>> Suppose you're healing someone. You use your first aid ability
>> (whch may be 6), and your "heal things" magic, whether that's a
>> Feat, common magic, or whatever. You use them both at once.
>> Obviously. Even if the first aid is just to recognise that the
>> bit that needs healing is the bit that's bleeding a lot. So
>> which is primary and which is an augment, and how does the
>> Gloranthan character know?
>
>Exactly. Is there a difference between an augment use and a non-augment
>use of magic to the Gloranthan Eye? I really am not sure.
About the only thing I can think of is that people are required to concentrate to perform magic. Without the concentration they only get a boost to what they're doing which happens without them knowing or understanding what they're doing. So an initiate with a break weapon feat hasn't the ability to decide "I will break my opponent's weapon" and it can't happen by itself or they'd never be able to spar. What it does mean is that in combat the trick they learnt to break an opposing weapon has an increased chance of working. If they don't know that trick they can't use the magic.
So moving on to the issue of active and passive use of magic I think passive is a much narrower definition than has been used. Basically it's only applicable if it is the target of the enemies attack. So if someone tried to slow down a Destor warrior the warrior could use his movement affinity as the resistance. If someone was trying to kill the warrior he couldn't. A concentrated user however could use his movement affinity to dodge the attack.
I don't know if this is right, but it seems internally consistant which the distinction between initiator and defender of a contest don't.
-- Donald Oddy http://www.grove.demon.co.uk/
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