How big was the Boarding House?

[Mira]

Well, to be fair it sounds like that one actually just used the original stone to facade over modernized concrete structure.

What Marcone was /wanting/ to do was this:


Which makes sense in light of Marcone, Morgan, and Murphy all having inspiration taken from that show.  Makes me really think there was some magic significance to it like in the show, either the castle itself provides different protections, he was trying to control the NN side, or maybe like the show it satisfied some magic spell condition.

Which is what Marcone may have done.

[SerScot]

eh, very little is physically impossible when money is no object.  It could be done (by a billionaire) even in the real world (You'd be amazed at what Ive seen thrown up during the 10-day yearly shutdown some of these plants and mills do all their maintenance in).  For a stacked-stone structure the real bottleneck is the physical transportation of the material (deep-sea shipping and customs delay) but Id say there's even odds that Marcone arranged for NN transportation.

No.  Moving a sizable working castle from Scotland to Chicago and having it’s mortar dry enough for it to be a secure facility in under six months would be impossible even with modern tech and magic.  It is too much mass to move unless a god steps in and finger snaps the building from one place to another.  Cash isn’t going to influence a god in that context.

[SerScot]

   Well, someone bought a London Bridge made of stone took it apart and shipped it to Arizona and put it up over a man made lake in the middle of the desert..

In six months?

[wardenferry419]

A quick Google search says that the smallest castle in England takes up about 61% of an acre. Ohh, and it was for sale a year ago.

[Mr. Death]

No.  Moving a sizable working castle from Scotland to Chicago and having it’s mortar dry enough for it to be a secure facility in under six months would be impossible even with modern tech and magic.  It is too much mass to move unless a god steps in and finger snaps the building from one place to another.  Cash isn’t going to influence a god in that context.

Well, Odin does seem to like Marcone and it's his einherjar staffing the place...

[Arjan]

Well, Odin does seem to like Marcone and it's his einherjar staffing the place...

And they are paid.

[Mira]

In six months?

Little longer, from Wikipedia

The original stonework was used to clad a new concrete structure.[1] The reconstruction took slightly over three years and was completed in late 1971. The bridge was not reconstructed over a river, but rather it was rebuilt on land in a position between the main part of the city and Pittsburgh Point, at that time a peninsula jutting into Lake Havasu. Once completed, the Bridgewater Channel Canal was dredged under the bridge and flooded, separating Pittsburgh Point from the city, creating an island. As a result, the bridge now traverses a navigable shortcut between the Thompson Bay part of Lake Havasu south of Pittsburgh Point, and the remainder of Lake Havasu to the north.[5]

But then again Marcone could of had some supernatural help from Gard's friends..

[SerScot]

Mr. Death,

Well, Odin does seem to like Marcone and it's his einherjar staffing the place...

One of the things that I have always liked about DF magic is that it has some relationship to real world physics.  It’s not “wave a wand and reassemble Manhattan” from “Magical Beasts and Where to Find Them”.  If the castle appears with a finger snap we are definitely in the latter category.

[Quantus]

No.  Moving a sizable working castle from Scotland to Chicago and having it’s mortar dry enough for it to be a secure facility in under six months would be impossible even with modern tech and magic.  It is too much mass to move unless a god steps in and finger snaps the building from one place to another.  Cash isn’t going to influence a god in that context.

Im sorry, are you arguing that /Magic/ is incapable of making mortar dry?     

Im not saying anyone finger-snapped and made it teleport, though Im also not saying didnt do something close (aka NN Ways instead of sea-shipping) since doing it that much the Easy Way would likely be more Debt than Marcone would think it worth.  But it absolutely, 100% does not take 6 months for mortar to dry in any universe.  Certainly not in any universe with modern concrete technology, and especially not in one with both that and magic.  Seriously, next month we are putting up a three story steel and concrete structure, plus all the processing equipment that goes inside it, during a 10-day scheduled mill shutdown and with maybe two months prior mobilization on the part of the contractor.  Even Harry noted that they'd likely had the plan in place and ready to move as soon as he was out of the way, so really the only stage that had to happen in the six month period is final assembly; there is a very real possibility that Marcone had the castle shipped, staged and ready in a wharehouse just outside of town.  Hell,If give it even odds that he had planned to put it up somewhere else and just change the final location when a last-minute opportunity arose (Im assuming he gets something out of it being the former bastion residence of a paranoid wizard which was coincidentally fortified on the NN side by one of the most powerful fae around).   

[Mr. Death]

Mr. Death,

One of the things that I have always liked about DF magic is that it has some relationship to real world physics.  It’s not “wave a wand and reassemble Manhattan” from “Magical Beasts and Where to Find Them”.  If the castle appears with a finger snap we are definitely in the latter category.

Doesn't have to be a fingersnap. We saw that Odin, for instance, was able to make a portal straight from Chichen Itza to Chicago. Hell, he's also Kris "Hit Every House On The Planet In One Night" Kringle. There's plenty of ways he could grease the wheels and get things done quicker.

[morriswalters]

The six months timeline is off. Harry is brought back six months after his death, and the castle is already in use.

Modern construction can be done quickly, precast concrete panels and steel frames in particular. Having said that, a castle isn't modern construction.  Harry is resurrected in May.  Which means the castle would have been erected in winter.  I can suspend belief as well as the next guy, but unless they used magic that would have been a tough build. But, magic I guess.

(Im assuming he gets something out of it being the former bastion residence of a paranoid wizard which was coincidentally fortified on the NN side by one of the most powerful fae around).   

That assumes a lot unless he knew Harry was coming back. And according to portal mechanics as described in Skin Game that might change with The Brighter Future Society being there instead of Dresden.

[Wizard Sibelis]

And according to portal mechanics as described in Skin Game that might change with The Brighter Future Society being there instead of Dresden.

Yea but technically the BFS stole Harry's brighter future mojo when they formed in the first place, remember what Harry's NN side looked like outside his house in iirc GP? It was Chicago, except brighter... and cleaner. I find this to be too much to be coincidence in the grand scheme of things.

[Ananda]

I think it’s just one of those aspects to the story where you don’t look too closely. Like Dresden’s origin story, him not being able to be near electronics but living in an apartment with a neighbour having a tv a meter above his head, why Captain Picard just happened to be wearing a jacket for the first time when he was beamed down to survive with a Tamarian captain, et cetera.

[Wizard Sibelis]

I think it’s just one of those aspects to the story where you don’t look too closely. Like Dresden’s origin story, him not being able to be near electronics but living in an apartment with a neighbour having a tv a meter above his head, why Captain Picard just happened to be wearing a jacket for the first time when he was beamed down to survive with a Tamarian captain, et cetera.

Thresholds.... Thresholds....

[Gman]

They built the Empire State building from scratch in a little over a year. That was back in 1930. I can see a small castle/keep being built in 6 months. Marcone may have had some supernatural help on the construction also.