, or innate spellcasting. These are examples of Species based skills that can be chosen from.

Backgrounds also have a selection of skills available to choose from, such as a soldier may know how to ride a horse, or how to intimidate someone, or maintain weaponry, or even rally troops. 

The Linear skills are skills that are gained across all characters, however the linear skill tree provides only stat increases, and other general increases, and provides skill points for the ''Civility Skill Tree'' which will be explained in the skill trees section of this chapter.

The skill trees are branching skill trees with a collection of skills to choose from, that cover different playstyles or abilities. There are 5 main trees, and 2 Unique trees. The 5 Main trees are Combat; Which covers combat abilities, statistics, skills, manouvers, Magic; Which covers spells, magical statuses, magical capabilities and magic statistics, Tech; Which covers crafting, technology, maintenance, and material skills, Utility; Which covers the skills focused on strengthening oneself or another party member, such as speed, buffs, boosts, motivation and rallying, Social; Which covers charismatic skills, from intimidation, to deception, performance, bartering or convincing npcs, this tree provides a communicative strength to the party. 
The Unique trees consists of the Civility tree, which has 2 sub-branches for Civil and Uncivil skills, The Civility Sub Trees are meant mainly for roleplay and for developing your character throughout the game as a person, consisting of a variety of skills from farming, cooking, sowing, etc. While its flip side contains more feral skills, meant to develop your character personality towards a feral or beast like fashion, despite these skills not having any material effect, they might provide roleplay, or at the GM's discretion may provide a boost in certain checks, for example a herbalist skill might provide a bonus on attempting to craft remedies from herbs, but only if the GM allows it.
The other Unique Tree is the ''Special'' tree, which acts as a category for a GM to make their own unique Skill Trees for their games, for example vampiric or lycanthropic skill trees, or a skill tree themed around a certain power or element in their world. 

Classes also have skills, but use a blend of linear skills earned and skills chosen, for example a class based on martial capabilities may gain skills from the combat tree or its sub trees (sub trees will be explained in detailed in the Skill Tree sections) that match with it's focus, these skills count as learned, and cannot be learned twice, when setting points into a skill tree you skip skills you already have. 

When levelling up you might get skill points at certain levels which can be used to learn skills on skill trees available to you, the skill chosen must be one for which you are qualified, unless a certain ability, (Or at the GM's Discretion) allows you to grab a skill without the required qualifications. 

It is important to note that this system is designed to be changed and adapted to any group/campaign/world, and a GM is free to change up skill trees, make their own, or otherwise change elements of the game to fit their vision and the world, work with your GM at all points to attempt to create characters, narratives, and games that works and are fun for everyone involved. These rules are ideas and suggestions and are fully malleable to suit you and your table's needs. 

Armour requires you to be proficient in using that armour, and Armours have statistics which will affect your character. Armour is applied with each piece being separate just like in real life.

Certain armours would protect against certain types of damage, and would have certain statistics that interact with other properties of the world and game. For example Leather armour would be flammable and would provide light protection against slashing and piercing, and large reduction to blunt damage, it would also be flammable and would be vulnerable to cold damage, as leather is generally not good for keeping the cold or heat out, however would have little effect on your action points (As described in chapter 3: Gameplay).

Meanwhile plate mail would protect large reduction against slashing and piercing, but would be vulnerable to blunt damage, require padded layers underneath, and would give a larger reduction to action points, due to slowing down your movement significantly. 

Due to the targetting system (As described in chapter 3: Gameplay), certain areas of the body may be difficult to hit, but provide significant issues if hit, such as a neck or armpit or wrist, these areas can be protected with armour pieces added to those areas, such as Besagews, which are rondels for the armpits, bracers for the wrists, or coifs and collared armour for the neck. Which would provide protection, at the loss of action points. 

Weaponry works similarly to armour, weapons are also based on their design, which would affect their function, statistics, and how they work.

For example a European Longsword would be comprised of a long handle with a pommel and a longer blade, it has a crossguard over the handle and the handle would have more than enough space to have both hands on the handle and still have extra space for alternate grips. The straight blade and the fact it is double edged, with a sharp edge on both the false edge and the front edge, makes it capable of slashing and piercing, making a fairly good all round weapon. 

Meanwhile a katana would have a curved single edged blade, which enables it to be exceptional at slashing, but less capable of piercing. 

Different techniques could affect a weapon's statistics for that attack, such as half-swording strengthening the piercing capacity, and makes it easier to aim at smaller targets, while mordhau grip (holding a sword by the blade and using the handle as a hammer) causes blunt damage. However these techniques may be less powerful than the main uses of the weapon. (And depending on the GM's ruling, may be locked inside of the combat skill tree or another skill tree. Or available for use if you state that you try it. Work with your GM to figure out how they rule the game.) 

Certain weapons may have effects, like a sword with weight towards the hilt may be faster and cost less action points to swing, while dealing slightly less damage, but a sword which is top heavy would hit slightly harder while being slightly slower and hence cost more action points per swing. (This would becomes more evident the more weight is at the top, as an example a mace would be slightly slower than a sword, but would hit hard with blunt damage, while a stick or rod would have an even weight distribution and probably do less damage at a slightly faster pace, a maul would be slow but do a lot of damage.)

other effects on a weapon may be a serrated edge causing bleeding over multiple turns. 

There are a variety of types of damage, from piercing damage which consists of any wound that is a sharp inwards wound, such as bites from fangs, an arrow, a dagger, rapier, or the tip of a sword. chain mail might for example reduce damage from a source of piercing damage that is too thick to go through the chains, the same applies to ring mail. 

Slashing is linear sharp damage, swords, and axes and knives can perform slashing damage, and contrary to belief, rapiers effectively perform slashing as well, and are fairly sharp.

Bludgeoning damage is blunt force trauma, this type of damage isnt sharp nor piercing, 

Beyond this we have elemental damages, such as fire, lightning, electric, sonic, cold

Various objects have health or durability, which could be reduced over time and reduce the effectiveness of the object, for example a sword might dull, or armour might dent or tear. You can maintain the gear with tools, like using a grindstone or whetstone on a sword to sharpen it.

This rule is a rule that is very easily removed from the game, and is only reccomended for hyperreallistic games generally.