Sigh - "Target" vs "target" again. (Not sighing at you, Rich - we're all the victims here.)
However the rules for Warping do not use that term! (see sig)
The way the rules do explain it is...
- Being affected by a powerful mystical effect
...
...being under a powerful mystical effect...
...
Anyone subjected to a powerful mystical effect...
The counter-position seems to be that if a spell affects something in the material world (the "Target"), and then that magically affected thing affects something else (the "target"), that the target is thus "affected" by the spell. And I say - pffft.
While with only the first phrasing it could be interpreted that a person hit by a wall of wind is "affected" by that magic, I believe there is no valid interpretation that demonstrates that such a person is either "under a powerful mystical effect" nor "subjected to a powerful mystical effect".
If all it took was for a person to feel an immediate difference in their life (thus, "be affected"), then if a 6th magnitude spell were used to...
- ... create a wave to push a boat, then the boat and all aboard are warped, "having been affected" by the magic.
b) ...give a grog +Strength spell on them, and they then lift up a peasant, the peasant is then warped - they were "affected" by the spell - no different than being lifted by magical air or pushed by magical water.
iii) ...as a more subtle example, yet one still absolutely parallel, to cause a person to spread false information - every other person's mind who "comes in contact" with that person, and who believes that information and then acts on it, is "affected" by that spell (a Mentem spell, with Mentem affects), and thus is warped "because they are affected".
However, none of these "targets", these persons who are secondarily effected by the primary magical affect, are "under or subjected to a powerful mystical effect" - no more than grogs living in a tower permanently conjured by (6th magnitude) magic would be "under" such an effect, or someone who meets a person cursed with a terrible stench is "subjected to" that powerful magical effect - not in the same sense that the Target is, which is the only person/thing warped.
If it were, then anyone ever walking across a (Lvl 30+) magically created bridge is warped - as they clearly are equally directly "subjected to" the benefits of the bridge being there.
We could take this to more absurd extremes of "being affected by a high level spell" (healing spells on people who then interact with others, patching roofs to keep people dry, illusions which people see) but none of them are essentially different, since none of them "subject" the target to the effect itself, nor is the target ever themselves "under" that effect. Thus, "affect" cannot (in this context) be intended to mean "have any end influence on" a target, merely coming into (often violent) contact with active magic. It must, imo, mean "as a Target of the magic". (Or, if not, the words were very poorly chosen, and I refuse to believe that until a writer fesses to it.)