and it may make BlitzMax loose a bit of its polimorphism.
No, something like:
Local something:BaseType=New DerivedType
Would still be fine. The only thing that would be ruled out would be automatic Int <-> Object conversions. They could still be done, but with explicit casting.
I realise that Mark was trying to make things easier for beginners, but I think that in the end it actually complicates the matter.