> The Puma's shapechanging ability is *not* common magic. There most
> likely will be something in the FAQ, that will hopefully be up shortly,
> explaining this.
Would you care to produce some basis in the rules for this assertion? Which part of my reasoning is either a) wrong as the rules stand, or b) is about to be FAQ'd to be false?
Once again:
> > > The middle section of that sentence is key. There's *nothing* in the
> > > rules that say you can't specify that a magic you were born with is
> > not
> > > common magic.
> >
> > What it's saying is that they need not arise from the common
> > *religions*.
>
> Nope, that's not what it's saying. Nowhere in that sentence is it
> saying anything about religions.
Apart from the first clause of that sentence, which gives it its entire context? (The part you didn't quote.)
"Heroes can learn talents from common religions, but this is not required; [...]"
And 'common religion' is much closer to the sense of the category you seem to be wanting to use 'common magic' for: 'common magic' is both inherent and learned mundane world magic, 'common religion' denotes only the latter.
> If a player wants his hero to have a magic ability (not common magic
> talent), there's *nothing* in the rules that says he can't.
The sense of the clause that you can specify it to be something other than a talent implies strongly to me that's what's meant is that you may specify it to be a charm, spell, or feat. The idea that you can specify it to be 'a type of innate magic that isn't a talent' is at best multiplying entities needlessly and on the basis of no evidence, and more reasonably is contradictory. Talents are _precisely_ the category of magic designed to model abilities of this sort, as the entire discussion of innate magic (p104 again) makes clear.
p29 is entirely specific as to this being the intended interpretation:
"Any magical ability written on the character sheet but not defined as a feat, charm or spell is assumed to be a talent within the common magic keyword."
> The narrator can, if that's the way she wants her Glorantha to be.
> That's not the official line, though.
The official line seems fairly clear to me that 'magic ability' in this sense _is_ innate magic, i.e. _is_ a talent.
> > � (Personally I'm not entirely clear how meaningful it is to
> > be "taught" innate magic, though;� one could rationalise this as being
> > training to use an existing but unknown or "unawakened" capability, in
> > the same sort of sense that being able to run is inherent to an
> > able-bodied human, but you can still be 'taught' to do it better.) If
> > innate magic isn't common magic in the broad sense, then what pray tell
> > is it?
> Just that: an innate magical ability. There will be an entry in the FAQ
> clarifying this.
Contradicting the rules, glossary entries, etc, that I quoted? That would seem an unfortunate (and I hope unlikely) turn of events.
Simplest fix still seems to me to be to rule that talents do not as a rule get excluded from 'otherworldly concentration', perhaps with some sort of proviso about 'learned' vs. 'inherent' talents, if that can be made to stand up, else just a more general one about 'your religion may vary'. This does unfortunately contradict one passage, but at least it doesn't introduce a whole level of hand-waving about categories of magic Not Appearing In These Rules.
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