Actuall, Victor contacted the Becketts to help him make more Three-Eye, not the other way around. Other than that one out of order issue, you do have a valid theory.
Personally, I think that the Three-Eye may be a by-product of some other potion that someone was trying to teach him. In SF Harry and Bob state several times that every potion recipie is different for every mage and will have slightly different effects depending on who made it. It could be that someone gave Victor his recipie for straight up crazy juce, but when Victor makes it it opens the user to The Sight.
well i think you would be giving Victor too much credit. he has no idea that another wizard can take control of his demon he uses its name in front of Harry. he had no idea Harrry could mentally smack his shadow self. he only knows specific things that his teacher taught him and he worked on. he is a one trick pony.
yeah, one running speculation is thatThe red court wanted to expand in the chicago criminal underground so it makes sense to get rid of competition. That is marcone. Harry was not yet that important
*Person who gave Victor the Three Eye recipe to attack Marcone
*Person who gave hexenwulf belts to the FBI to attack Marcone
*Person who got Denarians to attack Marcone
are the same person. It makes me wonder if Marcone is even more important in the BAT than Harry is.
Sells' limited knowledge points to him NOT having a teacher, not not having a teacher.so how did he come up with the formula for 3eye? that is a far advanced potion. how did he get the bloodline curse? how did he get an extensive library as they would be expensive? and he was never said to have one just a few books. no he isn't self taught someone taught him specific things and set him on his path. someone had wanted Sells to do specific things, he was a tool. it is obvious.
I'd bet that he was self taught, using an extensive library of books, and *someone/thing* made sure those books were the real deal
Why make third eye? Because he can.
Why go to war with Marcone? Because Marcones in the way of his three eye trade
So basically, the whole series and everything that harry has gone up against so far, has been to try to get Harry to leave the White Council, and join "someone". I would say that sounds like overkill just to get Harry. I also think that it was overkill to set up the outrageously powerful Bloodline spell just to take out EB, but that's me.
and that if any number of folks wanted Harry dead instead of turned, he would be dead right now.
well . . . .
so how did he come up with the formula for 3eye? that is a far advanced potion. how did he get the bloodline curse? how did he get an extensive library as they would be expensive? and he was never said to have one just a few books. no he isn't self taught someone taught him specific things and set him on his path. someone had wanted Sells to do specific things, he was a tool. it is obvious.Where do we have evidence that 3eye is a "far advanced" potion? He did not have the "Bloodline Curse", though the curse he used did have a similar effect, it did not target a bloodline. He had a demon summoned, it is possible that the bound demon was compelled to tell him something about curses, or even potion making. Or it could have been another demon that he summoned. All of this is speculation, of course.
So basically, the whole series and everything that harry has gone up against so far, has been to try to get Harry to leave the White Council, and join "someone". I would say that sounds like overkill just to get Harry. I also think that it was overkill to set up the outrageously powerful Bloodline spell just to take out EB, but that's me.
Also, the bloodline curse in Changes and the heart exploder in SF killed in similar ways, but the ritual in SF was NOT a bloodline curse, it used a thaumaturgic link powered by ritual sex. I don't think it needs to be the same person teaching sells and the Red Court. If two coaches who have never met each other both grew up knowing the rules of football and watching the same games, it is not unlikely they will both draw up similar plays. So I don't know if the connection is necessarily there, other than Arianna getting nudged into action that involved Harry.
Where do we have evidence that 3eye is a "far advanced" potion? He did not have the "Bloodline Curse", though the curse he used did have a similar effect, it did not target a bloodline. He had a demon summoned, it is possible that the bound demon was compelled to tell him something about curses, or even potion making. Or it could have been another demon that he summoned. All of this is speculation, of course.Changes page 161-162 for whole convo. i am just using the important piece.
Changes page 161-162 for whole convo. i am just using the important piece.Yes, I put that in my edit above as well, but it doesn't specifically say that it is the same spell, just that they are similar, and that Sells' version didn't have enough power to go bloodline. One could infer that it was the same spell, but it doesn't seem definitive. You can feel from the whole conversation that Vadderung *can't* fill Harry in on all the details. It seems to me that Vadderung is using this to point something out to Harry so he can find a method to defeat it, but he can't go into more specifics.
Harry,"How does it work?"
Vadderung,"it tears out the heart. rips it to bits on the way out, too. sound familiar?"
Harry," hell's bells." it had been years since i had even thought about Victor Sells or his victims.
Vaderung, "it's all connected, Dresden. the whole game. and you're now beginning to learn who the players are. the sorcerer who used the spell in Chicago before didn't have strength enough to make it spread past the initial target. the RC does.no one has used Power on that scale in more than a millennium."
Now while 3E does give the user the ability to see the metaphysical, how does this junkie know the name of an demon/outsider?
I like to think the Sells version of the curse was inspired by the White Court. Papa Raith just switched over to the Red Court version for the satisfaction of shanking Thomas to death.
I like to think the Sells version of the curse was inspired by the White Court. Papa Raith just switched over to the Red Court version for the satisfaction of shanking Thomas to death.It was like the Red Court curse so why not just blame the red court?
imagine the effect of third eye on all those minor talents, the WC trying to deal thousand of dark mini warlocks.
imagine the effect of third eye on all those minor talents, the WC trying to deal thousand of dark mini warlocks.
I think it is worth considering (as has been proposed before), that whoever put Victor on the path of black magic, passed out the wolf belts, etc., is a person or group of persons trying to engineer situations which would put Harry into a position to leave the White Council (or get kicked out). This also goes for manipulation of the Red Court. The entire war starting incident at Bianca's can be read as a situation manipulated to force Harry into actions which would get him kicked out of / severed from the White Council.We shouldn't work on the basis that all of Creation revolves around Harry. Even though it does (this is the Dresdenverse, after all).
IMO, most of the antagonists Harry has faced to directly to this point (to include the Red Court in Changes) are more than likely sock puppets for a background player who would like to see Harry unaffiliated or outright hostile to the White Council, and ready for recruitment to their cause.
Also, the bloodline curse in Changes and the heart exploder in SF killed in similar ways, but the ritual in SF was NOT a bloodline curse, it used a thaumaturgic link powered by ritual sex. I don't think it needs to be the same person teaching sells and the Red Court. If two coaches who have never met each other both grew up knowing the rules of football and watching the same games, it is not unlikely they will both draw up similar plays. So I don't know if the connection is necessarily there, other than Arianna getting nudged into action that involved Harry.
We shouldn't work on the basis that all of Creation revolves around Harry. Even though it does (this is the Dresdenverse, after all).All creation does revolve around Harry. But at that point in time most players did not now yet so it could not influence their decisions.
yeah, one running speculation is that
*Person who gave Victor the Three Eye recipe to attack Marcone
*Person who gave hexenwulf belts to the FBI to attack Marcone
*Person who got Denarians to attack Marcone
are the same person. It makes me wonder if Marcone is even more important in the BAT than Harry is.
I don't see why it couldn't be Victor's own creation. We have only seen Harry make potions and he seems pretty terrible at it since Bob needs to constantly hold his hand.
So basically, the whole series and everything that harry has gone up against so far, has been to try to get Harry to leave the White Council, and join "someone". I would say that sounds like overkill just to get Harry.
All creation does revolve around Harry. But at that point in time most players did not now yet so it could not influence their decisions.
So basically, the whole series and everything that harry has gone up against so far, has been to try to get Harry to leave the White Council, and join "someone". I would say that sounds like overkill just to get Harry. I also think that it was overkill to set up the outrageously powerful Bloodline spell just to take out EB, but that's me.Mab does not know the word overkill when she tries to recruit Harry ;D
If successful, then in 12 years or so, the world would have seen an initial spike in emerging wizards, with more appearing each year. At around 20 years, the White Council would have started swelling appreciably. Also, by that time, with a couple decades worth of addicts getting pregnant and having magic-infused babies, the wizarding community would be exploding in size. It could be like when homosapiens started to get born more and more and the cro-magnon was well on his way to extinction.
One hole in your theory is this ... The WC has to identify folks with magical ability. They've been spread thin and have been missing folks, thus the rise in Warlocks.
Here's another thought. I'm going in the opposite direction of the "lets make a lot of warlocks to spread the White Council too thin" theory). We know that the White Court came up with a plan to rid the world of wizards by getting rid of females who had some talent. The reduction of the available breeding-stock and the long time required to get a wizard from "lucky embryo who has the spark of magic" to "Dresden-Level Battleship on Legs" is exceedingly long.
But remember, in Storm Front, the Wardens and the White Council were not spread thin.
The Black Councils goals would have to be to place its members at the top of the magical hierarchy specifically of magically endowed human beings while at the same time organizing the weakening of the other supernatural powers to facilitate a smooth transition during the takeover.
It is clear that while Victor Sells is not in the same league power wise as Dresden, He is clearly well trained
Finally, if discovered by the White Council see if more focus can be placed upon Wizard Dresden in order to recruit him into the organization. He was under the Doom of Damocles and if under suspicion may run right into the Black Councils arms for safety.
Dresden was discovered to be far more resilient than suspected. Rather than running from White Council justice Dresden stayed to uncover the Sells operation killing Sells, capturing his associates, and destroying the production center for Third Eye. Worse, he clears himself of any wrongdoing and of the Doom meaning it will be more difficult to place blame on him in future events.
Clearly the entire operation was ruined and almost a complete loss. None of the objectives were achieved. Due to the interference of Dresden; Third Eye could not be either reproduced or it was deemed a security risk as its production after Dresden proved he was innocent would have let on that Sells had compatriots.
The White Council is proven to be completely blind to the goings on within its own community except when the most gross of actions are taken and even then they turn on their own before looking to other culprits.
Gain allies and operatives within the federal government utilizing supernatural favors to influence members
Eliminating Marcone is also a priority in that it opens Chicago for the Black Council Agent Bianca St. Claire
Evidently the Hexenwolfen sociopathic effects are also accelerated by the panic of discovery by Dresden
However there are several positives, one is that again there are no direct ties to the Black Council, second Marcone loses his supernatural enforcers meaning that he would have to start from scratch.
Starting a large scale conflict between The Red Court of Vampires and the White Council is clearly the most important goal of the events. The Black Council has had prior dealings with Harry Dresden; they know what makes him tick and specifically manufacture an event that will cause him to react. Bianca St. Claire is clearly misled on how Dresden will react to the situation. A child is threatened, a woman is threatened, his friends are threatened, and finally his beloved is threatened. He is forced to be there by his duty to the White Council, the Red Court is already looking for war. These are all specifically tailored to make him react violently and (in the opinion of the White and Black Councils) excessively.
If Dresden surprises everyone by allowing these actions to take place then it only underscores the weakness of the White Council to a predatory species that would merely find some other pretext to act on that weakness.
Dresden being killed in the meantime is all the better as he has interfered in several operations killing in chronological order agents Kravos, FBI Hexenwolfen, and Sells disrupting each of their operations.
Not much Dresden reacted exactly planned; war between the two major groups is accomplished. The loss of Bianca St. Claire while unfortunate is not critical.
The Red Court’s first strike against Senior Council Member Simon Petrovich and Archangel is clearly done with advanced intelligence from Black Council agents.
The Attack on Archangel is a message from the Red Court to the White Council that the war is so serious that the Red Court kills the White Council member that they trust the most first.
That being the case, it's not a sure thing, but reasonable to guess that Victor had been taught it by someone from the RC to test it out (it hadn't been used for 1000 years according to Odin and magic changes about every 300 years according to Bob
who wants to bet some of those warlocks found during the war, were due to someone sliping them third eye.
Where are you getting that one from ? That sounds like you're reading something as meaning there's a major change periodically rather than slow drift over time, and I'm not recalling anything in the text to suggest that.
Where are you getting that one from ? That sounds like you're reading something as meaning there's a major change periodically rather than slow drift over time, and I'm not recalling anything in the text to suggest that.
That being the case, it's not a sure thing, but reasonable to guess that Victor had been taught it by someone from the RC to test it out (it hadn't been used for 1000 years according to Odin and magic changes about every 300 years according to Bob). I'd bet they taught him the curse, and the means to make the 3eye. And if what you said is true, then in about oh, 20 years, the WC would have it's hands full of potential wizards/warlocks. And if you remember Ortega said that the War was started about 20 years early.
I can believe that pushing Harry to go dark is part of the point, even if not recruiting him directly. The flip he nearly has outside Sells' house, before the mysterious female voice brings him back to himself, seems to me like it very well might be the whole point of the operation.I try to avoid any theory that assumes that Harry is the center of creation (even though he actually is). Both Nick and Cowl have tried to turn him, and shown an interest in keeping him alive when they had the opportunity to kill him, but they have also made it clear that his death is perfectly acceptable to them, and that he is kind of secondary in their respective plans.
They did however get data on how well the curse worked, which may well have been useful for designing the implementation in Changes.Point there: Making people's heart explode for no apparent reason usually draws wardens pretty quickly. Using a fuse to experiment was a good decision.
I would say it's absolutely critical. She is another sacrifice; her death is a casus belli.As a principle, I hate omniscient villains (and I suspect that the Neurovore might be one, but that's another story). Look at the sequence of event that led to Bianca's death
I'll bet against. We have no evidence at all that the drug does anything other than opens the Sight. We know the Council hunts warlocks all the time, we know the number is long-term increasing because the population of the planet is increasing.
Sorry, it wasn't Bob. It was in a WoJ (http://www.jimbutcheronline.com/bb/index.php/topic,20960.msg917591.html#msg917591) from DragonCon .
I usually hesitate to jump into any thread the Neurovore has been in. Bob-like memory combined with a predator's instinct for pointing out contradictions are though to go up against. Also, the use of pronouns becomes a death trap.
I try to avoid any theory that assumes that Harry is the center of creation (even though he actually is).
My question however is: Who exactly did the experiment benefit? It wasn't the vampires, or at least Bianca was not involved. That curse seems to be something that the vampires have used in the past - Martin knew about this ritual even before he started his whole double-agent thing. This isn't even a theory at this point, but *someone* wanted to experiment with , and get more data on that spell, then 12 years later *someone* manipulated the vamps to use the same curse, and make it massively overkill.
[About Bianca's death]As a principle, I hate omniscient villains (and I suspect that the Neurovore might be one, but that's another story).
- Lea manages to steal Amorrachius - purely opportunity based, due to Harry getting hit in the head and making some very bad decisions. This happens at the last minute before the party.
- Susan decides to show up at Bianca's party.
- Harry blows a fuse, throws the accords and everything else out the window and goes up against Bianca.
- He actually succeeds in killing her, even though he was captive , deprived of most of his power, and locked in a room with a bloodthirsty half-vamp.
What I think is that the Red Court - or at least a faction of it, was indeed planning to start a war with the WC. Harry surprised them by starting that war earlier than they'd planned, and they just went with it. Whether by doing this he doomed the White Council or put a big wrench in the bad guys plan, only time will tell.
The Council don't react to Red Court provocation because they basically have no need to; we see in Changes that when they finally do bestir themselves, the Red Court survive a matter of days. The Council are in the position of a martial arts master walking down the street refusing to be provoked by the taunts of a small child into killing that small child with one blow.
reading your posts on the last page, this was the one thing that rang bells in my mind. have i missed something? if the WC could have so easily handled the RC, why wouldn't they have earlier during their war? iirc, the WC was reported as being on the losing side of the war several times. the results of Chances wasn't the WC killing a small child in my eyes, it was Martin's manipulation to get harry an extremely low blow that would hit the entire RC, the WC wasn't even a presence at the final conflict (sure a few of it's members where, but they were all Grey Council)
I have to second this. If the White Council version of a nuke strike was able to be pulled off easily, surely the strategic situation in Dead Beat would have merited such a response - Peabody's manipulations could only go so far.
Incidentally, the strike called up in Changes never materialized due to the Reds interference. Dresden managed to turn their own weapon upon them, but it still doesn't signify the White Council having the practical ability to do such a strike, even if they have the skill to do so. They tried and got slapped down before it ever occurred.
It was Arthur Langtry, remember? His policy was to stop the RC with wards, which his were very powerful. If you remember the various battle references, when the WC takes an offensive campaign, the RC get their balls caved in (paraphrasing Harry) by the WC. The reason they kept losing was because the Merlin was a pompous coward, politically speaking.
The Council totally took out the Reds in Changes. They did it by a combination of sending in a bunch of their best people dressed in grey, and denying Harry overt help so that he would turn to Mab for power, which she wants to give him and not any of the rest of them. I don't for an instant believe that either Chandler's letter or Eb's report of illness among the Council are proven true; they work for me as motivations for Harry.
that's .. interesting, I don't think the WC to be incompetent, but i wouldn't have thought to give them that much credit. How many people could really have known that Mab was on such good terms with harry, and had been pushing for him to become her Knight?
I think there are still too many doubters in Harry on the council for that idea to have made it past "Those powers will finally turn him evil. not going to put our hopes of the RC's destruction in those hands"
you think the grey council is just a puppet organization for the WC do get things done?
(sorta like.. abunch of blackstaffs?)
I thought that a lot of the Grey council members weren't even on the WC..
but still, I think if the council could have so easily annihilated the entire red court so completely as at the end of changes, at literally any time they had wanted, they wouldn't have weathered an entire war with the RC before leaving if up to Harry to stumble his way into doing the task.
Besides, I think Harry under Mab's control might well strike some of those people as a less dangerous wild card than Harry as he was pre-Changes.
[/quote
woah, never thought of it that way, the WK mantle being a lash for keeping harry tame...
For values of "pompous coward" equal to "not actually wanting to commit genocide".
He doesn't even have to have humanitarian* reasons for doing so. It seems entirely possible to me that we will discover in the next couple of books that the consequences of the annihilation of the Red Court are much much worse than the consequences of their existence.
He doesn't stumble. He's steered every step of the way. There are very few chapters in Changes where Harry is not being managed by some combination of a) the Merlin b) Eb c) Mab or Lea d) Uriel/the White God e) Odin. It's not a complicated set of chances left to run, it's an operation micromanaged every step of the way.
He doesn't stumble. He's steered every step of the way. There are very few chapters in Changes where Harry is not being managed by some combination of a) the Merlin b) Eb c) Mab or Lea d) Uriel/the White God e) Odin. It's not a complicated set of chances left to run, it's an operation micromanaged every step of the way.
Also the only reason Harry became the WK is because he broke his back falling off that ladder and landing on something, no one could have predicted that this would have happened.Oh? I'm sure it wasn't an accident.
He doesn't stumble. He's steered every step of the way. There are very few chapters in Changes where Harry is not being managed by some combination of a) the Merlin b) Eb c) Mab or Lea d) Uriel/the White God e) Odin. It's not a complicated set of chances left to run, it's an operation micromanaged every step of the way.
Everyone but the Merlin and Eb could have known. As for the bloodline curse, it would all depend on the 'foresight' that particular entity possessed.
There were way to many variables with too many available paths to being seriously up the creek for the CI scenario to have been micromanaged. MAYBE if we had seen Lea whisper to Harry that turning Susan and sacrificing her was tha answer I could by into your theory, but Harry came up with it all on his own that we could see. An no one, anywhere, wants to leave any plan up to Harry's bolshevik muppet thinking bringing him to the right conclusion.
I agree that those three COULD have known, but I doubt that all three DID know. In fact, I'd bet that the WG and Lea/MAB did know. Odin - maybe after Harry's visit. But enough for them to micromanage the events in Changes ... I find that doubtful.
Oh? I'm sure it wasn't an accident.
Susan wasn't going to randomly die in the battle either, because Lea gave her magical protections that made her completely undetectable and she had Amorrachius to boot.And totally by accident, Harry wore conquistador outfit, while Susan was dressed up as a human sacrifice. A not-so-subtle hint from the Sidhe?
Did anyone else note that the costume that Lea gave Susan was sacrificial robe to Harry's conquistador?
GOD I LOVE AN OBSERVANT READER!
And totally by accident, Harry wore conquistador outfit, while Susan was dressed up as a human sacrifice. A not-so-subtle hint from the Sidhe?
Heh, it's even in the WoJ compilation:
Your WoJ foo is strongWhy, thanks! (and this coming from the WoJ Rock Star himself ;D)
And totally by accident, Harry wore conquistador outfit, while Susan was dressed up as a human sacrifice. A not-so-subtle hint from the Sidhe?
Heh, it's even in the WoJ compilation:
All that being said, it seems somehow hypocritical of Jim to have all of Harry's actions micromanaged to the point of him almost blindly following some divine plan when he hammers home to us in the text so often that humans actually have free will. If we get som many occurrences of exposition talking about the merits of free will and the ability to make choices, and then have the whole series as being a human who was herded into making the only possible choices to follow a divine plan will be a serious cop out.
And totally by accident, Harry wore conquistador outfit, while Susan was dressed up as a human sacrifice. A not-so-subtle hint from the Sidhe?the sacrifice on the table had no robe nor did Lil Maggie. the outfit Susan wore was more like the vamp priestess robes. not a human sacrifice. the only play at anything i see would be Arianna and Ortega. she was a Mayan priestess and he was a conquistador. Lea knew of this and even talked about it in the limo. the robes like the one at the RC warehouse. they were props for the ceremony worn by the people committing the sacrifice.
Heh, it's even in the WoJ compilation: