Do flaws / Merits generate warping?

This just crossed my mind, initiations that grant a virtue or a "gift" given by a fey, angel, demon, magical creature, etc, do they grant warping due to ongoing effect?

Say a demon gives you the flaw: Cursed: Will feel the cold despair of life until death does you apart. Do you also gain infernal warping?

W

IMO both are possible.

If you start play with a flaw it's normally part of your essential nature, meaning that it can't be removed and isn't a mystical effect anymore.

A curse can be an ongoing mystical effect, or it could be a permanent Perdo or Muto effect (impossible with Hermetic magic, but we're not talking about Hermetic magic here).

Your essential nature can be changed by mystery initiations, adding new (permanent) flaws, and a demon is surely going to be better at creating flaws than a mere mystery cult :slight_smile:

I would say it depends on how they do it. For example if you have the flaw cursed because the demon cursed you, that is an ongoing effect. If you have the flaw cursed because you went through a demonic initiation and desecrated the name of God, then there is no warping. Though in that case you should also probably have a dark secret, but if you are doing those kind of rituals you probably had that anyways...

An important note on this: Ongoing effects are dispellable. Permanent one-shot effects aren't.

If you want the flaw to be truly permanent, it won't also grant warping.

If you have an actual Virtue/Flaw, that means it part of you Essential Self and it does not cause Warping.

However, there's any number of ways to bless/curse you with an effect that simulates a Virtue/Flaw, but is an external effect. These do cause Warping.

...that's my take anyway.