A Guide to Training Points...

I know this has been posted else where, but this is a good place for it also
I didn't write it, I'm just posting it. =)
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"To help guide you in your spending of training points as well as your pursuit of techniques, here is a breakdown of how the various statistics relate to each other.

Attributes:
Note that all skills are slightly increased by some or all of the four main attributes, so they have that value in addition to the specifics below.
Strength: Increases damage with physical attacks. It is 50% more effective than attack skill in this respect.
Power: Increases damage with magical attacks. It is 50% more effective than casting skill in this respect.
Dexterity: Increases chance to hit with physical attacks, and decreases chance to be hit by physical attacks. It is 1/3 as effective in these roles than attack and evasion skills.
Focus: Increases chance to hit with magical attacks, and decreases chance to be hit by magical attacks. It is 1/3 as effective in these roles than casting and magic defense (which is being renamed to magic evasion) skills. Also increases friendly healing spell amounts by 1/2 as much as does the casting skill for the healing spell (usually Life).

Skills:
Offensive skills (including weapon-using skills as well as spellcasting skills for attack spells): Competes equally against the evasion or magic defense of the target for chance to hit. Weapon skills also compete equally against incoming attack skills for initial Parry checks. Also adds to damage by 2/3 as much as Strength or Power.
Defensive skills (evasion and magic defense): Competes equally against incoming attack skills. Evasion is also re-checked equally against incoming attack skill for initial Dodge checks.
Healing skills (mostly Life): Adds to healing amounts by twice as much as Focus. Note that the healing amount cannot exceed double the healing spell's specified range.
Shield skill: Competes equally with incoming attack skills for initial Block checks.

Armor: Reduces incoming non-ethereal damage at a slightly better rate than Strength and Power add to such.
Ethereal Armor: Same as Armor, but against ethereal damage.
Resistances: Add to Armor and Ethereal Armor against attacks of the resistance's type.
Wards: Add to Evasion and Magic Defense against attacks of the resistance's type.
Parry/Dodge/Block bonuses: These "active defenses" use a two-check system. The first check is a skill contest, as outlined in the skill section above. If that check succeeds (from the defender's point of view), then there is a flat 20% chance of the defense working. Parry, Dodge, and Block bonuses add to that 20%.

Other stats (such as Armor Use and Augmentation) are simply for meeting requirements.
Crafting skills are used to determine the number of resources required to make an item.
Gathering skills are used to determine the number of resources gathered per "hit".
Attributes are not used in crafting/gathering beyond their increase of such skills.

Given the above, you can see that skills are generally more effective than attributes. However, attributes have a much wider application.

I'll endeavor to improve the in-game descriptions to match the above.

Edit: Rephrased Armor description to clear up confusion. "

and 2nd part (additional posts in that thread):

"More info that Smeglor posted, from that thread

75% of the increase to skill from attributes comes from Dex for one handed attack skills, while 50% of the inrease is from Dex for two-handers.

It's not telling you exactly how much percentage of Dex is added to the skills, but since an interpid soul could figure that out on their own anyway, I'll go ahead and tell you they always add up to 10%. So 5% of Dex and Strength is added to two hand weapon skills, for instance.

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I'll try to hit all the questions here, let me know if I missed any.

Bows/Crossbows are treated the same as any other physical attack. Their only difference is they have range. Well, another small difference is ranged attacks cannot be parried.

Here's the basic flow of things in a combat "round":

% To-Hit calc: Comparison of attacking skill * 3 + Dexterity/Focus against defender's Evasion/Magic Defense * 3 + Dexterity/Focus. Any attack chance to hit bonuses (i.e. Aura of Command) are added to attacking skill prior to this calculation. The result of this calculation modifies the base chance to hit.

Hit check: A random percentage is "rolled". If it is above the %To-Hit calculated above, the attack misses and this process ends.

Note that the following Block, Parry, and Dodge checks only apply if the attack (including spells) is from the currently engaged target. This means a target that you have engaged with the attack button, or have cast a repeat spell on. And obviously, you only get these checks if you have the corresponding ability and equipment (i.e. a shield for Block, a weapon for Parry).

Block "contest" % calc: Comparison of defender's Shield skill against incoming attack skill modifies base chance to be eligible to block. No bonuses nor other attributes apply.

Block "contest" check: A random percentage is "rolled". If it is below the % calculated above, the attack is eligible to be blocked.

Block check: If eligible, a random percentage is "rolled". If it is below (20% + Block bonus), the attack is blocked.

Parry only applies if you have a melee weapon equipped and the incoming attack is not a ranged attack.

Parry "contest" % calc: Comparison of defender's equipped weapon skill against incoming attack skill modifies base chance to be eligible to parry. No bonuses nor other attributes apply.

Parry "contest" check: A random percentage is "rolled". If it is below the % calculated above, the attack is eligible to be parried.

Parry check: If eligible, a random percentage is "rolled". If it is below (20% + Parry bonus), the attack is parried.

Dodge "contest" % calc: Comparison of defender's evasion skill against incoming attack skill modifies base chance to be eligible to dodge. No bonuses nor other attributes apply.

Dodge "contest" check: A random percentage is "rolled". If it is below the % calculated above, the attack is eligible to be dodged.

Dodge check: If eligible, a random percentage is "rolled". If it is below (20% + Dodge bonus), the attack is dodged.

Damage: Weapon/Spell damage + Strength/Power * Attack Delay + Attack Skill * Attack Delay - Target's Armor * Attack Delay
All the modifications are divided by values that I'm not going to reveal at this time, but as stated originally, Strength/Power is 50% more valued than Skill, and Armor is slightly more valued than Strength/Power.
The above result is then put through a Gaussian randomizer to give greater variety.

When damage is being calculated for a damage over time effect or a damage shield, the Strength/Power and attack skill are inherited from the values used to give the target that effect. For instance, the Engulf effect will have damage based on the Power and flame skill of the caster, because that was the attribute and skill used in the Engulf attack itself.

Additional info from Smeglor:

Resistances are effectively added to armor and ethereal armor for damage of the appropriate type.

I've never revealed this before, but will do so now. Armor (and therefore resistances) reduce damage per second by their value divided by 45. So 225 resistance will reduce incoming damage of its type by 5 DPS. Therefore against a weapon with delay 30 (3.0 seconds), damage will be reduced by 15.