Brain damage: mental or physical?

[ARedthorn]

So, let's say I use water(decay) or biomancy to directly target and damage someone's brain- not their mind, their brain... Causing neurons to die or scramble in mass- hell, maybe even use air to cause an embolism- would this be physical or mental damage?
I'm leaning towards mental for flavor and appropriateness, and towards physical for the sake of mental damage being wicked dangerous and imbalancing.

Furthermore, if mental would it be a law violation? Prolly not 3rd law- you're not invading any minds... But maybe/probably 2nd law, with some concerns. It may be modifying their body, but as long as it doesn't kill them or cause an extreme consequence, the brain damage would be (by the rules) recoverable and temporary... Arguably no more of a 2nd law violation than cutting someone's arm off with fire- less even, since that's decidedly permanent of a modification, but still a raw attack.
Dresden in the books and the DFRPG stresses that the laws have some pretty broad grey areas... Maybe this would be one? (ie, no lawbreaker stunt less you make a habit of it, and you'd better pray whatever warden finds out about it is one of the forgiving variety... Good luck with that).

Thoughts?

[Radijs]

Most of the wardens would probably chop your head off. They don't go in to the fine details.

It could be argued as a 1st law violation though, especially if you botch the job and you wind up destroying someone's mendula ablongata which controls heart and lung functions (Or so Futurama tells me) and wind up killing the poor sod.

I would however think that intent and belief is important. You're giving someone brain damage for a reason. And I don't think its to help him recover from a post traumatic stress thing.

And as for physical or mental stress, I'd say physical. You're trying to physically destroy or alter parts of their brain. And for stuff like this I'd go for the full monty that you'd need a ritual that would fill all the vic's stress and consequences before it can take hold. Its not that far away from a killing curse.

[SunlessNick]

I'd agree about needing to fill all the stress boxes and impose an extreme consequence for it to take.

I also agree about the stress being physical - the direct stress anyway, though it would probably impose mental stress as a side effect.

It could be argued as a 4th law violation.  You're not exactly enthralling them, but you are likely to destroy parts of their minds along with the brain damage, which effectively changes how their free will can manifest itself.

But it does sound grey on all counts, so it makes sense you could avoid the Lawbreaker stunt.  Wardens are pretty broad in their interpretations though.  And I suspect this is the kind of thing they would be likely to regard as a deliberate attempt to get round (as distinct from obeying) the Laws, which they won't view kindly.

[newtinmpls]

You want to damage someone's brain? Seriously?

This is one of those ideas where I as DM look at why anyone would want to do this.

1-It's evil.
2-In my universe, anything the PC's can do the NPC's can do, so any spell/ritual/whatever you come up with is now loose in the multiverse (think an extreemely rapid 100 monkey effect). So IF a PC wants this, they are also okay with the bad guys having it.

[TheMouse]

Physically damaging someone's organs is physical damage. This part of the question answers itself.

There are, however, lots of problems with this.

Mechanically, you don't get to decide what Consequences your target takes. You can hit them in the brain, and they might choose to take an Extreme Consequence about being blinded or some such. So you're stuck Taking them Out if you want to be sure that they suffer debilitating brain injury.

Then there are Law issues.

Poking someone in the brain with the intent to break something seriously, perhaps even permanently, shows a marked willingness to potentially kill them. A Warden very well might take this as a willingness or even an attempt to use your magic to end their life. This can go lots of bad places.

Similarly, it's a very, very small leap from breaking someone's brain to a 4th Law violation. By causing brain injury (especially intentionally), you are taking away their ability to think for themself. You're not compelling them to do something, true, but you are preventing them from doing anything by mucking with their brain. A lot of Wardens are likely to see very little difference between their mind and their brain in regards to this.

[sinker]

Personally I'd say physical, and no lawbreaker. It is a violent act and may lead to death (in which case lawbreaker), but as it is it's no different from punching/cutting/burning/etc someone with magic. As long as they don't die, no lawbreaker.

[jb.teller4]

Well, philosophically the relationship between brains, "minds", "free will", "souls" (in the Dresden Files sense), etc. is an interesting topic.

But on the original topic, I lean towards it being physical damage. I'm more concerned with how physical vs. mental damage impact the game and narrative than which is more "accurate". The three main effects (that I can think of) are: 1) which track of stress you're impacting in a conflict (which matters for subsequent attacks), 2) what types of armor protects against it, and, most importantly I think, 3) how recovery is handled.

For any supernatural power impacting recovery (whether Inhuman/Supernatural/Mythic Recovery, Wizards Constitution, or even Living Dead) I'd say it recovers as a physical wound. The Recovery powers and Wizard's Constitution would allow brain damage to heal compeltely without any justification except time. this is definitely more like physical damage.

Even for mundane healing, I think that rest or medical care are more relevant than getting counseling or similar for minor brain injuries.

Of course, many brain injuries never heal (without supernatural recovery of some sort) and intensive therapy to build new pathways around the damaged region might be appropriate (like a stroke), but in the system that would only apply if they took an Extreme consequence.

On the topic of armor, it seems weird either way. Neither physical armor nor mental toughness seems like it would stop it (unless it was innate physical armor, like the Toughness powers), but I don't think it's a good idea to worry about modeling that level of detail. It you want, do a maneuver to place an aspect like 'Their brain is undefended by their armor' and tag it for +2 to your attack. Otherwise, I'd just treat it as any other physical attack.

Anyway, just my two cents.

-John B.

[zenten]

To me it looks like physical damage, no Lawbreaker stunt, but just about any Warden would execute you for doing it for violating the Laws.

[ARedthorn]

First off- to all those who have suggested a thaumaturgy weapons-grade spell... this assumes PERMANENT brain damage, which I explicitly stated not.

The idea that brains don't heal is... well, a myth. Brains are highly adaptive and heal, but slowly. Examples follow.

My primary concern has to do with the consequences taken. The primary consequences available to everyone are P/M/S, but many others aren't... so what consequences are available to the player matter. Also, flavor matters. Some brain damage causes physical disability... some brain damage causes mental issues. Examples also follow.

There was some testing a while back where a group of test subjects were asked to wear prism glasses that completely inverted everything they saw. At first, they really couldn't cope... but after a couple weeks, they all reported something odd- the world was back to being right-side-up... their brains had adapted to invert the images again... and now the world was upside-down without the glasses. When asked to remove them, it took another couple weeks for the brain to re-rewire itself to adapt.

I'm a synesthetic... in particular, most of my senses are linked to my sense of touch, due to a my brain never having properly trimmed all the boatloads unnecessary neural connections it formed as a baby.... in particular, it's a little faster at forming new ones, and a little slower at trimming them than anyone my age. Most people with synesthesia learn to cope with it fairly easily in time... but as they age, it's also possible for the synesthesia to fade. I used to have a strong pain response to a particular stimuli that's since gone away. I'm not sure whether synesthesia would qualify as physical or mental, but I'd barely lean towards mental, myself... and it can definitely be caused by rewiring someone's brain. Hell, LSD causes short-term synesthesia.

I used to work with a man (as his caretaker) who had moderate mental retardation and aphasia. Aphasia I would ABSOLUTELY qualify as a mental disorder- so does medicine and psychology. It's similar to synesthesia on a lot of fronts, but instead of a scrambling of the sensory centers, it's a scrambling of the language centers... and while my guy was born with it, it's possible to develop... and possible to recover from. Those who recover typically do in one of two ways- either their brain fixes it's own miswiring (like with the glasses), or the person can relearn english as a second language. Even my guy was able to do this latter to some degree, if never completely (on account of his mental retardation). I'd call this a textbook Severe consequence, and most likely Mental.

And if it's only a severe consequence, it would probably land squarely in the grey zone of the laws... just like almost killing someone with magic doesn't count as a 1st law violation.

That said... I only barely lean towards this being able to cause mental damage... mostly because mental damage is supposed to be rare.... and the last thing we need is another way for someone to legally completely bypass all toughness. As such- I'm easily convinced to call it physical and avoid the issue, but wanted to touch base with the forums first.

Radijs/SunlessNick- does this make my question a little more clear?
newtinmpls- of course it's probably evil- it's certainly very very vicious, and it takes a certain kind of person to be that vicious... 99% of the time... not someone good.
TheMouse- I didn't think of 4th law... I like that.
sinker/zenten- thanks for the input
jb.teller4- that was more than just 2 cents... and I appreciate it.

[Roxy Rocket]

ARedthorn, you don't have a problem. You have a backwards.

You choose what stress track to attack and the consequence matches the track. If you choose brains and then fiddle around with the mind-body distinction then it's FATE that will have the brain-hurt, not the NPC.

FATE doesn't have rules for attacks on brains, it has rules for attacks on stress tracks and they can be narrated as...well whatever makes sense. You can stick to purely narrative reality for these things but that's another topic.

[braincraft]

What you want to do is blind a guy, long-term if not permanently. Use a ritual that does this.

It hardly matters whether you do this by damaging his eyes, his brain, his soul, by cursing him with terrible visions whenever he opens his eyes, by hypnotically convincing him that he can't see, by sympathetically blindfolding a voodoo doll, or by creating portals in front of his retinas that send light to another dimension.

[TheMouse]

It hardly matters whether you do this by damaging his eyes, his brain, his soul, by cursing him with terrible visions whenever he opens his eyes, by hypnotically convincing him that he can't see, by sympathetically blindfolding a voodoo doll, or by creating portals in front of his retinas that send light to another dimension.

Convincing him he can't see is definitely a 4th Law violation, while giving him terrible visions could be. Convincing him he can't see is going to get you the Lawbreaker Stunt and if a Warden finds out, snicker snack goes his sword. Cursing him with terrible visions is only like 99% sure to get your head cut off.

[sinker]

Convincing him he can't see is definitely a 4th Law violation, while giving him terrible visions could be. Convincing him he can't see is going to get you the Lawbreaker Stunt and if a Warden finds out, snicker snack goes his sword. Cursing him with terrible visions is only like 99% sure to get your head cut off.

Meh, personally I feel that something like that is exactly the same as tying a freaking blindfold on someone. Or for that matter placing a wall of fire in front of them. You aren't enthralling them, you aren't taking away their ability to choose. The definition in the book is "any effort to change the natural inclinations, choices, and behaviors of another person", and it seems to me that those are all still there.

[TheMouse]

You aren't enthralling them, you aren't taking away their ability to choose. The definition in the book is "any effort to change the natural inclinations, choices, and behaviors of another person", and it seems to me that those are all still there.

You are convincing him he can't see. That's a definite change to his inclinations, which would be to use his eyes to see. But he can't now, because you've enthralled him not to be able to do so. Which creates a change in his behaviour.

It's really difficult to argue that mind controlling someone into not being able to see isn't mind control. You're arguing against a tautology.

[Masurao]

First off- to all those who have suggested a thaumaturgy weapons-grade spell... this assumes PERMANENT brain damage, which I explicitly stated not.

Affecting the brain at any level with a degree of precision and control is Thaumaturgy in my book. Biomancy comes into play if you want to have any chance of directing your magic at all. Evocation is quick and dirty and it is doubtful you'd have enough control to precisely affect such a intricate organ as the brain (or any organ, for that matter). Of course, if you have Sponsored Magic, you could use Thaumaturgy at the speed of Evocation and all that

You are convincing him he can't see. That's a definite change to his inclinations, which would be to use his eyes to see. But he can't now, because you've enthralled him not to be able to do so. Which creates a change in his behaviour.

It's really difficult to argue that mind controlling someone into not being able to see isn't mind control. You're arguing against a tautology.

I fully agree with TheMouse here. Your brain gets very conflicted signals, because, physically, it receives the signals that his eyes send out. However, the magic prevents these signals to reach the subject's conscious mind and interpret them at all. So, yes, it is breaking the 4th. The difference is, a blindfold is a known quantity, you know it is there and that it's that what is blinding you. If you manage to cast little disks of shadow in front of someone's eyes, that might be just as distressing at first as a mental attack, but at least your brain actually sees nothing and it isn't getting conflicted.

About the OP's question: you hinted at it in your own post, that what the game describes as mental and physical become really convoluted when the brain gets involved. Simply put: any 'mental illness' we know, has a physical cause, whether we have identified it yet or not. This is the reason that medicine works against depressions. But for the game I would go with Roxy Rocket's explanation: you choose how it affects the victim (within reason) and which stress track to attack.

And, yes, it is a big grey area. Technically, biomancy could circumvent the 4th law by rewiring the brain entirely, but do you think a Warden will care about technicalities when you've just made a man believe he is a rabbit? Whether it is a mind-destroying compulsion, or finely rewired neurons, the intent and effect are the same.