It's probably a mechanics thing, I haven't seen anything that out-of-whack in my experiences.
Sometimes it isn't really obvious what modifiers are active in a scenario.
- The number in the gray circle up top is the "adjusted" number to beat in a roll. It includes any added difficulty due to failing a check (like in Bunyip's case), or other scenario modifiers. There's a "subtract one from all dice rolled" mod that periodically comes up.
- The number in the red box in the middle of the screen is the player's modifier. Its usually a positive number, but with situations like not having weapons proficiency when a card requires it, it can easily get to -4 or worse.
Having 9+ points of modifiers working against you is a little extreme, but could still be possible in certain situations. Usually when this sort of post pops up it is quickly explained away when the poster didn't have weapons proficiency.
I'll try to capture a video of it next time it happens as it's happening fairly frequently.
I know it's not a wisdom check because immediately after i rolled the 18 it attacked.