User summary: The 2001 Version of the core rules updates the alchemy, sorcery, and magic rules. Races have been revised and several Skills have been removed or merged. Additionally, typographical and formatting errors have been eliminated. Actions are resolved by rolling 1D20 plus modifier against a Difficulty. Higher rolls succeed. Opposed rolls use a mechanism called "matching" where each opponent makes the rolls with the highest result winning. Die rolls of "natural 1" are always considered failure and rolls of "natural 20" are always considered successes. Character creation uses random rolls to assign values to Primary Attributes; alternately, the values may be allocated from a random pool. Secondary Attributes are then derived. Race is selected and may influence Attributes. Characters have a selected "Affinity" which is (very roughly) analogous to Class but much less restrictive. Characters then select Skills from their Affinity.