In the books, everyone with this catch only has Inhuman Recovery, and thus can only net them +1.  But in general, what would be its max?

It's an everything-but catch so that's +0
Only a special class of "people" can access it +1
Surely every clued in person knows that you fight Summer with Winter and vice versa +2
Theoretical Maximum: +3

Is this correct?

I'd just houserule it, figure out what the largest reasonable strength the particular wizard or community of wizards could raise and make it that.

I'd only use the rules for making a ward when they are somewhere without one and the zombies/faeries/vampires are coming for them.  That would cut out the silliness.  Your character is probably hurt and the zombies/faeries/vampires are going to be there any minute.  Throw up a rudimentary ward then nut up or shut up.

It being the season, and Jim having mentioned Santa at DragonCon, I've been thinking about what would make for a good character based around EDIT:a servant/representative of Old St. Nick, using his themes.  He'd need Marked by Power of course, and perhaps Unseelie Magic, but what else would make for a great themed character?  I have a few ideas, but I'm mostly interested in what you guys cook up.  What do you think?

So for example, the true specialist Ectomancer would be someone who has Thaumaturgy (so he's learned how Wards and Summoning work in general) and has taken three Refinements in being better at Ectomancy.  He is going to be much more awesome than some guy who never got a proper education to begin with and is just sort of winging it on Ectomancy and nothing else.

This would make sense if that was the way it is presented in the book.  Here, to be an ectomancer one would take Ritual and now you can talk to ghosts.  I'm actually saying, why not just spend the extra 1 refresh to have Thaumaturgy with specializations and potential Refinements and the like.  But that would make you a Sorcerer, not a Focused Practitioner.

Perhaps they intend that FPs should take either Thaumaturgy or Evocation as they progress.  As far as I can tell though, that's never spelled out.

I'm houseruling it so that Focused Practitioners start off with a specialization bonus in their field for both conditions (power/control or complexity).  This pays them for foregoing the other fields, but not enough to disincentivize taking one of the main powers.  And I'm allowing the use of Refinements for increasing specialization.  But that's just my own take.

That Forge link was fecking awesome.  I'd had some real problems getting mystery creation straight in my head, but that really cleared it up.  Brilliant.

As you can see, this guy is stronger. Slightly worse at Thaumaturgy, but slightly stronger and far more versatile when it comes to Evocation. Please note that both Belial and I are allowing Lawbreaker to add to power as well as control. This is a houserule, but you could be forgiven for thinking that it's canon. Many people do, at first glance.

For the exact same refresh point expenditure.  This just confirms that there is no mechanical reason to be a focused practitioner, even with refinements.  I just wanted to make sure I understood correctly.

cold-forged-iron

Also, there's no such thing.  Iron is far far too brittle to be hammered into a useful shape by pure strength.  Cold-forged is a term without meaning.  It just sounds impressive.

But mechanically, you understand what I mean?  There must have been some kind of rationale from Evil Hat or one of the betas that prompted it.

You're already specializing, why not further develop that specialization?