At some point, there was a non-magical universe. That universe probably didn’t have the laws of physics as we know them, but it could have had something similar maybe? The life within that universe developed technology. They made some sort of high tech omnitool (like ambient nanobots). That tool was designed to be used by sentient intelligent beings, which explains why magic focuses on sentient beings. The tool had a help function. Which explains the effect where if you think about roughly what you want to do, magic will fill in the details. (mentioned elsewhere)
At some point, something went badly wrong.
It might be as simple as everyone accidentally getting full admin privileges, followed quickly by the first nerfing. It could be all sorts of weird bugs in the code.
Now you have mentioned the nested nerfing, I think that can go after the broken tool.
I had the broken tool hypothesis.
At some point, there was a non-magical universe. That universe probably didn’t have the laws of physics as we know them, but it could have had something similar maybe? The life within that universe developed technology. They made some sort of high tech omnitool (like ambient nanobots). That tool was designed to be used by sentient intelligent beings, which explains why magic focuses on sentient beings. The tool had a help function. Which explains the effect where if you think about roughly what you want to do, magic will fill in the details. (mentioned elsewhere)
At some point, something went badly wrong.
It might be as simple as everyone accidentally getting full admin privileges, followed quickly by the first nerfing. It could be all sorts of weird bugs in the code.
Now you have mentioned the nested nerfing, I think that can go after the broken tool.