The Dresden Files > DF Spoilers
In Hindsight, These Story Choices Were a Mistake
wardenferry419:
I like the idea that technology goes kablooey around wizards. It creates so many different limitations on what wizards can do. Would you want Harry to be sitting at Burger King and texting his magic at the enemy?
Quantus:
--- Quote from: groinkick on July 13, 2018, 03:42:43 AM ---The issue with the firearms was a mistake by Jim I think but he basically let it fade away, and doesn't really seem to be part of the book lore anymore. He even had Carlos with a modern sidearm. So one could walk away feeling that it was in fact Harry's misunderstanding of firearms that lead him to believe it was magical interference causing semiautomatic weapons to jam when in reality it was happening naturally (guns do jam sometimes after all).
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Not a mistake, just something that a lot of people misunderstand. Here's his explanation of how some of that actually works, and it's a lot less like a walking EMP than most people imagine:
--- Quote --- Quote from: Grise on January 18, 2007, 10:48:40 AM
--- Quote --- The ‘Harry screws up guns’ thing hasn’t been seen for several novels now, and I sincerely hope it’s something JB has decided to let go to dust. First away, if Harry’s disruption thing is so bad that it can mess up simple chemistry and even simpler mechanical operations, then howinblazes does his car ever work? Orders of magnitude more complex, mechanically, chemically, and electrically speaking…
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On the other hand, using a GUN in earnest tends to be a tad more emotionally (and therefore magically) engaging than your average drive in a car. Proximity has a lot to do with it, too. Harry’s actually TOUCHING the gun, generally in his right hand (the hand that projects magical energy) to boot. In fact, the gun is small enough that it’s actually going to be encompassed by his bioelectric field (a very mild, but totally individual field of electromagnetic energy that the human body produces).
The car is a much larger (relative) object that is (relatively) farther away, even when Harry is driving under stress–and even so, the Beetle (and other cars) have broken down on-stage more often than guns have actually jammed on-stage.
And there are other factors involved of which Harry is not entirely aware. Alas, that the viewpoint character is non-omniscient. :)
The rules aren’t changing. The proper circumstances just haven’t all aligned the way they have in the other instances of guns glitching.
Jim
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Mr. Death:
The purpose of all of these plot points is to limit Harry -- that's not a defect, that's an express purpose, both to keep the stories interesting, and to emulate the old-school noir fiction that DF takes so much inspiration from. Isolating and handicapping your protagonist is a standard for just about any genre -- so that he will have to be strong and clever to overcome those limits.
--- Quote from: Warbird on July 13, 2018, 03:06:09 AM ---Off the top of my head I have two:
1) As discussed in another thread, I find the idea that black magic inherently corrupts a person (and as such the Blackstaff is needed for the White Council's dirty jobs) a poor choice. I think the idea works in Molly's disfavor and is honestly less interesting than the idea that such corruption is based on the person using the magic and not vice versa.
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It's an intentional limiter. It's a way to force Harry to not blast everything that attacks him. It lets mafia goons stay a significant threat, and makes Harry and others have to measure their actions. If Harry wasn't worried about being corrupted or having the White Council after him, what's stopping him from just fire-blasting every mortal goon who gives him trouble? By making this a limitation, it forces Harry to grow as a character and keeps things interesting without having to go the DBZ route of constantly making everything he faces stronger and stronger.
It's also a way to introduce internal struggle, and create a very real risk to the character. If it was just a White Council prohibition, well, they're not watching him all the time -- he could get away with it constantly, as could Molly. But making it corrupting -- and having Harry already touched by that corruption -- gives him and later Molly something to really struggle with, something that informs and shapes their characters in a way that it just being prohibited would not.
--- Quote ---2) Wizards inherently have issues with technology. To be fair, this was presented in a pretty silly way from the start. Harry talks about how he naturally can cause issues with firearms which is ridiculous (although the books do drop this as time goes on). Like I can understand how Wizards can screw with electronics, especially delicate things like computers (as it is computers in our world can have issues with outside energy sources). But guns are pretty simply machines, even the fancy one's. It'd be like if being a wizard meant you'd have cause a bicycle to fail. I could understand that a wizard could, if they try, bend the laws of nature. I mean that's what they do. But to inherently prevent things like combustion or lever or gear or springs (for example) from working is just silly.
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As other people have pointed out, it's not a simple electrical-field thing.
--- Quote ---That said, for actual tech like cell phones and computers, I feel that wizards being unable to use them is kind of meaningless for the story. Like, the White Council could still be behind the times simply because institutions are slow to change plus most of its members are pretty old (so no one would have thought of Paranet before Harry did). Similarly, Harry can still be on his own early on because for instance no one can get to him in time or he's purposefully keeping them out (which is something I did not care for, but it seemed like Jim intended for it to be a flaw of Harry's so its not an issue).
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Meaningless? Far from it. It informs the entire wizarding world of the books and is a reason for why it's shaped the way it is. It's an ongoing, tangible issue that the Wizards' problem with tech is a significant handicap -- if Wizards could just get on planes reliably, the whole plot of Summer Knight comes apart.
--- Quote ---Bu the world now is significantly different from the world of 2000 (when the first book came out). So much stuff is online now and even things like newspapers are dying out. It struck me how Harry had to use a pay phone in Storm Front. Now they're non-existent which for the series would make it so much harder for Harry to update/get in touch with others. Like the only way for Harry to make calls is from his house or someone else's (or to do so magically). This ends up cutting him off from his supporting cast to such a significant degree that it seems like it'll cause issues for the stories. Honestly, this doesn't seem to add anything for the story but does cause issues. Plus other series in this vein let their wizards use tech and it doesn't seem to cut off any story potential.
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Isolating Harry is the point. Causing issues is the point. He's the hero, which means he has obstacles in his way. Him not being able to just whip out his smart phone to look something up or call an Uber or wikipedia his way to a monster's weakness is another thing that keeps the story interesting and shows how he has to really build his knowledge base.
Life isn't supposed to be easy for Harry in the books. If he could just solve all his problems with a fireball or a smartphone, that just plain is not as interesting to read.
And, going back to the previous point, Harry Dresden's stories are massively influenced by old-school noir detective fiction from the 30s-50s. The limits on technology are an enforcement of that, so that Harry has to go through the same sorts of leg work that old PIs would have.
Wizard Sibelis:
What he said^^
From an overarcing point though, the wizards mess with tech is part of the subtle mechanics upon which the world is made. It's explained loosely through TC and GS, specifically shagnasty referring to Harry as 'little spirit caller' and ghosts being able to mess with technology that's farther away from humans. Being the active forces(spirits?) of creation, in a reality that should only be utilized without breaking others free will, magic effects technology for the same reasoning Harry takes a shower after visiting the mothers. Aura bleed off.
Granted, I still find guns to be a bit of an oddity because it should be in their aura too then, but I tend to attribute that to subconscious desires of the wizard, Harry doesn't want his own gun to misfire. He does enjoy destroying tech even if he sometime must quell the urge, his conflict comes from this fact. where not conflicted, like wanting to shoot or not get shot, the confliction doesn't manifest.... Mmm I wonder if this could be tested by comparing two wizards shooting at each other?
toodeep:
I agree that there are serious issues with some of the black magic interpretations.
Apparently, using black magic, even once with a reasonable cause (self defense) like Harry did against Justin had repercussions on Harry, but in Cold Days as he races from the wild hunt and uses magic to blast a hound the hound turns out to be a human - another use of black magic on Harry's part, but we haven't seen any effect from that.
Additionally, things keep getting redefined in the series as we learn more. Most wizards seem to think it would be fine to kill white court vampires with magic - no black magic twisting them because of it. But over time, we've learned they are scions (per an angel), human enough to become the winter knight, and probably human enough to wield a sword of faith. All things that point to them being human enough that it should be black magic to use magic to kill them, but we've never heard that is the case...
Same argument for the half-reds. They appeared to still be human, with souls and free will, and yet Harry caused the death of thousands of them with the curse, and yet.... no going crazy because of it.
The whole black magic thing appears subjective to the viewpoint of the caster, but then we are told repeatedly that it isn't (both in the books and in WoJ). It doesn't make sense.
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