I twisted open both salt shakers and started pouring them out in a circle around us, maybe three feet across. As I finished the circled, I invested it with the slightest effort of will, of intent, and it closed with a sudden snap of silent, invisible energies. I stood up again, holding my breath, until the mist touched it a moment later.
It roiled up against the circle and stopped, as though a cylinder of Plexiglas stood between it and us. Murphy and I both let out our breath in slow exhalations. "Wow," she said quietly. "Is that like a force field or something?"
"Only against magical energies," I said, squinting around us. "If someone comes along with a gun, we're in trouble."
I meant, "line in the sand" and/or "chalk on concrete" circle. Not block.
(the demon's not appearing with a gun, after all.)LOL.
Not only could he shoot you, but he could also throw a rock at you, set the building you are in on fire, lasso you and drag you out, pump poisonous gas into your room... ect, ect, ect.
A few films have shown this type of thing, but the only one I recall off the top of my head is the scene in sleepy hollow where the headless horseman throws part of a fencepost (with a rope attached) into the church, impaling a guy and dragging him out by it.
Heck, nothing really prevents the vampire from grabbing a leafblower and breaking a circle, if you made it out of salt or the like. Similarly, he could douse the area with enough water to ground the circle out.
So, circles are really best at things that are unintelligent, or for things that you've summoned into the circle (the demon's not appearing with a gun, after all.) It also shows how crucial it is to keep your work area clean; nothing sucks more than being beheaded by a perfectly thrown piece of junk. :)
Okay, so I accept that non-mortals can't break a circle, even if they throw something across (Bob threw Dresden a squeeze bottle of "GTFO" potion in Storm Front, and it didn't end the circle). So shouldn't a non-mortal with a gun be able to shoot across the perimeter?
i remember that movie! lol but before he throught the fence post didnt he try and through his hatched/ tomahawk only to have it blocked by the circle around the church so wouldnt this translate into weapons say brought over by fae (rhym not intended) from the nevernever are also block so for example an elf archer who brought hus own bow would have his arrows blocked by the circle
Okay, so I accept that non-mortals can't break a circle, even if they throw something across (Bob threw Dresden a squeeze bottle of "GTFO" potion in Storm Front, and it didn't end the circle). So shouldn't a non-mortal with a gun be able to shoot across the perimeter?
Yes, but anything real crosses the threshold of the circle, it breaks the circle. Harry breaks Victor's circle later that book by throwing something across it before Vic stabs the rabbit. Not to mention Binder threatens Harry and Murphy with breaking their circle (that was keeping out his summoned baddies) and letting them through. In face what he said was that if they SHOT him, it would break their circle and they'd get eaten. They could shoot him, or keep them out, but not both.
I'd lean more towards examples that come from later books... I wonder sometimes if Jim didn't quite have all of his "settings" rules straightened out at the start of the series - probably by the third or fourth books, they were fleshed out quite a bit more in his mind and he was able to stay consistent.
Or maybe it was a potion made by him so it was "invited" or exempt. I dunno.
To get back to the point of the magic circle & vampire's gun... I'd say that's kosher. Fire away, oh bloodsucker with that B.F.G. Perforate said mage into swiss cheese.
But it wouldn't be terribly sporting if he whipped out that pistol in the climatic end-fight - if I was the GM I'd establish early on that he's a gun totin' backshootin' sort of bloodsucker, and he's got an unethical and unstereotypical approach to fightin'.
It's not just anything 'real' that breaks the circle:
"As a weapon, it wasn't much. But it was real, and it had been hurled by a real person, a mortal. It could shatter the integrity of a magic circle." (Storm Front)
So Murphy or Harry shooting out of the circle would break it, as would binder throwing something in. His minions - being summoned creatures - couldn't breach the circle. Which seems consistant with the rules laid out in Storm Front
That suggests to me that a magic circle wouldn't keep out bullets shot by a full vampire with a gun, but said bullets wouldn't break the integrity of a circle mid ritual. Of course the spell caster leaping behind cover (or falling to the ground in a twitching mess would probably do that anyway.
The second example is from Turn Coat.
“They’re spirit beings,” I said. “As long as the circle’s here, they’re staying outside it.”
“Couldn’t they just scuff dirt on it or something?”
I shook my head. “Breaking the circle isn’t just a physical process. It’s an act of choice, of will—and these things don’t have that.”
So I just went and looked at Turn Coat, and ... well, well. I have to reverse my stance pretty fully with regards to second order effects.