Do Wound and Fatigue penalties apply to Soak totals?
At first it appears they may – page 178 says “The character suffers a penalty to all actions (rolls and totals) equal to the sum of all penalties due to his wounds…” On the other hand, Soak is a Total (page 171), but is it an action? A player cannot decide, “my character will now attempt to Soak this or that.” Soak happens automatically whenever the character (potentially) takes damage. An important clue is on 172 under “Combat: Simple Example.” The penultimate paragraph says “note that Polandrus’s Wound Penalty does not apply to Soak because Soak is not rolled.” That’s pretty explicit, though it’s an obscure reference that’s hard to find (especially in the middle of a game session). So, no, Wound Penalties do not appear to be meant to apply to Soak. The word “totals” in the discussion of Wound Penalties probably means things like Lab Totals and Study Totals, which are not rolled (though for Study Totals, the effects of wounds are discussed under “Activities While Injured” on pages 1
