I took her for the example, it's not her specifically. For easy access : http://www.arkhamhorrorwiki.com/Zoey_Samaras

Her success says "... Zoey gains Fight +1."

Her failure says "Zoey suffers a -1 penalty to all Luck checks."

I was wondering why the failure text doesn't say "Zoey gains Luck -1." I understood "suffers a -1 penalty" as "throws one dice less that what she's supposed to throw". Am I right ? Or is "suffers a -1 penalty" means "throws the expecting amount of dice and applies a -1 to each dice (meaning a 4 become a 3)" ?

Hugues said:

The first one, I'd say, 1 die less on every check, otherwise, when cursed, she'd be unable to pass any Luck check, and I hope this is not the designer's intention.

As for the wording... maybe "gaining a malus" could have been misleading too? Not so confident with the language to be able to defend my point of view, anyway

Yep "Gains Luck -1" could be misunderstood. But the way it was written can be misunderstood too

And I thought about the Curse status, and thought "maybe it's like the shotgun, still a 6"... but would mean that it has no effect on a curse person.

So I really think it's one die less, but still have that doubt which annoys me.

It means she essentially has -1 Luck. The only difference is that if she had an encounter that gave her a bonus for having a "Luck of 2 or less," and her slider said 3, she wouldn't get the bonus. There are maybe one or two encounters out of all of Arkham and its expansions where this occurs, so the distinction is almost non-existent.

Okay, just to be sure I understood the right way.

If you take The Abyss encounter from that Kingsport other world encounter : http://www.arkhamhorrorwiki.com/File%3AGate100.png

"If your Speed is currently 2 or less".

Says the investigator has its cursor on the 3.

A card which says "Gains Speed -1", implies the investigator fulfills the requirements. (Wording i was suggesting)

A card which says "Get -1 penalty to your Speed checks", implies the investigator doesn't fulfill the requirements. (Zoey's wording)

But in fine, if a Speed check is made in both cases, 2 dice will be thrown ?

Hoping I made my mind clear.

Yes, that sounds right. Speed and Speed checks aren't exactly the same. Your speed checks are based on your speed stat, but that example encounter you posted references your speed stat without involving a check.

Another example is how the Dodge skill doesn't help you move any farther—it's only useful for Speed checks.

Yep, I didn't realized that "Gains -1 Speed" would also reduce the number of movement points you'll get. Somethings a "-1 penalty to your Speed checks" wouldn't do.

By the way, "-1 penalty to your Speed checks" should be written "-1D penalty to your Speed checks" to be less ambiguous I guess.

Thanks a lot Tibs, I think everything is clear now in my head.

No, I don't think that would make it less ambiguous. There are already environment cards in the base game that say things like "Luck checks (in Arkham) are made at a -1 penalty and Will checks are made at a +1 bonus." These figures don't actually change your stat's innate value.

It's pretty apparent from Zoey's text that any Luck checks she makes have an additional -1 penalty to any penalty they might already have. Making a Luck -2 check would become a Luck -3 check, for example. She would not get a +1 to Fight checks, but her Fight would already be 1 higher than whatever her slider says. If she had Tom Murphy as an ally, it would be 3 higher than whatever her slider says. If she had Murphy and a Sledgehammer, it would be 3 higher AND she would get +1 to any checks.

Like I said before, a distinction between making a check and the actual value of the stat only occurs very rarely, but you found an encounter that is a good example.

Unless you're talking about Speed, of course.

Speed is that ONE SKILL that gets transformed into movement points. Yes, in this case, having +1 Speed is better than having +1 to Speed checks, because you also get the benefit of the additional movement point..