"magical affinity" - what does it mean?

[Papa Gruff]

Hey everybody!

Right now I'm pondering over the question what construes "magical affinity". It's only mentioned once in YW169 in the first paragraph of the "Marked by Power" passage.

What does this entail? Is somebody with an average or fair lore skill affine to magic? Do you have to be a supernatural being to sense "Marked by Power"? Do you need wizard senses or is it enough to be a practitioner of some sorts? Are Knights of the Cross magical affine?

You see it can be read as dreadfully inaccurate or you can simply decide that everybody with the slightest connection to the supernatural world will be aware of it. Now: I know that it should come down to what's reasonable in the given situation, but I'm looking for opinions here.

[ways and means]

Its only a +1 to a non-attack skills so I would interpret it as loosly as possible.

[Richard_Chilton]

The way I look at it:
If someone can sense the mark, recognise the mark, recogniase that there is something that marked the character, or heard about the mark - then it kicks in.

For example, Karen Murphy in Storm Front wouldn't recognise a mark and if you told her that "Joe is the emissary of the Winter Court" then she wouldn't know what it meant.  If she encountered the PC then she wouldn't be impressed by the mark.

On the other hand, Karen Murphy in Small Favors would know what "Joe is the emissary of the Winter Court" means and would be impressed by the mark.  It wouldn't make her like or hate Joe, but she would know that there was more to him than meets the eye.

Looking at it this way makes sense to me.

Richard

[mostlyawake]

We use a very, very, very broad interpretation of this:

Are they inhuman? Then magical affinity counts.
Are they human with a Lore score above zero?  Then magical affinity counts.  Absolutely anyone with any understanding of magic recognizes that this person is marked somehow, but maybe doesn't recognize the mark itself.  That's why the bonus counts even at that level: you know the person is connected somehow, so you play it safer (they get the bonus).

[Papa Gruff]

We use a very, very, very broad interpretation of this:

Are they inhuman? Then magical affinity counts.
Are they human with a Lore score above zero?  Then magical affinity counts.  Absolutely anyone with any understanding of magic recognizes that this person is marked somehow, but maybe doesn't recognize the mark itself.  That's why the bonus counts even at that level: you know the person is connected somehow, so you play it safer (they get the bonus).

That's pretty neat. Thanks. Anyone else an opinion?

[Richard_Chilton]

That's a more concise way of saying what I was trying to say.

Richard

[sinker]

For me it's all about the mystical perception trapping of lore. YS135:

In certain circumstances, you can substitute Lore for
Alertness to pick up on supernatural details about a scene.

I feel Marked by Power is one of those circumstances.