Can someone tell me what a shader is and how to use it?

Shaders are a graphics addition to Toribash that gives a cool back ground. Ray tracing can also be used with it to give a more realistic geometric effect. They serve no real reason except for looking cool in movies etc...

When i go to options and try to turn on shaders it won't work, any ideas why and how to fix it?

Buy a new gfx card, your card doesnt support shader model 3.0

Add-on ?: What is the standard for a gfx card that can run shaders?

Any card that supports Pixel Shaders 3.0 and above.

Really just to make the game look spiffy.

Well, thanks everyone(: