Aside from it being what we root for Danny Briere to do every night, scoring paper is an important consideration in many printing jobs. And it’s something we deal with at cutpasteandprint when we are finishing your printed brochures, cards or catalogs.
As a printing term scoring paper is a way of preparing a sheet of paper so that it folds cleanly. Basically, a crease-line is pressed or embossed into the paper at the folding point. This allows for the paper to fold easily without cracking, shifting or otherwise looking ugly.
Here is a sheet of board before being scored, 
And after. Now with a nice crisp line to insure a clean, beautiful fold.
If you are designing something that you needs to score, its important that your work be designed so the score runs in the same direction as the grain of the paper. You should also be careful when using old paper. In most conditions, as paper sits around it tends to dry out. If that happens then you are more likely to see cracking in the paper.
Of course with most projects, we can handle these issues for you in prepress. Still if you are preparing something larger than or the same size as a standard cut-size paper, its a good idea to keep these in mind.
Here you can see what can happen when something is scored against the grain. Notice the cracking.
And here is a nice score that will create a nice fold, and have your project looking great.
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