From the introduction: Characters are defined by their Traits, which can be skills (hacking, fortune telling), professions (investigator, assassin), or simple adjectives (clever, strong, vicious). All Traits are rated from 1-5. If a character doesn't have a Trait that's relevant in a given situation, the default rating is 2. When one character wants to do something to another character, compare the ratings of any Trait relevant to the action. The player with the higher Trait gets to flip a number of bonus coins equal to the difference. All you need to succeed is a single heads-up.