Say the protagonists have entered a surreal fantasy dreamscape to do something surreal and mystical and whatnot. (They are explicitly experiencing a dream or vision rather than being physically transported to a magical fairieland.) Say they fight some dream-baddies and get dream-wounded a bunch.
What are some ways to represent this mechanically, in situations where just applying the equivalent physical wounds to their “real bodies” doesn’t fit the narrative?
BW’s philosophy is that wounds are important long-term consequences, so we’re looking for examples that fit that pattern. Get your dream-guts ripped out by a demon and wake up with a really crazy, lasting trait, that kind of thing?
Well, it’s a whole session worth of stuff that we haven’t played yet, so there are many directions it could end up going. That’s why we’re kinda trying to feel out the mechanics available to us.
The larger context is that the dreamscape is a place of healing, but has become corrupted, and our hero seeks to fix that by facing various fantastical obstacles at the heart of the dream.
Applying an ongoing +Ob to actions, that expires at some time in the future, to represent mental anguish/damage is entirely legit RAW.
I have used -D penalties applied only to Will, Perception, Steel and Skills rooted (in whole or in part) in those Attributes. But that isn’t RAW and that was for more physically rooted damage, specifically hurt incurred during being plugged into wired-into-your-brain virtual reality. I treated these roughly like Sickness although duration of a given “injury” scaled based number of -D in size akin to how progressively higher PTGS wounds take orders of magnitude longer to heal. I stacked the effects of the -D with normal physical injuries in determining when the PC succumbed upon reaching 0 exponent in any Attribute.
The creature in the dream takes a part of them and they are psychically reduced as a result. Wounds correspond to damage to relationships or unsettling reputations, for example.
[ul]
[li]“You survive, but the next time you see your lover, Francesca, the spark is gone and you don’t connect any more. Everything is awkward. Take the trait ‘damaged love.’ If you play it, you’ll get Artha.”
[/li][li]“You survive, but the next time you address your men your voice seems hollow, even to you. The burden of command seems so much heavier. Take the trait ‘damaged confidence.’ If you play it, you’ll get Artha.”
[/li][li]"You survive, but in the waking world you’re still maimed somehow, deep in your soul, and people know it. Take a 1D infamous reputation, “Wounded Soul,” which will come into play whenever people need to have confidence in you.
[/li][/ul]
I agree with the idea of adding traits relevant to the kinds of mental anguish inflicted. Might I also suggest use of the Possessed trait to have a player come back from the dreamland with an agenda not their own.