Immunities conveyed by effigies

[Praetorum]

The wiki page for effigy states this:

If their Effigy requires a certain strain upon the Mortal body to use, the body will become resistant to that strain. Like their Dragon, the Bearer is immune to any powers, be they from Effigies, Blessings, Magic, or natural sources, that fall under the Aspects of their Effigy.

I have a couple questions about this. First of all, what does "strain" mean in this context? Is it the use of aesthete? Or would it be something like "breathing ice makes you resistant to ice"? If so, that seems redundant with the immunity section—surely most breath powers channel the effigy's aspect already?

Also, what does it mean to be immune to an aspect? Some of them are relatively self evident: fire immunity conveying protection from heat, poison immunity from toxins, etc. But what about more emotional aspects like fear and rage? Is an immunity only applicable to unnatural manipulation of these emotions, or are they entirely deadened for the wielder? How about abstract aspects? What is an immunity to bonds? Or to growth? Does the effigy of vindecaldra halt age, in that case? I'm pretty skeptical that it should.

Are these immunities able to be switched on and off at will? With vindecaldra's aspects including restoration, would a wielder of her effigy be unable to be healed by others? This feels outside the original intention of effigy.

Finally, it feels somewhat strange to me that someone with vindecaldra's effigy is able to avoid damage by excessive heat, but would not be able to retain/generate their own heat if affected by cold, if that makes sense. This one I'm less certain about, and I mostly bring up because it ties into my proposed solution, which is for the effigy bearer to be able to regulate these aspects within themselves.

That is to say, that the effigy bearer is able to keep at a baseline level of this aspect (growing at an appropriate rate, body temperature normal, normal amounts of fear) and then choose if and to what degree they want external influences to shift that aspect within them.

This makes it clearer what immunity is (you remain at a normal state) and allows characters to decide the degree of immunity they want, depending on the situation.

Note: no real timelimit on this question for me, the threads I'm planning where this might become relevant are quite a bit later down the line.

[Basilisk]

Hiya. While I'm not the final say on this, I am the one who wrote that sentence, so I'll clarify what I can.

I have a couple questions about this. First of all, what does "strain" mean in this context? Is it the use of aesthete? Or would it be something like "breathing ice makes you resistant to ice"? If so, that seems redundant with the immunity section—surely most breath powers channel the effigy's aspect already?

This was deliberately left somewhat vague, since I wasn't sure what form Effigy might take as other people worked on it. The idea behind this was that it would act as a blanket cover for anything that conferred a secondary strain on the body. High altitude flight is a good example, since most Effigies confer some form of flight. I didn't want to make people have to write an additional paragraph just to cover being able to breath easily at higher than their normal altitudes, or not getting cold because they're really high up, or needing eye protection from the wind. Things of that nature. If it needs tightening up, though, that can be done.

Also, what does it mean to be immune to an aspect? Some of them are relatively self evident: fire immunity conveying protection from heat, poison immunity from toxins, etc. But what about more emotional aspects like fear and rage? Is an immunity only applicable to unnatural manipulation of these emotions, or are they entirely deadened for the wielder? How about abstract aspects? What is an immunity to bonds? Or to growth? Does the effigy of vindecaldra halt age, in that case? I'm pretty skeptical that it should.

Same deal as the above, and for the same reason. This one definitely needs tightening up and should probably be explained on the individual Effigy pages, because I don't think it's possible to make a good blanket statement for this one with how Effigy has grown since I wrote that.

Are these immunities able to be switched on and off at will? With vindecaldra's aspects including restoration, would a wielder of her effigy be unable to be healed by others? This feels outside the original intention of effigy.

You are correct, it would be outside the original intention. Probably I should have specified harmful aspects, though whether or not that should be added the Effigy pages or to the main page is up for debate. Being able to switch them off the same way you switch off the physical traits might work.

Finally, it feels somewhat strange to me that someone with vindecaldra's effigy is able to avoid damage by excessive heat, but would not be able to retain/generate their own heat if affected by cold, if that makes sense. This one I'm less certain about, and I mostly bring up because it ties into my proposed solution, which is for the effigy bearer to be able to regulate these aspects within themselves.

See above.

That is to say, that the effigy bearer is able to keep at a baseline level of this aspect (growing at an appropriate rate, body temperature normal, normal amounts of fear) and then choose if and to what degree they want external influences to shift that aspect within them.

This makes it clearer what immunity is (you remain at a normal state) and allows characters to decide the degree of immunity they want, depending on the situation.

Note: no real timelimit on this question for me, the threads I'm planning where this might become relevant are quite a bit later down the line.

See above above. I think it's a viable solution and could definitely be implemented if it's something we think it a good idea overall.

Thank you for raising this, Prae! It's good to know what's slipped through the cracks.