What makes a Wizard likely to win a duel? Power or Luck?

I just don't see why authors like to make Harry more powerful, in a quantitative manner. It's just doesn't make sense, well, it's difficult to see how the quantity of power someone has can change the outcome of a duel.

In a duel even a first year could kill Voldemort with the right spell at the right moment. Right? It's just like any kids could kil a bunch of armed adult with a simple gun, if he knows how to aim of course. Therefore, why does power matter?

Wouldn't it make more sense that Voldemort create some powerful Felix Felicis potion to get powerful? With luck, he can dodge spells, avoid being killed in a crash plane or stepping on a rake and getting self-killed?

That's why I have some questions:

- Does 'power' make you more 'resistant' to magic? You know, like, dampening the effects of curses, etc.

- Does 'power' make your spell stronger, or only enhance your magical stamina, meaning you could cast spells longer?

- Does 'power' make your shields stronger? Maybe a powerful Wizard can block more spells. Or not necessarly, because even a weak Wizard could put more 'power' into his shield to make it more effective?

So, what puts Dumbledore apart? Is it only with the creative use of magic?

Well, why is Voldemort so feared? Every moron could cast the killing curse. Every moron could find in a old library or from someone a way to make Horcruxes.

Power... it's also about the Prophecy. How will Harry be the equal to Voldemort. Is it in power? And by power, what does it mean? Creativity or just the quantity of magic one could do? Or it's just a symbolic equality?

Shouldn't Voldemort fear any experienced and creative dueller?

I know my post is a little messed up. But these are many questions centered principaly about power, creativity and luck.

 

It's easy to see how quantity of power can change the outcome of a duel. If it's a duel of attrition then the person with the most power is going to be the winner of the duel. In a quick fight, Voldemort's much more powerful spells, which he can only cast because of the amount of power he possess, are going to easily break through the shield of a weaker enemy.

You can't take Felix Felicis with out becoming highly addicted and I think it can kill you, or something like that, if you take it too close together.

I believe it does. Look at a dragon. It's hide is incredibly resistant to most spells. I think that has to do with the magic in it. If a wizard was so strong that magic was literally seeping from his pores, I think it would give him that same type of resistance. Maybe not though, who knows. It's a fanon decision.

Bellatrix Lestrange's Cruciatus curse is supposedly very powerful compared to other Death Eaters. Also, Voldemort's Imperius curse was stronger then Crouch's. That makes me believe that power makes a difference in a spell's strength.

Having a large magical 'reservoir' should help someone to keep up a duel longer, as I stated above.

I think this all depends on the spell. The shield Voldemort created in the Department of Mysteries didn't break when Dumbledore hit it with all those spells so I assume that the power he put into the spell to create that shield had a direct effect on how long his shield could withstand Dumbledore's attacks. As a weaker wizard couldn't make that strong of a shield, they couldn't block as many spells.

His power definitely seems to have an effect, as the sound Voldemort's shield made in the DoM's increased when Dumbledore hit it with a couple of his spells. His magical creativity kept Voldemort guessing though, but that's just his style of attack which helps him to win duels quickly without getting hit with a lucky spell.

He's feared because he's an amazingly powerful wizard with seven pieces of his soul around and a large following of wizards who all use curses that kill or turn you into a mindless minion. Also, as we saw in HBP, the making of a Horcrux is something that not even Dumbledroe knows how to do. Because of that, we can infer that Horcruxes are not some topic found randomly in an old library.

Harry will never be as powerful as Voldemort in canon. The moral of Harry Potter is that 'love conquers all' and that, sadly, will be what defeats Voldemort. That's all, nothing else.

As I said above, no. Voldemort is far to magically gifted to fear someone like Mad-Eye Moody. That's why the man never went directly after Voldemort directly. He'd be dead.

 

No ever moron could not use the killing curse. In the 4th book fake moody tells the class that if they cast it at him he probably would'nt even get a nosebleed. In the 5th book we see Harry try to use the pain curse and fails causae he can't muster the hate. I think that is what separates the Unforgiveibles.

As for your question. We have seen that Luck can help you win, as Harry uses it in all of the books. But in a real fight like his duel in the graveyard I think that it power and skill that really come into play. We have seen so far that a simple shield spell will stop a wide verity of spells and if we use Harry as a example until the 6th book what was his most powerful spell? His protrnous(Sp?) or the stunning curse. He really had nothing. I think that when you reach the higher levels it does come down to power. Voldie was in power for a long time. It was power that kept him alive for that time not luck Just my views.

For those of you who watch Anime or Read manga I always kind of though that a strong wizard naturally leaks a amount of magic that would protect them much like Kenpachi for BLEACH. Just a idea though.

 

I hate to rain on your parade, but in the JKR Universe (read: Canon) magic isn't quantifiable. One is either magical, or they are not. I believe we can attribute the more "powerful" spells we've seen in the books to skill, not "a large magical reservoir". For instance, Bellatrix's Cruciatus Curse may very well be more "powerful" (better cast) because she's had more practice with casting it. A prime example of this would be Lockhart, unable to even block Snape's Expelliarmus, he still cast a Memory Charm through a foreign wand (and a broken one at that) which had enough "power" to destroy his entire memory.

Skill and experience are key to magic, which is of course why Wizards learn at a school, rather than just being given a book with incantations and left to their own devices. Dumbledore, of course, has had nearly 150 years of magical education and experience behind his spells and this is why Voldemort fears him. Voldemort traveled extensively after leaving Hogwarts, most likely training all the while learning Dark Magic. This is also a good reasoning behind Neville's skills growing in OOtP, with proper practice he became more "powerful" or skilled with his magic.

Magic is not about quantifiable power, it's about skill, dedication, and confidence.

 

I've always looked at magic as a battle of wills. Say you fire a full body bind at... Draco Malfoy. He's not very strong-willed, so he'd likely be stuck under it until someone released him or he died. Use the same curse on Harry Potter. He's strong enough of will to throw off the Imperious curse, so he's likely to get out of it on his own rather quickly.

{pulloutofass}
It's all about pitting your will against the victim's. Whoever is stronger willed wins the "contest" and one of two things happens. A. The curse takes effect or B. The victim throws off the curse and blows the bejeezus out of the caster.
{/pulloutofass}

 

[SIZE=-1]Contra felicem vix deus vires habet. - [/SIZE][SIZE=-1] Publilius Syrus 46 B.C.E.

Against a lucky man, a god scarcely has power.
[/SIZE]

 

Unfortunately you are wrong Avitus.

Pg. 564 of the Half-blood Prince. Statement by Dumbledore to Harry.

Pg. 564 of the Half-blood Prince. Statement by Dumbledore to Harry

These quotes clearly show that wizards have different amounts of magical power...

 

Umm . . that's about your argument in a nut shell, and it's not quite correct. As DigitalStorm said before, JK made it quite obvious that magical power is quantifiable. Besides that, just look at a few of the characters:

Voldemort: The guy has been around for only half as long as Dumbledore, but he can fight him to a stand-still. Dumbledore has obviously had more practice then Voldemort when they fought.

Dumbeldore: It was said in the fifth book that Dumbledore had done things with a wand in his fifth year that the O.W.L. examiner had never seen before. I don't believe that this is enough time for Dumbledore to have used hard work and practice to go above and beyond the imagings of a man who was good enough to preside over the O.W.L's and N.E.W.T.'s.

Harry: When has Harry ever sat down and done extensive work before the Tri-Wizard Tournament? Looking at the Patronus, which most wizards can't create at all, it's obvious that magical power had just a touch to do with it.

I don't know how to say this any plainer. Yes, skill, dedication, and confidence do come into play, but the fact that magical power is a huge factor in the abilities of a wizard is obvious. They might both play a part, but being skilled magically is like being a skilled artist. With hard work you can improve your drawing skills, but you can only get so far with out a whole lot of innate talent. And, likewise, without a whole lot of innate magical power you can only get so far with practice, practice, practice.

(I'm going to be gone for a week or two so someone please answer back for me if I get a reply)

 

Interestingly enough this pretty much proves that Harry is going to get bitch-slapped in book 7. His power is so weak Voldemort wouldn't consider him a minor threat worth preventing? Here I thought that Dumbledore was the only man Voldemort ever feared... How the hell will a weakling who barely registers compared to his own power even survive, let alone win?

HE CAN'T!!! So either luck is the most important feature with magic or else Rowling will pull an overnight "magical maturity" to bump him up a couple notches. Super!Harry stories are rarely worth it in the long run so I just hope it's luck.

 

You know,just to put my two sense in. I hope Harry dies against Voldermort without taking him down. Im so pissed off that JK made him into such a weakling,and i sincerely hope Hermione dies also. God I hate her

as for the questions above.

Power absolutely matters in a duel, skill and power is what makes you win a duel. I would actually wager that power is better then skill,who needs skill when your can just reducto staight through the enemies shield if hes weaker then you

 

Power without a knowledge how to use it and skill needed to execute it is completely useless.

It'd be like having a broadsword, strength required to swing it properly, but without a knowledge how to use it (block and attack) - a person like that would be killed by a guy with a rusty dagger, but necessary skills and experience.

As a person, who prefers back-stabbing and creativity over brute strength, I'd say that every element is important, but skill and experience is the most.

E.A.

 

Dude,its not like having a broadsword at all,because if you knew even one spell like reducto and you had immense power and cast it at someone who just used a shield you would probaly damage the person quite allot.
besides i was playing around somewhat.Thats what the was for.

 

We don't know how shields work. They could be just a wall made out of magic and therefore it'd only be a matter of spell's power, or not. But than AK would be stoppable by simple Protego if the power applied to the shield would be greater than the power of the spell.

Without knowing exactly how that stuff works this discussion can be based on speculations and opinions only, but, in my opinion, it's funnier that way.

Also, you shouldn't forget that shields aren't the only way to evade being hit by a curse. Wizards can summon things to block spells, can apparate out of the way, or just use a specific counter-curse.

To end this post I'll present a quote from a story I'm reading now:

It's just a click away.

E.A

 

The sad thing is that even Harry knows that he is weak.

Pg. 509 of the Half-blood Prince

The above quote also pretty much says that both power and skill are important in the Harry Potter books.

 

JKR is inconsistent .

That's the crux of the argument. I come back after a couple months and this is what DLP has degenerated into? Bah.

JKR has stated that power is not what defines a wizard- this is true, since it HAS been shown that Harry, got through the dementors' attack in the third attack through determination and most importantly conviction that he would, when he would normally have been rendered incapable in the face of just one dementor.

It's pointless to try and hammer out a single, working rule for the way magical power and wizards' strength works out in the HP universe. That's the point.

About the argument about Dumbledore; assume magic is an acquired skill. Capish? That's why they go to school to learn how to use it. Since it is a skill anyone with magical talent (there's that word talent again) can learn and train, then it's also true that there are people who have greater natural talent than others.

Like musical talent- say you want to learn the piano. You manage decently through hard work and lots of hours of practice, and you can play a decent repertoire of songs. Along comes say, a prodigy in piano playing, and even though you play the same piece, it's going to be radically different in both quality and effect. But, even a genius can't play something amazing without lots of hard work and practice- it's just that the base ability and perception of how things work is radically different from the start .

Who said everybody starts at the same spot in the understanding and use of magic? Neville Longbottom is a near-squib in his early years, but is seen as a modestly powerful wizard in the 5th book, and elevated quite a bit in the 6th book.

This can be seen in Tom Riddle's childhood; we've seen that he had an inate grasp on magic, or at least an understanding that he could use a supernatural ability to torment others in his days at the orphanage. He saw that he had a skill he could use and he knew how to use it; he refined it in practice (hence his many trophies), and combined with his great natural talent in the field of magic, he is said to be a prodigy for having a greater ability to wield magic due to a higher understanding and grasp on magic.

So it's not necessarily possible to 'measure' magical power like you would a voltage measure or calorie amount. What you have is people who can use magic more efficiently and with greater finesse; people with more talent.

Therefore magic is not 'measurable' nor is it quantifiable. It's a skill.

Can you quantify your skills in writing? No. You can say you're good at writing and you're better than the average person, but you can't say that you have a 95% talent in writing.

The counter I would expect from other people is that using magic depletes the caster's energy, and thus must cause the use of at least some energy. Therefore it MUST be measurable.

I say no, because a human being is not a machine, though the human body may be built like one. It is NOT a machine like a scifi laser gun that shoots a beam of light, and loses some energy to do so. Human will and conscience, as well as intelligence, confidence, and an understanding of what magic is and does all come into play on how a spell might work. Even if one were exhausted, one could cast a powerful and effective spell if one had the conviction and drive to do it- this is seen in both canon and in countless cases in fanon.

In any case, JKR makes it clear in a statement that one 'can not measure magical power, and that one either has magic or they don't'. However, as Kolskit and digitalstorm said, JKR has also clearly written about cases of magical power and described it as quantifiable.

Therefore, we can attribute this argument to inconsistency and plotholes.

Case closed.

 

As far as Harry's magical talent, I'd say he's got a lot, but what we have in his case is a severe lack of confidence. In other words, he has a mental block. He's got it in his head, and we've got it in ours, that he's no good at this magic stuff, but look closer. There are a couple cases strung throughout the book that prove that when Harry is confident that he can do something, knows he can do it, or practices at it, that he brings it off in epic form.

Harry was convinced that he was doomed that night on the lake with the Dementors, but look what happened as soon as he found out that he was the one who cast the epic Patronus. He went all Dumbledore!ZOMGBBQ powerful.

Look in HBP, it said that he hadn't been able to bring off a refilling spell in class yet, but with his confidence from Felix Felicis, it becomes laughably easy.

In GoF, he can't even summon the fucking Dictionary, but when he practices for a few hours, all the sudden he can summon something down to the Quidditch pitch like nothing. Then, when practicing Banishing Charms, he brings one off perfectly while not paying attention.

In OotP, we see him fucking decimate Lucius Malfoy, a seasoned Death Eater with fucking Impedimenta. Impedimenta? Are you kidding me? He does the same thing to another DE in HBP when he's hunting Snape down. He teaches seventh years things they didn't know, as a fifth year.

All you bitches are sore in the ass, whining because Harry doesn't have talent when the Sorting Hat told you he did in the first goddamn book. He has talent, Dumbledore said so himself. All Harry has to do is put it to use. We see how powerful he is when he puts his mind to it and has some confidence. What do you think DH is going to be for Harry? Practice, gaining confidence, and knowing that he's good at magic. Those are, guess what? The three exact things Harry needs most.

It's like people have said, it comes down to natural talent and practice. He has the talent, he needs the practice. Hermione is the person who practices hard for hours and hours, but J.K. has stated that Harry, like the natural prodigy, would destroy Hermione in a duel hands down after third year.

It won't make much sense, but I'm guessing what's going to happen is that Harry is going to start having confidence in himself and put his natural talent to use, and then clinch it with the "love" power. But seriously, stop beating Harry down just because J.K. doesn't have him becoming "teh God Wizardz", how boring of a story would that be? It's supposed to be a struggle, and I've said before, in any good story, the protagonist is never as powerful as the antagonist. It's just not good form. She knows what shes doing, so stop the bitching.

I'm starting to feel like an advocate for Harry's competence here.

 

I’m in agreement with Avitus.

I've now come to the conclusion that there's no such thing as raw magical strength (speaking of wizards here, not magic in general). As JKR said on her website, "...it's not a case of being magical enough, you are either magical or not."

So, you are either a wizard or you are not. There is no graduation of raw magical strength or anything like that, you either have none - Muggle of squib - or you have it - wizard.

Let's start with a definition.

pow·er –noun
1. ability to do or act; capability of doing or accomplishing something.
4. the possession of control or command over others; authority; ascendancy: power over men's minds.

The traditional view is that a wizard's power, that is, his "ability to act" or his "capability" or "possession of control" is a result of this equation:

Power = Raw magical strength x Ability

Where ability=(skill+knowledge+experience+creativity+willpower)

However, what I'm suggesting is this:

Power = Ability

There is no raw magical strength, just skill. Dumbledore is not more powerful than Harry because he has greater magical reserves, or a stronger type of magic, but simply 'cause he's better at magic than Harry. Voldemort, Snape, Slughorn, McGonagall, Bellatrix...all these people are portrayed to be powerful, and all of them have a strong grasp of magic and a high level of skill. When a spell is "powerfully cast" it is not the magic behind it that's stronger or anything like that, it's just been cast in a superior manner. E.g. Harry's Patronus is strong because he has strong emotions, Bellatrix's Cruciatus is strong 'cos she's well practiced at it, and has a lot of sadistic hate, and so on.

An explanation for Dumbledore’s comments in HBP: He was talking about power as in ability, not raw magical strength. So when he says “your power will not registered compared to mine” he is referring to his magical abilities as a whole, not raw strength. Which makes sense, as if there were such a thing as raw strength, then Harry would surely have lots of it, being Voldemort’s equal. Dumbledore being so superior to Harry backs up the ability-theory.

P.S. Weird being back.

 

Welcome back Taure!

As for your post Taure we went over this argument before here. I guess I'll have to debate it again.

Dumbledore makes a clear distinction between power and skill.

Pg. 509 of the Half-blood Prince

Ergo power can not be the same as ability because ability is knowledge plus skill, experience, creativity and will power and Dumbledore makes a clear difference between power and skill.

And my response....

Pg. 564 of the Half-blood Prince

Amount- quantity; measure (Taken from dictionary.com)

Why would Voldemort care about the amount of magical power that crossed his lake if there is no such thing as raw magical strength?

 

Look at my definition of power.

Power =/= raw magical strength.

Power is the "ability to do or act; capability of doing or accomplishing something." So, Voldemort was not measureing some kind of raw strength, but the wizard's ability.

Notice he didn't say "skill or power," he said "skill and power". This indicates that the two are linked. You need skill to have power.

Just because Dumbledore has used the word power, doesn't mean that he means it in the way you think. Yes, some wizards are more powerful than others, but this doesn't mean that they have some kind of larger store of magic, or superior brand of magic. No, they're just better at using what they all have been given.