And what rating do you give to the block made from a 2mm-thick encompassing stone dome?
I'm pretty sure I could punch through it with only minor effort, and I wouldn't give myself more than an Average fists score at most. And yet, if I found myself standing under that dome, I don't believe for an instant that I could tell at a glance that it was that thin and consequently fragile.
Good point.
On the other hand, I tell people what's up when the block is established. And I think it's reasonable to say that if you watch it form you can tell roughly how thick it is.
So they can't tell exactly, but they can tell close enough that it makes no difference?
Again: Wizards, who know magic inside and out, who work with and can see magic on a wavelength that almost no one else can, need to stop and do a Lore check before they can know enough about a spell's power to counterspell it.
Yes.
My impression is that counterspelling requires some kind of magic-science analysis. But I generally ignore counterspells so I'm not exactly an expert.
But untrained goons can take one look at a spell and decide, "That's too powerful for my ability to aim with guns or throw my fists to get through?" What frame of reference are they using?
...
I have to ask, how many fights have you actually been in? Because I wrestled for 12 years, and frankly, that isn't true in the least. Going up against someone new, you have no idea what they're good at or able to defend against until you try it out against them. Only if you had a chance to see them wrestle before could you maybe have an idea.
Funny. That's the same amount of time I've spent doing martial arts.
I find that a quick look at somebody's stance and how they move once the fight starts gives you a pretty good idea of what to expect.
But I wouldn't be surprised if it was different for wrestling.
And with all the random variables involved with a fight or a wrestling match, even a defense that "outclasses" you can be beaten. Back in the day I could go toe-to-toe with a wrestler who was 100 pounds heavier than me, and a hell of a lot stronger, even when I was playing to his strengths, and sometimes win.
That's what the dice are for.
Right, they don't know until they roll to attack, and the enemy rolls to defend.
And with a block, the roll is made well in advance. So the information arrives in advance.
I don't necessarily tell everyone "this guy has Great Fists, dudes" but I've found that if somebody ever makes a roll it's easier just to be transparent about where the numbers come from. And if somebody asked "what are my odds of hitting this dude?" I'd tell 'em whether they're any good.
Going by the fiction, we have no reason whatsoever to assume that blocks look as strong as they are (Harry's blocks in Storm Front are described as visually almost identical to his blocks in every other book, even after we know for a fact that he's strengthened them).
I can't be bothered to look it up, but this doesn't square with my memory.
Actually, by the time of Small Favor Harry's shields are probably up around 6 or 7 shifts, given that he's made a better focus item and talks about how much tougher they are to get through. Which means it's not "sensible" at all for someone with an attack skill of 3--like most vampires--to attack him. And yet they do. Constantly, as recently as Changes.
Maneuvers can look an awful lot like attacks, narratively. And of course there are Compels.
Plus, given the need to pay for duration and the like, it's likely that Harry's shields are about Superb. So it'd often be worth attacking him with skill 3-4.
Show me where, in any of the fiction, has any character taken a quick, casual glance at a wizardly shield and figured out how strong it is from just that. To my recollection, it doesn't ever happen, even between wizards.
Sorry, my books are in a different house and buried under a bunch of stuff. Can't be bothered to do proper research for the sake of an internet argument.
But I do remember something with Harry and Molly and a snowball fight. Think it was in Summer Knight.
Hell, how many times has Harry thrown a spell at someone only to find out later that he didn't have enough strength to punch through their defenses? By your argument, Harry should have already known he couldn't get through that shield/around that speed/through that block.
That's what dice rolls are for.
By this logic, when the Merlin and LtW threw up a ward offscreen in Proven Guilty, the whole Red Court would've given up and gone home because they knew they couldn't get through it.
Or maybe they got together and tried to break it down, because maybe with teamwork they could smash it in time to chase the wizards.
Either way seems fair to me.
They'd know it was a big attack because it's filling the entire zone. Would you be able to look at, say, Luccio's laser in Dead Beat (pre-body switching) and tell that it's got a huge attack power at a glance? Logically, you'd think that Harry's beams are stronger because they tend to be a lot thicker.
Harry is impressed when he sees the laser. He can clearly tell how impressive it is.
(IIRC)
With the books and the game, we're never given the implication that putting more power into a spell makes it bigger and more obviously stronger--hell, veils are the exact opposite, the more power into it the less obvious it is.
Nonetheless, the power of a veil is pretty obvious when you look at it.
