I can buy that. I suspect it still drastically counts against "Familiars." How often have you cast spells on other people's Familiars? (Yours doesn't matter in the count due to overlap.) How often have you cast any sort of animal spell on yourself or another person, a spell on animal that isn't your Familiar (including Bjornaer), etc. Even Bjornaer alone strongly suggest this counts against Familiars. Which is more likely: A Bjornaer casts a spell on themself in animal form, or a non-Bjornaer casts a spell on their Familiar? On top of that, which is more likely: A Bjornaer casts a spell on an animal of their preferred type, or a non-Bjornaer casts a spell on a Familiar that is not their own? I've played in plenty of sagas over a couple decades, and I don't believe a single time I've seen probability on the side of "Familiars" being more common, and that includes several characters of my own who focused very heavily on using their own Familiars.
I get that. But I haven't seen anything presented that seems to show greater size for "Familiars." Counting targets, counting effects, probability of application, etc. What actually shows "Familiars" to be broader?
It is just possible that familiars being a fair and balanced MMF says a lot about the kind of sagas one expects.
Let me repeat that I did not conclude that familiars should be major, merely that the arguments for its being minor were not quite as clearcut as presented.
They may not be clearcut arguments. But so far I haven't seen anyone actually present an argument to qualify them as Major, except for withdrawn arguments based on having missed or forgotten the core book's text on Foci and Familiars. That means so far there are multiple solid points that it should generally qualify as Minor and not a single one that it should generally be Major, either here or before on this topic.
Personally, I'd love a erratum on this and if there is something especially unusual about a saga that would change relative values, then that rare saga could house-rule it to Major. It's not that it needs erratum, as you can take an ultra-narrow MMF, but we have seen it repeatedly cause confusion when people try to rationalize why it's Major.
What I'd like is something where what I call "enchanting foci" (foci where everything invested in something covered by the foci is affected by it) are bumped one category.
So, in short, you'd have a mMF in Gold that would govern spells relative to Gold, but not enchantments in a golden ring to make people invisible. For that, you'd need to increase the focus to Major.
This would help make sense, IMO, of ultra-restrictive foci, like Familiars or wooden wands: They are, in essence, mMF foci with a extra restriction, bumped back to minor by being "enchanting foci"
Sure. An erratum to make it familiars a minor focus sounds like a good idea. I am inclined to defend canon over houserules, simply in the interest of stability and shared reference. The argument that a canon MMF does not preclude the same focus area as mMF is counter-productive. While it is logically true, it would also imply that the canon reference to the MMF is meaningless, and the second-guessing it encourages would be such a chore.