Many times you will be matching your skills or abilities against those of others. Perhaps you have a contest of who can run fastest, or sing best. Or you could do some arm wrestling. Or maybe you try to sneak past someone, while he is on guard duty and tries to notice suspicious things.

In all these cases, both parties must make a roll with a d10 on the skill or ability they are using, and the highest wins. So if you try to wrestle your neighbour down, both of you roll a d10, and add your STR. The highest of the two wins!

The skills do not necessarily have to be the same. So if you try to sneak past, and the guard might notice you, you roll on your Sneaking skill, but the guard rolls on his INT.

At certain times the Game Master? may also feel one party has a sure advantage over the other. In this case he will give the advantaged party a +3 on the roll. When you wrestle arms for example, the highest STR is much more important than luck, so the higher STR would get a +3. And if you sneak past a guard who is really not paying attention, you also get a +3. On the other hand, if the guard actually is actively paying attention and has Excellent Hearing skill too, he would instead get the +3, and roll on his Excellent Hearing skill!