So there have been a variety of conversations about how to make magic in play both better and better in accordance with the written material. Most of the conversations have been repeated with most of the players, but I thought I should write down my impressions of ideas that have been suggested.

The basic problems are that magic is unmagical and that it is treated as a set of effects, rather than as a process.

One suggested solution is at a mechanics level: hugely increase the degree to which mages learn affinities rather than the 15. Affinities might be with subjects (such as birds), but they might also be with methods. For instance, a mage might study from a text on magical associations with the high holy days and increase their ability to both cast spells on the high holy days, and also gain a bonus with spells that incorporated the magical associations of the high holy days. As another example, a mage might explore the use of balance in spell casting, and subsequently be able to cast more powerful spells so long as the spell was cast from a position of balance. The basic idea here is that mages incorporate certain habits into their magic because those habits are useful. Those habits should be paid attention to by the rules.

Another suggested solution is at a system of play level: currently, each player is largely responsible for adjudicating their own magic. While this works okay when a mage is spell casting for plot purposes, it doesn't work very well when a mage is studying magic, since the player is responsible both for coming up with what sort of problems they encounter, and also for coming up with how they solve them. It also doesn't work all that well because it is essentially monologuing, with no real player-player interaction over how the magical research progresses. The suggested solution to this is to have someone other than the player be designated as having partial responsability for each character's magic, so perhaps Kip would take responsability for adjudicating Sonata's magic, while I might take responsability for adjudicating Giles' magic, etc.

Two further suggestions relate to increasing the level of detail in the magic. One is the Lexicon game, which will eventually provide (over the course of half a year or so) a fully detailed library, with each book having character and specific contents. The second is to do the same thing to spells: e.g. what does Sonata's spell for transforming into a flock of birds consist of? What does she say, and what does she do, and what symbolic meanings are implied by the words and the gestures?