And you forget that the murder happened. The evidence actually exists. To anyone who isn't aware of the supernatural, it is compelling. To most of CPD, Dresden is a cop killer. The only reason he hasn't fallen down some stairs, or wasn't shot "resisting arrest" and his place hasn't been searched, is because these guys asserted jurisdiction. Yes, they took Dresden. But this could easily be protective custody, in a sense. This was a very soft take, all things considered. Very diplomatic.
Green Flame Rising (Exalted vs Dresden Files)
- Thread starter DragonParadox
- Start date
- Crossover Fantasy
- Location
- florida
I'm sure the government is just going to take that lying down.
And then cry salty tears of regret and sadness over how they could have been so foolish.
- Location
- being near locations is my passion.
Huh. No.You made the very foolish mistake of assuming people would act rationally in their own self interest.
As opposed to letting fear, paranoia, and ignorance drive them.
It's very funny. Especially with everyone trying to figure out what their brilliant 4D chess moves with multiple layers of sock puppetry could be.
But no. They just wanted to hire him
Apologies, I badly miscommunicated my intention/perspective.
I was trying to point out that these people are stupid assholes and that they defaulted to trying to pressure Harry by threating to ruin his entire life is a good indicator that they are like in general: Awful.
And that is an error to extend them any sort of benefit of the doubt.
This group went after Harry. They know Harry is the "biggest deal" they have come across so far, so we know this bullshit was signed off on from the top.
I didn't miss that these people let fear, paranoia, and ignorance drive them, but was trying to say that their default, "go to" method was... well. This. That tells us that the people making decisions in this org are bad people. They do bad things, and they are stupid about it.
They are not our friends. People who want to mitigate harm would attempt a Carrot before trying to wield a Stick - there was nothing that prevented them from first trying to get Harry to agree willingly, and then resorting to this if that did not work.
But they didn't try.
@BeepSmile Essence expenditure for the purposes of anima flare is counted per scene, that has reset.
- Location
- florida
Good to know.
But I'm still pointing out this happened because people thought they were being "oh so clever" instead of taking the easy win on their motives the crown represented.
- Location
- Germany
Why would the goverment even start looking for Wizards when a minor natural disaster destroys a building and some records and personel are lost?
- Location
- being near locations is my passion.
[1] Irrelevant to what I am talking about, and I am confused as to how you missed my point. To reiterate:
The murder happened.
The accusation is false, as in "The FBI know Harry did not do it but are arresting him anyway"
My point is that by trying this as their first method as opposed to trying to reach out to Harry, and then escalating to this if that did not work; we can infer the quality of the people we are dealing with. The quality of the people who gave the "go order" on this operation.
And they ain't quality people
Yeah. Some people do be like that.
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- Location
- florida
Ah. Who are those people at the library of congress?
@Yog you need to apply protagonist centered morality. Then they are clearly evil badman doing evil badmen things.
If Ebenezer decided to, it wouldn't need to be minor natural disaster. It could be an entropy curse that eliminated the entire FBI leadership via random accidents.
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- florida
Myself included naturally
Still I can't believe "you know he's in the phonebook" was hitting the nail on the head. That's so surreal.
- Location
- Germany
I don't know who they are, but if they still exist they appearantly managed not to challenge the major factions of the supernatural world.
- Location
- Norway
@DragonParadox I encourage you to add to the Crown of Eyes Informational post how it's limited in asking about future actions and guidance, since this seems to come up several times.
Here are a few stabs at describing how I understand it so far, which you might steal to use the phrasing of, or correct my misconceptions too.
-The Crown of Eyes doesn't answer "How do I..." questions. It can answer who, what, when, where, and even "How did this happen?", but will not tell you what you can or should do. This is not a statement about which literal word you use in your question, it's a description of the types of questions it works on.
-The Crown of Eyes looks for secrets and facts about people, it is not a general problem solver. If you want to free a friend from Bob the Fey's captivity, you could ask "What are Bob's secret vices?" and the Crown would tell you that he's got an extreme sweet tooth and will do anything for candy, and you could try using that. But the Crown will not tell you whether offering honeycakes would actually work, nor how many of them you'd need.
-The Crown of Eyes cannot predict actions to come from free will. "Which lottery number will win tomorrow?" works, because it's a machine draw, and "What are Mister John Smith's normal habits on a Tuesday?" works because it's an established fact about John Smith. "Where will John Smith be next Tuesday?" does not work, that's not something the Crown can tell you. "What would convince John Smith to...?" also does not work, you have to make your own arguments.
Here are a few stabs at describing how I understand it so far, which you might steal to use the phrasing of, or correct my misconceptions too.
-The Crown of Eyes doesn't answer "How do I..." questions. It can answer who, what, when, where, and even "How did this happen?", but will not tell you what you can or should do. This is not a statement about which literal word you use in your question, it's a description of the types of questions it works on.
-The Crown of Eyes looks for secrets and facts about people, it is not a general problem solver. If you want to free a friend from Bob the Fey's captivity, you could ask "What are Bob's secret vices?" and the Crown would tell you that he's got an extreme sweet tooth and will do anything for candy, and you could try using that. But the Crown will not tell you whether offering honeycakes would actually work, nor how many of them you'd need.
-The Crown of Eyes cannot predict actions to come from free will. "Which lottery number will win tomorrow?" works, because it's a machine draw, and "What are Mister John Smith's normal habits on a Tuesday?" works because it's an established fact about John Smith. "Where will John Smith be next Tuesday?" does not work, that's not something the Crown can tell you. "What would convince John Smith to...?" also does not work, you have to make your own arguments.
- Location
- being near locations is my passion.
OBJECTION!
@Yog you need to apply 17 y/o angry-punk-bitch morality. Then they are clearly shit-for-brains jackboots blindly wielding the power of the state like a cudgel because they don't have the capacity for genuine subtly.
...That or they know that whatever they are doing would not be agreed to willingly by Harry. And the implications of that are actually a little bit worse :/
We are 100% talking past eachother here. I thought you were referring to the spooks who didn't try to ask Harry first before coming out with the threats. Edit: I was very confused about what you meant by "the crown represented"Myself included naturally
Honestly, I think that attempting for a better outcome than what we got (i.e. these Feds backing off and not taking Harry) would required threading a much narrower needle. But I do take your point.
Asking a specific question about the motives of the people behind this would have given us the opportunity to keep him out of the state's clutches.
I'll try to take a lesson from this and not be so... unreasondly avoidant of using the Crown.
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- Location
- florida
...mmm good point about talking past each other.
Well lunch calls.
I will admit I cannot wait to see Ujus analysis of the situation. I disagree with his conclusions usually but his posts really are a treat.
What else could they do? Remember:
1) The murder happened, and the cops have the tapes with Dresden's face.
2) FBI doesn't know details about magical politics
3) Dresden doesn't know about FBI magical investigation squad.
Based on the first, they had to approach Dresden before cops do. Based on the second and the third point, they couldn't just tell Dresden "yeah, we know about supernatural, you need to come with us, so we smooth things over for you". Moreover, why should they?
They have no way to bury this right now, because evidence exists. To anyone not aware of magic, it is compelling.
Goldfish
Friendly Spider-Fish Abomination
- Location
- Formerly of the Far Realm
The folks who barely know the supernatural exists know that Harry wasn't involved, so the evidence, whatever it is, must have been extremely poor to begin with. By acting in this manner, however, they've deliberately legitimized it in the eyes of others, law enforcement included.
Please read the actual text:
They are only aware that he was framed because they know about techbane. They evidence is too good when it is taken into account. If someone is not aware of techbane being a thing, the evidence would be compelling.
- Location
- being near locations is my passion.
No. [1] They could have done that. They absolutely could have.
They could have ordered their agents at his doorstep to inform Harry they they know he is framed, and from there, apologise and like... say they have to bring him in. Try to set the foundation for healthy working relationship with him as best they reasonably can.
They should have done that because it would be more likely for Harry to treat them as Allies against whomever framed him, and then try to build on that to get him to join their organisation.
They had the option to be nice but firm, with room for escalating to asshole if Harry proved intransigent. They decided to start at asshole.
But we're not talking about how it looks to outsiders. We're talking about how the FBI chose to approach Harry, with the information they had (i.e. Harry is innocent and has been framed), and they chose to come in as they did, rather than start off nice and then escalate if needed.
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The thing is they seriously don't understand what they're dealing with, they think Harry is maybe a bit stronger than the average practitioner, they don't understand how massive the gap is between a Wizard and a minor talent.
Nevermind that Harry is still basically a baby wizard and is at least a century away from really hitting his stride.
They think they're a big fish and someone is muscling in on their turf, their territory.
They simply don't understand they basically have a bunch of lemonade stands and think they own the town.
I'm not advocating keeping them in the dark, the opposite actually as we don't want them stumbling over something worse than angry Wizards.
They know that Harry was framed for this. They don't know that Harry is a good guy. They likely don't know what the standard operating procedure for him discovering that they know of magic. They don't know his capabilities. They have no reason to trust Dresden.
Oh, and they were there with people NOT in the know. Like us.
This really verges into protagonist-centered morality. Because as far as they could plausibly operate without exposing themselves to too much risk, they behaved very softly.
Oh, and another point - if they are doing esper (likely minor talent/practitioner) research, they NEED to be informed of the Laws, before they create monsters.
FriedIce
The Authentic Fake
- Location
- Hyperreality
At the very least their name for the White Council 'Lawmakers' implies they know about the laws. They might not know why they exist, but they do know they exist.
True. But in this case "why" very much matters.