Dresden Files repeatedly stresses that things like Lawbreaker, Sponsored magic, and oaths upon your power are serious deals, that affect you spiritually. They are not matters of morals or ethics; they are the way the universe works. But this also makes them eminently impeachable. If it is a law of morality that it is wrong to kill with magic, then not even the word of the Almighty can make it otherwise. But if it's a law of reality? Magic, technology, hell, even Stunts, Fate points, and good luck on the Fudge dice can interfere with reality.
So, take the disease metaphor of Lawbreaking. Performing certain actions can afflict your very soul, and if left untreated, can grow, spread, and metastasize until they have taken over your very being. Well, there is a treatment for things like that in the physical world. If a part of your body has grown sick and gangrenous, you clamp it, cut it off, and seal the wound. What if you could do that to your soul, as well?
Spiritual amputation was introduced to wizards by a particularly pernicious Outsider. Learning the ritual to perform it is almost always enough to rack up Lawbreaker(Seventh)[-1]; performing it counts as egregious or repeated violations automatically, and pushes you to [-2].
The ritual adds a Maimed Soul (Law of Magic)[-2] Stunt to the mortal spellcaster it is performed on. This stunt replaces the relevant Lawbreaker stunt (if it exists). This Stunt functions identically to the Lawbreaker[-2] Stunt; with the following exceptions:
*The bonus is extended by an additional +1 to all relevant rolls to break the law.
The natural inclination of the character to avoid depravity has been stripped away, with either crude brutality or cold precision. The barrier within the character that is weakened by depravity is now gone entirely.
*The character cannot spend Fate points to improve or reroll actions taken that benefit from the bonus. Your soul has been sufficiently violated that it cannot lend strength to your sins.
*Lawbreaking of the specified type no longer twists your aspects; however, all aspects that were previously tainted are now tainted with Spiritual Amputation. For example, a character with the Aspect I MAKE THE HARD CHOICES performs murder with their magic, and has the aspect tainted into I MAKE THE HARD CHOICES, I METE OUT THE HARD CONSEQUENCES. Maimed Soul (First) might distort this aspect into I SEE NOW THAT THERE WAS NEVER A CHOICE.
Any character with a Maimed Soul stunt is, spiritually-speaking, an impossibility, an abomination, and a gap in the proper workings of the universe. The character's defenses all suffer Catches identically to Outsiders; in addition, any effects that specifically target Outsiders have equal effects on such characters.
Finally, characters can use this practice to escape debts and bargains. A character can gain a Maimed Soul (Oathkeeping)[-2] stunt that protects from the consequences of any broken magical oath they might make, but also prevents them from swearing any other binding magical oaths, as well as releasing any creatures with oaths to the caster. This can also be used to erase both Sponsored Magic stunts and Sponsor Debt.
Finally, any two Maimed Soul stunts decrease the Refresh cost of all Maimed Soul stunts by one; a further two stunts (for a total of -6 of Maimed Soul stunts) reduces the cost by a further 1, to zero. A character so spiritually crippled no longer has enough soul to be meaningfully effected by further loss.
I haven't come up with the specifics of the ritual yet, but I'm assuming it's going to be one of those "Round up a room full of people and sacrifice them all to gain the requisite number of shifts" deals.
Thoughts?
