But here's a counter:
Whenever Jim lists "beings that can take Mab on" he includes Ferrovax.  Note that he also includes the enter White Council, Drakul, and a few others, but Ferrovax is there.  Ah - found it - the post is at http://www.jimbutcheronline.com/bb/index.php/topic,11012.msg462610.html#msg462610.

Why is Ferrovax such a big deal? Because he's a greater dragon.  Now he used to have brother, name of Sirothrax, who did various things - but he doesn't have that brother anymore.  Why? Because that brother ran into a sword.  A Sword of the Cross, but a sword just the same.

That's right - a sword with comparability low refresh held by a Knight of the Cross kill the brother of something that could take on Mab.  If a Sword of the Cross could do that, then why wouldn't a Sword be able to take on Mab?

But statting them out is a bit like statting the One Ring (see? I got back on topic).  A plot device is a plot device.  Giving a plot device stats is meaningless.  It's like trying to work out the shifts needed to do the spell the Red Court tried.  Weeks of prep time at the center of ley lines with dozens (if not hundreds) of human sacrifices - how many shifts would that be? If you call that number X you'll see that it's the same number of shifts needed by a spell to kill Mab (there's some speculation that Donar Vadderung is part of Dresden's family tree and was the real target) and the same number of shifts that One Ring could produce.

For X = the amount that plot requires.

Richard

Two comments: Sithrovax was the weakest of the Dragons and the Swords of the Cross explicitly have different levels of power depending on who they are fighting and aren't just swords, they are direct channels of the power of the White God and his servants (their stats in the game only sort of reflect this variability). Against a normal human they are little more than swords, against the entirety of the Red Court one allowed an Archangel to gain control of the wielder for a short period of time and channel power quite a bit of power through them. More than likely Michael's fight vs. Sithrovax could more accurately be describe as an Archangel controlling Michael's body vs. a Dragon.

Um, you realize that resources is exponential in the amount of money it gives, so 56 resources is 10^56 dollars (1 followed by 56 zeros or 100 Septendecillion dollars). To give you an idea of how large that number is, a typical star has only ten times more hydrogen atoms than they have dollars. In other words your player has the resources of several solar systems at the very least. So yah, they might just be able to hire a super powered bodyguard.

Edit: Before anyone asks, inflation is not included in this because Resources is based on the value of what can be bought and not specific amounts of money that can be spent (this is a small but subtle difference that makes it inflation proof).

Edit2: To give another example of how high this is, the estimated total economic production of the entire human race to date is slightly less than 2,397 trillion. Which if you divide that amount by the amount your player has, it is so small that it is effectively zero (1/[2.39695 × 10^41]).

A visual comparison:
                                                                                               2,396,950,000,000,000
100,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000

Desert Eagle and co pack significantly more punch than the .50 cal handguns from the latter half of the 1800s.  You might be able to barely squeek into weapon 3 but you'd have to be using modern, custom made ammunition. The "very special" comes from it being an Item of Power not from the purely physical aspects, so it needs to be a Power to boost damage.

It is perfectly possible that like the Swords of the Cross it was reforged (or since it is a gun, maybe remade would be more appropriate). Thus, it being a modern handgun is plausible.

For an explanation by Jim on how powerful Mab is see here, here, and especially here.

Shield Of Faith: Your faith protects you from harm, repelling those evil beings that cannot tolerate its power. You may use your Conviction skill instead of your Athletics skill to defend against attacks from characters that have catches related to faith.

This is written so that it defends against ranged attacks as well and that makes no sense.

There is a word of Jim that confirms that Marcone is pronounced Mar-cone, not mar-cone-i.

You can already force consequences on people after taking them out. Even if they weren't invested enough in the fight to take consequences in it. It's dirty pool to stomp a guy's spine in half after beating him in a friendly martial arts competition, but you can totally do it.

Yes but people can see when they're going to be taken out and concede before hand. With Brutality the only way to concede before hand is to concede before you get hit.

And it's almost impossible to inflict a consequence that will necessarily be worse than another consequence of the same severity. Compels are in the GM's hands, and they are only broken if he makes them so.

If by almost impossible you mean blindingly easy to do then yes. For example a consequence to your primary weapon hand would be worse than one to your off hand, even though they would be the same level.

And a mild and a moderate are actually worse than a severe in the short term, barring compels.

Also, an extreme consequence impedes a guy no more than a mild, barring compels. So inflicting one doesn't mean you've won.

So I don't take any of those criticisms terribly seriously.

Inflicting something as extreme as well an extreme consequence is ripe for all kinds of invoking for effect and compels since quite frankly if they aren't in too much pain to think it would kind of strange. Also, the problem is mainly in the long term, not necessarily the short term since higher consequence take longer to go away.

What I do take seriously in the mention of player rights. There's a social contract involved in gaming, and if this violates that then this has gotta go.

I wonder if the playerbase at large feels that it'd be inappropriate to force consequences...

I'm intrigued by this mention of Called Shots. What are those?

PS: It kinda bugs me that you can't deliberately break someone's arm in this game. The guy can always choose to take some other consequence. The only way around this is to take them out, and that shouldn't be a requirement for deliberately injuring someone. Hence the stunt. If someone has a better way to handle this, I'm all ears.

Called Shots are one of the basic maneuver types. They represent attempts to target attacks at specific parts of a person's body. They allow you to place aspects such as "Hurt Knee" on someone (note these aspects can't be as severe as consequences and the target can roll endurance to shake it off).

Also just because you want to be able to do something, doesn't meaning doing so is in anyway balanced.

Brutality: If you ever manage to put your finger on it, I'm listening.

I don't know about him but I just realized another two problems with it. It completely violates the you-get-to-choose-your-own-consequences section of the rules and there are a whole host of problems with violating that. It also allows one to inflict mental or social consequences using a physical attack.

Edit: It also allows one to skip right to the higher consequences which wouldn't normally be possible since a player is allowed to use multiple lower level consequences instead of taking a higher level consequence.

Edit: And it allows one to inflict an Extreme Consequence against their will.