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hkmaly

Q&A / Story Friday, Apr 12, 2019

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http://egscomics.com/comic/qa8-15

Yeah, as predicted, laws of EGS universe can't contain something which would be problematic for some readers ...

... wait, what? Susan "doesn't have an irrelevant name-based affinity for cheerleading magic is because her inherited affinity for magic weaponry took precedence."...does it mean that people can't have two affinities? Because if not for this wording, I would assume that the inherited affinity for magic weaponry would take precedence in giving her spells, but she would still have the name based affinity and may get some cheerleading magic later when already having enough weapon spells ...

Also, totally expect that with name-based affinities rare the thing about Will of magic not "getting" some of the puns and missing them would apply.

PS: Lisa, don't worry: You are unlikely to get name-based affinity for summoning cupcakes, but you can still get the spell: cupcakes wouldn't be so hard magic you can only get it with affinity.

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The "given name must synergize with the surname" aspect is interesting, because in modern societies there is often no choice in a child's surname--assuming that the child is not an orphan, many governments mandate that the child take the surname of one of the parents (at least for what would count as the original naming of the child). Also, in societies where clan membership (not just nuclear family membership) is a legal thing, an adult can not simply change their surname arbitrarily--they must first dissolve any legal ties to their clan before renouncing their surname. Some take it even further, requiring adoption into a new clan (and taking that clan's surname) or else being clanless, which can be tantamount to being stateless (i.e. being deprived of certain rights that only clan membership grants). This means that a parent often could not change their surname in order to create an affinity-attracting name for their child. If your name happens to be Smith, then don't count on attracting an affinity that doesn't involve metal-working or something metaphorically similar.

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Just now, hkmaly said:

... wait, what? Susan "doesn't have an irrelevant name-based affinity for cheerleading magic is because her inherited affinity for magic weaponry took precedence."...does it mean that people can't have two affinities? Because if not for this wording, I would assume that the inherited affinity for magic weaponry would take precedence in giving her spells, but she would still have the name based affinity and may get some cheerleading magic later when already having enough weapon spells ...

This feels like something I've said before that I felt that name based affinities couldn't override genetic affinities. I wouldn't be surprised if Dan was intentionally avoiding making Susan EGS's version of Buffy the Vampire Slayer though Diane could potentially fill that role depending on how she awakens, but then any cheerleading type spells she'd get would be due to her personality rather than any affinity.

 

In general Dan's clarification basically amounts to him not wanting people to think that name based affinities are easy and knowledge of it would suddenly create an explosion of babies being given ridiculous names for the purpose of getting specific affinities. If might be more of a first come first serve situation at best if parents tried to game the system, but they'd have to be pretty creative to get that "on the nose" effect, same with changing names later on knowing that one could change their affinity might not let them change if unless the name they have a deep personal reason that negates their original affinity and their new name is still "on the nose", knowledge of how name based affinities work might still lessen the chance of changing names working since it might still come across as them being like "I don't like how my current name might imply I'd be getting those types of spells". The question though is, if someone awakens before changing their name would that basically set their affinity in stone and they could no longer change it by changing their name?

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I'm a lot happier with this than what the original version of the previous comic seemed to imply. On the other hand, there sure are a lot of "maybes" in this "answer".

It's also kind of jarring how the answer went from "no, you can't change your name to get an affinity" to "sure you can change your name to get an affinity so long as both you and Magic like the name enough". I hope Dan is still happy with this set up...

6 hours ago, hkmaly said:

Yeah, as predicted, laws of EGS universe can't contain something which would be problematic for some readers ...

Dan doesn't like to offend people. Also, alienating a good chunk of his target audience isn't a very good choice from a business perspective...

6 hours ago, hkmaly said:

... wait, what? Susan "doesn't have an irrelevant name-based affinity for cheerleading magic is because her inherited affinity for magic weaponry took precedence."...does it mean that people can't have two affinities? Because if not for this wording, I would assume that the inherited affinity for magic weaponry would take precedence in giving her spells, but she would still have the name based affinity and may get some cheerleading magic later when already having enough weapon spells ...

Well, I'd say it's more like one person can't have more than one "accessible" affinity at a time. I imagine the non-accessible affinities remain in a dormant state, and can become accessible if the currently accessible affinity becomes invalid for some reason.

I'm guessing this is similar to how name-based affinities can block other spells an immortal could give a person.

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9 hours ago, ijuin said:

If your name happens to be Smith, then don't count on attracting an affinity that doesn't involve metal-working or something metaphorically similar.

Fletcher Smith, with an affinity for musical magic.

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7 hours ago, ChronosCat said:
15 hours ago, hkmaly said:

Yeah, as predicted, laws of EGS universe can't contain something which would be problematic for some readers ...

Dan doesn't like to offend people. Also, alienating a good chunk of his target audience isn't a very good choice from a business perspective...

I seriously hope most of Dan's audience are not so much touchy.

8 hours ago, ChronosCat said:
15 hours ago, hkmaly said:

... wait, what? Susan "doesn't have an irrelevant name-based affinity for cheerleading magic is because her inherited affinity for magic weaponry took precedence."...does it mean that people can't have two affinities? Because if not for this wording, I would assume that the inherited affinity for magic weaponry would take precedence in giving her spells, but she would still have the name based affinity and may get some cheerleading magic later when already having enough weapon spells ...

Well, I'd say it's more like one person can't have more than one "accessible" affinity at a time. I imagine the non-accessible affinities remain in a dormant state, and can become accessible if the currently accessible affinity becomes invalid for some reason.

I don't think affinity can become invalid. Well, name-based one maybe, but those are the weakest anyway.

8 hours ago, ChronosCat said:

That's different.

What I'm speaking about is that affinity would eventually run out of "important" spells to give and therefore stops blocking other spells. Similarly how Elliot could only get non-girl spells if he starts liking the girl ones or how Nanase needed to stop hiding to get non-hiding spells.

 

 

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