changing material attributes at runtime

For some reason....Unity doesn't let me change Material attributes at run-time, with scripts... On selecting the offending Material in the Inspector it will suddenly update, but if left to it's own devices...nada.

Apparently if you make a copy of the material and assign it to a disabled/hidden gameobject in the scene, then alter the material to be how you want it, on running the game your original material should function as desired. - this however didn't work for me :(

But....it seems for what I was doing (altering the emission colour), simply setting the material's emission above 0 allowed the script to function properly.

The internet suggested "shared materials" and "shader variants"...but I haven't had much luck with those either...

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