i am reading the core book, and i see that if you investigate something, the level of succesess translate in less time for the investigation.

I dont understand how it works, since it seems i need to reach the time i need to take for a investigation via successes. But how much time should i wait before rolling again. And what does it mean? That if i roll too good , and constantly, i can do a investigation of 11 years in just 1 day, if i keep rolling and taking succesess. I see this very unrealistic, please help!! i really am lost in this investigation system

I think the best way to understand Investigation skills is that it assumes as a premise that most people willing to search for long enough will eventually find the information they are looking for. Therefore, any character with some form of Investigation skill can attempt to uncover information and it basically comes down to a question of how long it takes to locate this information. As for how often you can roll, that comes down to the description of the individual skill.

The Inquiry skill is debatably the one used most often and I can tell you how we tend to run it.

The DH core book states that each roll represents about 1 hour of work. The first two entries on Table 7-4 show 1hr and 6hrs for Simple and Basic tasks. We are rarely asked to roll to get such information: if you have training in the skill and no extenuating circumstances, you find the info you need. (It also speeds up play and allows us to focus on more meaningful role-playing opps.) We'll only be asked to roll for Drudging and higher difficulty investigations. Also, we allow combining and assisting others in creative ways so long as they possess related or useful skills for the investigation at hand. For instance,a character with Common Lore (Underworld) and the Inquiry skill looking for a good fence might have the difficulty of his roll reduced by one step given his general familiarity with the environment. If they also had the Peer (Underword) Talent, that might help too.

When the roll is made, we assume that the time taken to locate the information is reduced by an additional 1d10 + relevant Characteristic Bonus for each degree of success of the test. (We count additional increases to the skill as Characteristic Bonuses for the purpose of this roll. A charcater with a FB of 3 but Inquiry +20% would roll 1d10 + 5.) With Inquiry you would technically be able to keep rolling every hour until you were successful or the GM decided this particular group of people just don't know what you're looking for.

Also, for longer investiatigations, it's useful to think of the process as requiring several steps. You may discover that "Dark Secret" in 1d5 years, but you'll probably come accross a whole bunch of little clues in order to get to it - encoutners and events that can be role-played and the culmination of which will lead to the revelation your characters have been working towards for months or years. More than likely, however, the high-end secrets will already be "written into the adventure" so to speak and the characters will come accross it if they need to know it.

We tend to play fast and loose with the guidelines and most of our "rolls" are only meant to nudge us in the right direction or answer more mundane questions. (And we think long and hard about what should be considered Labyrinthine: how annoying would it be to have to roll 1d5 years and then substract from the amount of remaining hours by rolling an Inquiry test every 1 hour? Most of the time, this is best left to GM discretion, who will decide how likely the informaton is to be found and just make a flat ruling... Or if a PC really wants the info - or a piece of equipment. maybe - but it's not immediately pressing, the GM just assumes it takes X number of session to get a useful answer or find the item required.)

Not sure if this answers your question, but hope it helps at least!

Thank you really for all the help, although i dont understand too much , please, can you give me some examples? Thanks to all, really i want to do it good, and been a GM, i need to know the rules to the letter, at least to prevent problems. XD

dosan said:

Maybe you could tell us what you have in mind for your characters and we can suggest some ways of playing / arbitrating that?

Yes Macharias, you are right. I plan to let them find some artifacts and books of "subversive knowldege", maybe the kind of knowledge that it had been once part of the imperium, but now is sactioned and heretic.

If they happen to reach that knowledge, i will not make it easy to obtain all the data from it, since what i like the most is making the PCs believe that they know something completely, depending of the result of their investigation rolls, i will give more and more pertinet knowledge, of course the most important part will be revealed when they 100% investigate it.

This kind of knowledge can be a campaign long endeavour, probably they will investigate about it in their "between the missions" time. But what i want is to understand the rules of investigations, so they dont take the advantage of that "1 hour per roll" , to decipher all in 2 or 2 sessions, since i want to do this as a secondary objective in the campaing, and should they uncover the truth, they will be more prepared for what will come.

I mainly want to understand all this, since i really like the rules od Dark Heresy. I came from playing World of darkness, so i really want some trustful rules to play, i am tired of house ruling things, so please, help me to interpret the rules, so i can be in peace with them, and focus in my story.

I really dont want that somebody finds the loopholes in the investigation rules, so they can abuse it.

Thanks in advance to all!!!

dosan said:

Well, I know that in my group, if th GM decides that you get to roll once per session and you get the info you get, we simply accept that the GM wants the story to proceed as a certain pace. Rules are great but, as alwasy, they are guidelines at best.

I would explain to the characters why they can only make 1 roll every session (or whatever frequency you decide on): explain to them that, once they've found the books, they now have to

• translate it (I assume old books = old imperial dialects. And that may mean having to find some sort of expert or sage)
• Read it.
• Cross-refernece it, etc.

If any of the PCs have ever done any serious research, they'll understand that it can be a long process even whe you already have the information in-hand.

Regarding that 1 roll / hour: the easiest way around that it to rememebr that there are very real reasons that will prvent your players from rolling every hour. The rules have to assume that you can roll every hour when the action of INVESTIGATING is what you are devoting that hour to. WHich means that whle you're travelling, fighting, drinking, sleeping, eating, etc. you're not INvestigating. If you're not investingating, you don;t get to roll. So, let your players know that 1 roll equals 1 evening (2-3 hours) or reading/translating when they have the opportunity only. That should help limit a little.

You are right, maybe is a little houserule, but it helps. I am a little freaked out by houserules, since in my last World of Darkness game i GM, i was doing houserules all the time, but i believe no rules are perfectly done, so its the way it is for us GM, although a little intimidating

Thanks pal, what i really like the most here in the forums is that all the people i met is very polite and friendly, and dont get angry for somebody that is lost, hehe.

now i am collecting data for my campaing, so i am myself in an investigation process.

Sorry to bother you, but, can you explain me the stealth rules and mechanics please? Some other member kindly did it, but i still dont get it completely.

I made a thread here about it, please help me, again, hehehe