True not a fan of the guns much, it just takes the feel outta a magic story. Hehe i recon it would be a lost cause, a mudblood would know what it does, but i highly doubt they could but up a powerful shield to stop it! then like Necrule Paen had to say a pureblood would know jack shit about the whole process. truely it defeats the perpose (spelling!) of having magic if you have a gun! oh i suppose you could do it to kill the weasely slut!...then it's good.

 

And this where I wish she was more clear about what the shields can do. Does Protego stop a physical attack or only magical? There are other shields, but are the differences about strength, strategy, or what it stops? If its strength then does the weakest shield stop a bullet or do you need to use the second weakest shield or the third? If its strategy then what if the shield protects by the attack bouncing off, but that only works with blungeoning forces and modern bullets pierce and so the shield fails? If it is about what it stops then what if the chosen shield does not stop physical objects? It is not very clear at this point what the shields can and cannot do. I personally think that there are certain spells and counterspells that work better under certain circumstances. I imagine that apart of Auror training is not learning spells but learning when to use them.

I agree with srispg that a wizard could stop a bullet at close range but I think they first need to know what they need to do, a wizard who has never even given a thought as to what they should do if confronted with a gun would most definitely just freeze. Besides, the description most wizards are going by is a metal wand. How many times have you looked at a gun and immediately thought 'hey that looks like a metal wand' if you have, well, I won't even say it. Basically what I am saying is that the wizard would have to know what they are facing and what to do, a deatheater recruit not very likely, a inner circle deatheater it depends on how they usually go about attacking muggles, aurors, Hit Wizards, and Obliviators all have a very high likelyhood of knowing what to do considering their professions, average witch or wizard? Unless they are familar with the muggle world I would say a resounding no.

 

If a gun finds its way pointing at your face, and the owner has the intention of shooting you, you will be shot in the face before you can react. Before you can so much as form a reptillian thought, let alone a conscious one.

If someone's behind you, and shoots a gun at you, the first sign that you've been shot at is a hole in your body. There's no warning whatsoever, and no chance to dodge or bring up a shield.

If you and a cowboy are standing on opposite sides of Main Street, when the clock strikes noon, he'll be able to pull out a gun and shoot you much quicker than you'll be able to pull out a wand and think three sylables. Usually, you can't consciously think a whole lot faster than you can speak. So do this little test -- Take out a stopwatch, and see how long it takes you to pull a trigger. .002 seconds, you say? Quick, eh? Now say (or think) 'Portego'. How slow was that? 1.2 seconds? .7 seconds? .3 maybe? Oh, shame, you're dead already.

Are you seriously trying to argue that you can think 'portego' in less time than it takes for a bullet to travel ten feet? How would you know that the gun's been fired? What would be your cue to bring up a shield?

Unless you can send your thoughts backward, you have no warning that you're being shot at, until you're shot.

Wrong. The difference is inversed. The bang happens AFTER you've got a hole in you. So even if you can bring up a shield in the very instant that you hear the bang, you'll have already been shot. And you cannot bring up a shield any quicker than that, because there will be no warning before that (unless the gun makes a flash, in which case, you might just have a shot, Flash).

Actually, I don't think that there's any wand-waving in Defence Against the Dark Arts at all, now that I think about it. Maybe someone points their wand at themselves to do a defensive spell, and at their enemy to do an offensive spell? And who says that the Shielding Charm forms immediately, anyway? Maybe it takes a few seconds to kick in. Does the shield create an energy wall in front of you, or does it surround your body? Who knows? Who cares?


But I don't think that I'll be doing any more arguing on the merits of firearms versus hocus pocus any time soon. Seems like a waste of the valuable time consumed by my thoughts.... We're going off topic and I always get yelled at when I disagree with mods....

 

It's only logical to assume that magic is more powerful than firearms (it would be totaly lame otherwise and Aurors would be using guns instead of wands, pride be damned).

Now, if spells are more powerful than bullets, how come they are slower?

The only logical conclusion is that energy is taken from the speed and transfered to the effect upon impact.

Thus, a bullet that hits it's mark has a lot less energy to cause damage than a spell with the same total energy.

The conclusion is that shield as Protego, designed to stop spells, is a complete waste of energy when used against bullets.

The only logical thing would be for there to exist some other shield that transfers less energy to the shield itself, and more energy to maintance. It could be like an invisible orb around cester, that is normaly unnotecable, unless there's kinetically fast object approaching the ceaster.

Conclusion is that there are shield specially designed to stop bullets, that are cast once and stay active for several minutes/hours. They DON't stop spells - they just go through them.

Thank you.

 

And we can all thank ip82 for giving us a logical explanation for why guns aren't used in HP.

Thanks again

 

Just countering some neglect here. This is one of my favorite old stories. I'm even tempted to call it a classic.

Sure, it's got a few moments of WTF (guns, throwing knives), but overall it has aged pretty well.

It has scenes that have stayed with me since I first read it: Harry and Peter Tyson stage a confrontation to get Snape arrested; Harry uses 'the power known not' to escape an assassination attempt in the Great Hall; Harry and Bill give Snape veritaserum at Grimmauld Place after a terrible tragedy. Those descriptions may not sound like much, but I bet the people who have read the story recall the details of the events.

Anyway, this is a good Indy!Harry story that does most things right and is very entertaining. Highly recommended.

4.5/5

 

eerrrrr....
I came up with a theory on how magic works.
Wizards can manipulate magic in an amount of energy similar to the amount a person could work physically (however they are barely intertwined).
IE It takes a person 4-10 seconds to start a fire, With practise they can do it in 1-3 seconds.
A magic user takes time to learn a simple spell to start a fire in 30 seconds and can take it down to seconds with some practise.

A person can build a brick wall 10X10 (cinder blocks) in 10 minutes
a really ripped guy can do it in one

a magic user who is first learning can only conjure something small and takes time to learn
The magical equivilant of being ripped can let the person do it almost instantly because they have spent that much time practising magic (working out)

The easier it is for you to strangle someone the less energy it would take for you to magicly do it.

So for a bullet, using a spell that slows it down when it has such a high rate of velocity would be really hard for a wizard because it has so much energy behind it. However if they use a spell to deflect it or conjure a wall solid enough for it to impact it should work.... I get bored at work and think stuff like this out... Its 1 in the morning and I am really tired. I will retype this tommorow so it makes more sence.

 

Way to jump in on a 5 year old discussion. Did you even read the fic?

 

Needtoknow, don't listen to all those silly billies, I think this has great potential.

Now write a self-insert about it that revolves around your character find a big blue stone that your character tries to get KFC with. Then all you... I mean your character has to do is find some hot chick to annoy for the rest of his life and kill a Voldemort-rip off. Then give the finished master piece to your parents who just happen to be rich and just happen to be in the publishing industry with a fair amount of clout and your all set to get something that looks a little bit like this with just a sprinkle of this.

Good luck!

 

Your poast made perfect sence.

 

Also, if possible, include a random reference to Dr. Who in your third book.

If you do this, you will be rich.

 

And don't forget the Bumblebee . . .

Why all the Eragon hate anyway?

 

I don't hate Eragon. I am just aware enough to realise that it has it's flaws. Huge gaping flaws.

Lurk here long enough and you'll realise just how many of us hate/want-to-urinate-on HP-Canon (not that I do but there are many who do).

We read Harry Potter world fics now. Not Harry Potter fics.

 

This is generally well thought out, isn't overly sappy when it comes to romance, and has intelligent Dumbledore bashing. I also like the fact that people die for realistic reasons. Harry's pairing off with Luna came straight out of nowhere and is totally unbelievable. On the other hand, very little in this story actually moved me to any grand emotion. It meant absolutely nothing to me emotionally when main characters bit the dust, so I think that means either the author isn't angling for that reaction, or they just can't properly present people in a way to make us love them, willingly or not. It doesn't help that there are too many characters involved. I just can't find it within myself to give a damn about most of them.

3/5

 

The story seems to have been pulled by the author. I have found it in three alternate locations:
The files section of this group:
https://uk.groups.yahoo.com/neo/groups/LostAndFoundStoriesgroupurl/info
(in the Harry Potter folder and a Bellerophon30 subfolder. Also has As Yet Untitled and Brave New World)
Also here
http://fanfics.me/read2.php?id=58217&chapter=0
and here:
https://www.ultimatehpfanfiction.com/index.php/fst/a/0/The+Final+Straw/bellerophon30/35

P.S. Does anybody know what happened with Bellerophon30? With no warning he just deleted the fics out of the blue, and when I posted about it on his group asking what the deal was, he deleted them from the files section on his group as well with no reply.

 

Hahah, a two and a half star story from 2005. How does it hold up today?

Thanks for the links - added them to the OP.

 

Well, it has two parts that I thought were awesome. One was the way Harry sets up Snape, that was also used in the spin-off divergence story "Brave New World". BWN has the same beginning, but diverges wildly after Harry decides to leave the U.K. instead of remaining as he does in "Final Straw".
The other is the epic "Final Battle", which I think is actually one of the best done "Final Battles" in the HP fandom.
I honestly think it deserves four or five stars.
5/5