Inspired by the discussion of Soul Poisons on Monte Cook's forums; original post by Quilion as "Truename Variant Mechanics"

So your one player with an unbound character is complaining that he's missing out.  From character creation, the pros and cons seem logical--the Bound can be targeted by Curses, the Unbound cannot.  The Bound can be targets by other spells requiring a truename, the Unbound cannot.  But these don't seem to come into play very often, and in the meantime, the Unbound character is not only missing out on numerous beneficial spells, but a whole slew of ceremonial feats. 

One way of combatting this is the creation of unbound-only feats, as has already been developed on this site.  Another way is to increase the use of things like curses--making potential truename penalties *real* penalties.  And further along that way is the manner described in here--Soul Poisons.

A Soul Poison does not attack your body--though it *can* have a physical effect, up to and including death.  Soul Poisons attack your soul--and more specifically, the part of your soul where your truename resides.  Soul Poisons are not merely alchemical in nature.  Powerful rituals are required to create them, rituals that can only be enacted at certain times, and which require rare reagents.  Though they can be created by those without magic, the power of the ritual *does* imbue the poison with magical energy.  These are thus magical poisons.

A soul poison comes in one of two forms--it can affect everyone with a truename (but never Unbound at all), or it can only affect someone with a specific truename.  The former is usually created by Unbound Assassins, who can share a meal with the poison liberally dosed throughout it, while only his guest suffers an ill effect.  The latter cannot be made at all, unless the creator knows the target's truename.  The assassin must obtain his target's truename, and then create the poison, which will only ever work against that single target.  Though the former kind of soul poison could conceivably be found on the black market, the latter kind can never be found there.

EFFECTS:

All soul poisons have the following effect:

• They are resisted by Will saves, instead of Fortitude saves.  Any ability damage and ability damage recovery similarly involves Will Saves instead of Fortitude saves.

• They cause a target to lose all abilities that require having a truename, until the poison has killed the target or been neutralized.  This includes all Ceremonial Feats.

• They cause a target to become vulnerable to Truename magic.  Any spell or ability where the caster knows the target's truename gains a +2 to DC for any saving throw. 

• The target cannot be resurrected if he dies while under effect of a Truename poison.  He *can* be raised as Undead, unless the spell involved requires knowing the target's truename.

• The poison is magical and can be detected with Detect Magic (school: transmutation and necromancy, strong aura).  A targeted Dispel Magic can suppress the poison as though supressing a magical item, but cannot remove the poison (and thus is essentially a delaying tactic). 

• The poison cannot be removed by a simple Remove Poison-type magic.  It *must* be removed first by a Remove Curse, then a Remove Poison.  The caster of both spells must know the target's Truename in order to save him. 

Someone must successfully resist both Initial and Secondary damage rolls to resist the poison.  Fail one or both, and the poison remains in your system until removed as outlined above.  While someone may survive and eventually recover from any ability damage inflicted in the Initial and Secondary damage phases, the other soul poison effects continue to affect the target until removed. 

Some soul poisons are limited to just these effects--it is a non-spell way of ensuring someone does not come back from the dead, for instance.  In addition, someone who suffers no ability damage may feel only a sense of temporary malaise, and may never realize they have been poisoned until they try to use a Truename ability.  Many soul poisons, however, also cause ability damage.  A soul poison that does ability damage does so only in the Initial and Secondary phases, as with normal poisons.  It is only the Soul Poison effects which continue to affect the target beyond that.

CREATION

Creating a basic soul poison requires a month-long ritual with rare herbs and strange reagents costing 500 gp.  It has all the effects common to soul poisons, but causes no ability damage.  The save DC against such a poison is 15. 

Creating a soul poison that also causes ability damage requires a 'base' poison.  The ability damage of your finished soul poison will thus reflect some other poison such as Black Lotus extract or Wyvern poison.  The save DC and poison abilities are as listed for the base poison, save that any ability damage is reduced by 2.  The ritual to modify an existing poison takes two months of work, with herbs and reagents that cost 5 times the base price of the poison.  Therefore a Soul Poison based on Black Lotus Extract would have a resist DC of 20, do 3d6-2 initial and secondary Constitution damage, and cost 22,500 gold.  You must have a sample of your base poison in order to create a soul poison with it; the base poison becomes part of the soul poison.

Both creation methods can be used to create soul poisons for anyone with a truename, or create a poison for a specific individual (as long as the creator already knows the individual's truename). 

Sample soul poisons:

Basic soul poison: injury or ingestion DC 15; Initial and secondary damage 0; soul poison effects; price 500 gp.

Wyvern venom soul poison: Injury DC 17; initial and secondary damage 2d6-2 Con; soul poison effects; price 15000 gp

Drow soul poison: Injury DC 13; initial damage Unconsciousness, secondary damage Unconsciousness 2d4 hours; soul poison effects; price 375 gp

Arsenic soul poison: ingested DC 13; initial damage 0, secondary damage 1d8-2 Con; soul poison effects; price 600 gp

Lich Dust soul poison: Ingested DC 17; initial damage 2d6-2 Str, secondary 1d6-2 Str; soul poison effects; price 1250 gp.