Ended up writing this for a swedish Facebook-group a couple of weeks ago. It was a lot of fun. For some reason I always like to imagine what the inside of a magical textbook would sound like, and I feel like I've gotten pretty close to what I would imagine here.

So, anyone else ever write something similar? If so, it would be a lot of fun to read.


"Incantation: Refractar

Description:

A dueling shield, known by most as the Hammer Of Xanatos.
Due to it's extensive use, Referred to by most experienced Battle-mages simply as the Hammer.

The Hammer is an Active Shield, constructed of magical circuitiry(as are all active magical barriers) that will absorb most non-emotion spells with physical manifestations(I.E. A visible projectile) mid-flight.

The spell is then accelerated through the circuitry in the shield, eventually bursting through the magical membrane and projected back in a wide cone.
This projection is always projected 180* away from the shield.

The circuitry of the shield is burned out in the projection, and like most active magical defenses it thus only protects against one spell(Though the resulting blast will generally obliterate any non-emotion based magic in its path.)

The acceleration of the absorbed spell is such that even a relatively weak spell such as a high powered Stupefy is usually enough to gouge a solid crater in the ground.

Use:

While notoriously hard to cast, especially wandlessly and in the heat of battle, the threat of a wandless hammer is enough to warp most duels between senior battle-mages to such degree that most will rarely stand behind their own spells if they can avoid it.

For those unable to consistently cast it wandlessly, the Hammer is less useful as a offensive weapon, but still a good way to punish a slow but powerful curse such as the Bombarda.

Weaknesses:

While the hammer is an effective defense against non-emotion magic, it is, like most active membranes, useless against unforgivables. Because of the circuit-structure, any tear in the shield will cause the whole structure to collapse. Experianced Battle-mages will therefore usually preface important spells with a Imperio or a Sectumsempra (See Ch 3 p55-57:"Forgiving shields: Unforgivable carriers).

The Hammer is therefore usually cast when a spell is already mid-flight, and a Mage with fatigue to spare will usually cast a backup Passive shield, such as a protego."

 

I believe there is a similar thread,spell discussion or something, I think Taure started it

 

Sectumsempra isn't an unforgiveable.

 

Isn't Sectumsempra Snape's own personal spell that nobody else (besides Harry) knows? I really doubt it'd be included in a textbook.

 

There is a difference between a reflective shield and a reflection of energy. Think of it as a magical railgun, that absorbs the energy of the spell, accelerates it through a membrane, and then spits it back out. (I made a really ugly paint picture to illustrate.)

I use the term active shield for any shield that isnt just a hunk of magical energy(That does something), but I guess i didn't really make that clear in the text. And doing "Something" would require some kind of magical circuitry, since a hunk of energy couldn't just interact with its surrondings.

Also, Unforgivables = Emotion-based magic. By my textbook definition Expecto Patronum is an unforgivable. I would rationalise this with the fact that the term unforgivable has been in use so long in magical england that most english textbooks would probably have adopted it.

I've kind of taken some authorial liberties with the Sectumesempra, because I think having an unforgivable that can act like a sort of sword, and swat spells out of the air is a really interesting mechanic to write around.

When I first read the books I got it in my head that it was emotion-based, and then that thought just stuck with me. I was also under the impression that the spells in the HBP-book was not necessarily spells Snape had created, but rather spells he had created and/or found.

As for magic in the air being nearly instantanious. No? Tends to differ wildly from story to story. I like to think that all spells have different properties in that regard.

I Like making magic kind of scientific, if that wasn't obvious already.^^

 

It's his own personal fanon. He didn't make any claims about canon so there's nothing to smack down. I dislike the aesthetic of his magic system as I like the canon aesthetic, but that doesn't mean he can't do his own thing. So long as he makes no claims about canon we're good.

Also rationalise with an s is British English.

 

Fixed.

Wow, realise how awfully smug I sound, lol.

 

British
American

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lot of American spelling is due to Noah Webster - the first editor of the standard American dictionary. He deliberately tried to rationalise/rationalize spelling. Sometimes he did this by using an older simpler usage, sometimes he just made stuff up! The main result today is the American use of -ize compared to the British -ise and some missing 'u's.

 

Where-as Canadian spelling is some weird bastard mix of the two, and therefore superior in every way.

 

Nah, Americans basterdised English while Canadians made a weird mix of French and British english

 

So Canadian English is far more heretical.

 

You're also wrong. Rationalise is the Cambridge spelling. Rationalize is Oxford. Both are technically correct English (yes, British English) spellings depending on whose dictionary you use.

The UK public obsession with using only Cambridge spellings didn't really solidify until the early 1990s. You can't blame the rest of the world for occasionally using the other system when it was an accepted use in British English across the entire modern colonial period, and remains a technically correct (if not in common parlance) British English spelling even now.

Yze spellings (as opposed to yse), however, are generally an Americanism. And you're free to mock us for those. But the ise/ize issue rests purely at the feet of the British.


Alumin(i)um is your fault as well while I'm at it.