I can think of both fire and water spells that would be capable of putting people off balance, and for that matter water could do it many different ways.
Keep in mind that stress does not equal damage or injury at all. As long as you are only taking stress an attack has not hit you, but rather caused you difficulty in avoiding it. Consequences are damage.
I don't really know why the developers chose to include the elements however they repeat the following concept over and over. A block is a block is a block. Same applies to any other concept (attacks, maneuvers, aspects, counterspells). What this means is that every block prevents the thing it was meant to prevent unless broken. Every aspect provides a +2 when invoked. Every attack functions in exactly the same way. There are no "better" aspects, no blocks that are less effective at blocking, no counterspell that is more effective than another. You can surmise the developer's intent all you like but they felt that this concept was important enough to clearly state repeatedly, so I expect they felt it was important to the game core.
pt 1- fair enough, to some degree, with creativity.
pt 2- absolutely fair enough- I've looked around the board some more and thought about it some- and I agree with the ideas bounced around here that ignoring a block outright shouldn't cause stress, but it might be appropriate to allow a player to take a consequence to boost their roll (until it bypasses the block), as stated in another forum.
pt 3- a block is a block etc, etc... yeah... but to be honest, I and my gaming group consider the dresden files series to be, in essence, supplements to the rpg system, much the same way lawyers use precedent to supplement the code of law. If there's a grey area in the rules, and my players can point to an established example in the canon of the series or even simple reason as to why it should go one way or another, I think that's fair. One of the ways this comes into play is the appropriateness of various spells within their elements- especially since it's a recurring theme in the book.
On a related note:
The restrictions you use for what elements are capable of are rather harsh, it seems to me. I would certainly let someone push something around with a jet of water or use spirit to disrupt the emotional energies that hold a spell together. And so on.
My experience suggests that most people do not restrict the elements as heavily as you. And I don't think that the rulebook is on your side either.
In essence, you have changed the rules. It is not surprising that the consistency of the related rules is affected negatively by this.
Water, specifically... hell no. Water magic isn't about projecting water even vaguely- water magic is entropy associations... you couldn't so much move the object as dissolve it.
I also was trying to come up with the most restrictive examples I could, to prove a point about how sometimes the restrictions should matter, and the elements should have an effect in play. There's also a lot of overlap between spell elements too. Spirit can make decent counterspelling material for non-spirit spells, since spirit is the element for all unseen forces (which just about covers magic entirely), but I'd have to hear the player reason through it like you did before I'd outright accept it. Likewise, I'd be ok with using fire to counter an unseelie frost spell as mutually exclusive opposites just as much as I'd allow fire to counter/divert it. (again- speaking of maneuvers and other less direct spells here- for direct damage, just about any block is reasonable, with the right visual).
As for "most people"- well, that may be a difference in area and groups... I have 2 gaming groups both running a dresden campaign right now- I'm the only member those two groups have in common, and I only GM in one of them. This is as much from my players as me- when my wizard comes up with her rote spells, she likes to think about the visual, and how it ties into what she should be capable of, and when my players run up against any kind of magic-wielder, they operate against the caster in different ways based on what they're throwing.
For me- "most people," in point of fact, the only dresden players and GMs I know until I signed on this forum- operate on my wavelength... so this has been something of a curveball for me to find anyone (much less the whole board), operating under completely different assumptions.
So- the whole reason for this rabbit trail is this: versatility.
If elements matter, then versatility in elements matters... making a strong specialization pyramid becomes easy and worthwhile for any wizard, and foci become wasted refresh.
If elements don't matter, and you can do everything with a single element, then versatility in elements is a waste of points, the pyramid gets very small, and foci become the only way to go... but my question is this... in that case, why play a wizard at all? Save yourself a refresh and just take channeling. If a focused practitioner can accomplish just as much versatility as a wizard, then my problem is that wizard is obsolete... at the very least, this should be a world where wizards and f.p.'s would be on equal footing at worst (probably better- the f.p. has extra refresh he can spend on even better foci!)
Edit: (forgot to add this, even though I'd been thinking about it since post #1)
Example- My game is set in Seattle- lots of light showers, all the time (it's a city aspect, so theoretically, my players can even compel it if they want... not that any of them have thought to do so yet). If it rains, it's going to impair all magic some, but fire magic more than anything else (no... there's not really a hard case for this in the system, except that there's no reason not to have a general block against magic, and a slightly stronger one against fire magic come into play... and there's at least twice I can think of in the books where exactly this effect is established).
Hence, elements matter, in our campaigns.
