i was thinking holding people in the air, kind of makes super strnegth worthless,

This is one of my PC's rote spells, just for that reason.  Inspired by how the Archive dealt with Magog.

So we have one conflict -- Harry and Ramirez vs. Vittorio and Madrigal. That conflict ends, Madrigal is taken out, while Vittorio makes a Concession (he's out of the immediate conflict with a loss, but changes the terms).

Then we have a second conflict, which is Harry, Ramirez, Murphy, Marcone, Hendricks, and the Einherjar Dream Team vs. Uber Ghouls. Vittorio is a background detail in this conflict, and not a participant from the immediate perspective of Harry et al.
By your own personal reading of the scene, and by a definition of conflict that is not the game books' definition of conflict.
The book does not have this requirement.
That's one possibility. The other possibility is that the GM set the difficulty of surviving it so high that Harry wasn't sure he could survive it on what he had left. He still has consequences, mental and physical. I've had players create declarations and bank aspects before they'd ever cast a single spell, as insurance.

I agree with this interpretation of scene changes.  I've had similar issues with the stress limitation on magic in the game, and analyzed the duel scene strongly to come to grips with it.  The scene breaks (and these forums) were integral to my understanding.

Arguably (IIRC), there may have been a brief social conflict between Dresden and Marcone at the gate, where Dresden convinces him to extract the key vamps.

You may be thinking of Fate Core, where if someone spends a Fate Point (not a free invoke) on an Aspect against you, then you get the Fate Point (at the end of the scene, I think).

Source?

Finally found one (takes a while when you only have audiobooks).

Cold Days, Chapter 15: Thomas is talking about himself, and how he steals chunks of peoples souls and eats them.

I'd give the turtlenecks Inhuman Strength, Aquatic, and Supernatural Sense to cover their sonar, plus a decent Guns score. The shark-gorilla thingies from Even Hand would probably get Inhuman Strength and Toughness, Claws, and Aquatic.

Personally, I would give Echoes of the Beast and possibly Pack Instincts to represent the sonar instead of Supernatural Senses.

There are a few things that worry me here.

First, you've made spellcasting significantly stronger by only requiring one skill for it. And spellcasting is already pretty strong.

I disagree.  Considering that most would have a casting stat at apex skill anyway, all it's really doing is allow the caster to be more rounded with other skills.  Makes the caster stronger, but not spellcasting itself.  And the advancement with Focus Items and such still has to deal with Power and Control ratings.

Perhaps with advancement over time that changes, but we haven't gotten there yet.

Second, you've made spellcasting significantly stronger by letting people defend reflexively with it. And again, it's already strong.

Agreed, I'm personally on the fence about it.  But we have had a hard time finding a mechanic that would allow for the scene where Ramirez blocks the gunfire from a WCV with "I go first" speed, and various other close calls throughout the fiction.

Third, Athletics and Rapport seem more powerful than the other skills, while Burglary seems weak.

Uh... okay.  There's been lots of talk about Athletics being too powerful.  I won't argue that.
I consider the Core version of Rapport far more clearly defined and less powerful than it was in DFRPG.

Also, I'm not sure it's advisable to reduce the number of skill points available to Chest Deep and Submerged characters. I'd rather let Chest Deep characters get two Superb skills. And it seems wrong that Submerged characters can't make a traditional pyramid.

I agree with this.
The Fate Core pyramid is effectively equal to the 20 points of Feet Wet, even with the reduced skill list.

I think using Athletics for thrown attacks may be too useful, so Physique could be used for chucking thrown weapons up to a zone away.

If you're throwing to cause Stress, it should be Shoot.  Making either of those skills into Stress causing skills should be worth a stunt at least.

Regarding magic, there are now only two stress tracks - physical and mental, so for evocation spells, wizards wont be able to blast away all day, especially if they have been mentally attacked via Provoke.And you still need Lore to be a half decent Wizard. The reflexive nature of spells is tied into the four action rules. I cant see why a wizard couldnt cast a quick shield-based rote spell (which would still cost him at least 1 mental stress). Using Will to resist attacks is just incorporating the new situational aspect rules regarding blocks and represents the wizards mental focus trying to cast the spell quickly. However, I think its entirely appropriate that you couldnt use any free invocations the spell provides if you are casting the spell in reaction to an attack. That stops players loading up a rote shield spell so that they are immune to surprise attacks.

I really don't like the idea of Provoke reducing the number of spells you can cast.  That doesn't hold up to the fiction well.

In DFRPG, surprise attacks don't allow defend at all.  That's why we put in a clause on the reactive magical defense that you have to be aware of the attack.  Catch a wizard off guard, and he's paste.

Actually thats looking very nice So I am intrigued about combining Discipline and Conviction. Are you still using the draw power and control it nature of magic, and if so, how does that work with just Will?

Thanks

Check out the Powers document.  At the beginning of the Spellcasting powers it explains how to do it.

We haven't playtested it yet though.

We're still debating making Rote spells the average of your Control and Power, not just based on your Control.

My group and I have been working on a conversion for a few months now.  The results are online, and you can make comments on the documents.

We recently combined Discipline and Conviction in to Will, and got rid of the Social stress track.  Gaining spellcasting gives you a Magic stress track, so you still have to deal with taking stress for casting.

Take a look: https://drive.google.com/folderview?id=0BwouQYZcwYj2aDdORkgzeVNBa2s&usp=sharing