Quote - actually, the main thing i'd want to be a light source is specific materials.  like Stonemason sets that have lights defined by materials.

Lux has a light type for that (see my post from yesterday ( ithink)), so that shouldn't be a problem at all.

Quote - i realize most flames and magic effect stuff would be impossible as true lights because they use transparency

They should be easy too, see the thread I posted just above for some examples of transparent lights in Lux.