Simply, does the purchased +10/20 to a skill count toward the total +60?

As far as I understand, +60/-60 is the absolute capping, reagrdless of skills, talents, or combat circumstances. If you are, for instance, about to fire a full auto burst into a vile xenos horde which is so massive that their size alone gives you a +60 bonus to your BS, then you do neither get an additional +20 for full auto burst, nor any other bonuses for any skill or talent your character might possess.

Sorry, can't find the edit function for my previous post.

Of course, although that example was about a characteristcs test, the same also goes for skill checks.

Last time I asked about the consensus was that the +10 or +20 for skill mastery was not included in the +/- limit. Don't know if it has been officuially ruled otherwise, or if the unofficial consensus has changed.

My understanding and the way I play it is that + from the skill does not count towards the +/- modifier, but is rather an adjustment of the base check required to succeed.

The funny thing is when I first read the post I 100% agreed with Arkhan's answer, but then in reading the last two posts realized that I don't actually play that way- we figure the 60 max based on environment factors alone, much by accident.

Another question, does the 'difficulty modifier' (such as for unnatural characteristics, things that increase or decrease the challenge of a test by a degree) stand within this bonus or outside it? For example, a hellish -60 task, can that be further modified by the situation and environment or is the 60 modifier still the cap?

With regards to Charmander: I specifically asked that last question to the devs. If you have a Hellish -60 task, but you have all the right tools, servitors, the moons align, and every possible way to get a bonus, you can get a +60. The difficulty of a tests counts as a bonus/penalty so just included it with all other modifiers.

xandarian said:

So in a different example, if my task was mundane (or whatever the +60 version is), I could straigh up ignore all other bonuses- tools, the right sunlight, blessing of the omnisia, etc., because the +60 was already factored in?

With this definition, it seems like skill bonuses should be counted into the grand total of bonuses, otherwise you put a decent sized slant on success (which may be the intent) where I'd think you'd want the field to be balanced. Without adding the skill bonuses to the total cap, I can break it by 20-30% for a total +80 or +90 to a given skill roll. At the same time, I can only ever be at a total penalty of 60 to the same skill check.

@Arkhan- you ahve 5 minutes to edit your post, and you find the edit button on the title bar of the post in question. After 5 min goes by you cannot edit anymore.

That just sounds dumb, though, there's never a situation I wouldn't want, say, my doctor, to use a medkit, even if he was a master surgeon, Talented, +20 skill, and with two nurses. (That's a total of +60 before the medkit)

assuming the difficulty of the test was included, that's the nurses.

I personally run it that the difficulty of the test and the bonus for skill mastery (but not for talented) alter the base number you are rolling from (ie are not included in the +/-60). So if you have a -60% test you can still add another -60% from modifiers to it (not that there are usually many negative modifiers on skill checks) for a grand total of -120% on you characteristic. However, I am not sure when this would ever happen.

No, it does not count towards the modifier, it is prolly the one thing that doesn't because it alters you profile and thus is no bonus.

Charmander said:

How does that figure? I mean surely you *want* your character's skills to be a major contributing factor here?

The way I run it is that all permanent modifiers (Skill Mastery and Talented, primarily) do not count towards the cap, while any modifiers which are in any way temporary or circumstantial (including modifiers from equipment) are subject to the cap.

Chastity said:

It just seems to go against the balance of the +/- 60 theory is all. Though I like No-1 and Borithan's explanations quite a bit, and will likely be adopting them, that skills or task category are outside the cap, and circumstantial modifiers (bad weather, autofire, etc.) must fit within the list.

That all said, it doesn't really make that big a difference to me because as a GM I'm only calling for a roll if I expect there to be a chance of failure (or there is a time issue), and as such I toss the base jam rule across most skills.

Until yesterday, I adhered to the +/- 60 rule, but then I came across something I found pretty odd.

Our Killteam's Assault Marine has a strength value of 70. Including his unnatural strength trait and his power armor, he reaches 160. See where I am getting at? Even with the maximum penalty of -60, he will always pass a strength check without even having to roll. How can that be? Surely there must be a borderline of what is possible even for a marine of such incredible strength.

As a GM, I do not favour telling my players "you just can't do that", I like giving them a roll with an adequate difficulty modifier. For said marine, according to the rules that would not be possible anymore. If I allow a roll, he will pass it.

The only way of preventing him to throw spaceships around is to say to him "I forbid you to roll on that". While that example of course is extreme, other situations, like trying to breach a sealed bulkhead without any tools would have a small but existent possibility of success. But here again I can either forbid it or he automatically succeeds. That's just not balanced.

Arkhan said:

First, you're forgetting the chance of a 95-100 there No reason to forget critical failure, ever !

Second, you're using Unnatural wrong : it "only" gives a +10 bonus to related characteristic tests...More precisely, it downgrades the difficulty of the test by one degree. That's page 136 of the core rulebook.

So your fellow Assault Marine will effectively be at "100% chance" for a challenging test (90 Strength with the armor, and the test is a +10 thanks to Unnatural => 100 %), but only 40% chance of making it through a hellish (-60) test without any other modifier

That said, I personally think that only environmental modifiers fall under the +/-60 rule, seeing as Space Marines are supposed to be that awesome. That's only my point of view, mind you

Arkhan said:

He will still automatically pass any Challenging strength check or better, barring any situational modifers and any house ruled automatic failure (some people I know rule it that 96-100 fails automatically, similar to the combat rules). Anything harder than that and he can fail, even if it is unusual.

Arkhan said:

Huh?

Strength 70, +20 from Mark VII Power Armour, gives Strength 90. Unnatural Strength doesn't affect the basic characteristic value, but rather the bonus, so that character has a Strength Bonus of 16 (7x2, +2 from the Armour's +20), but he still tests against 90 for a Challenging (+0) Strength Test.

Ahh, thank you my friends, now it becomes clear, these are really good news

@borithan

Why 12 strength bonus? Shouldn't it be 70 x 2 = 140? Or am I missing something here too?

No, your not missing anything... just a typo on my part.

Arkhan said:

You double the strength bonus and then add PA bonus on top of it. Your strength bonus is only the 10s digit of the attribute. So base strength of 50 would be a bonus of 12 in PA (10 from the base strength, +2 from the 20 strength from PA).

Yeah, how to add together the total Strength bonus value was clear to me, I was just confused because of the 12, which, as borithan already pointed out, should have been a 14.

Nevertheless, thanks again for explaining that to me, I totally overlooked that when reading the rules (and obviously my group did, too). This way, the +/- 60 rule makes perfect sense again. And as Stormast pointed out, there's nothing wrong with the AM passing challenging tests automatically, I mean he IS a bloody strong fella, so that's ok. I have just been unhappy that he passes ALL the tests, but hey, if I'm too blind to read the rules, then it's not the fault of the system

Well the rule isn't exactly crystal-clear anyway and it is a bit hidden somewhere you wouldn't expect it to be But it appears the same problem was raised in my own "face to face" Deatwatch group, and I did the research...So now I know

Unnaturals tend to make the game scale on a very strange way anyway (meaning when you give Unnatural Toughness to the PCs, you nearly immediatly need to find how to add 1d10 damage to your mooks ). Lucky us, they don't do it too dramatically on characteristics tests ^_^'