Step one: Stand up and loudly explain how a patronus works, and what a dementor actually is, under the guise of arguing for a diffrent punisment - This will make the entire wizengamot, including the aurors controling the dementor present incapable of casting expecto patronum.
Destroy the dementor before it eats anyone. Now the wizengamot has to shut down azkaban (Because the secret would get out).
This would not exactly endear him to anyone at all, but they cannot seriously retaliate, because they need him to kill off the dementors before they run out of aurors who havent heard the truth yet. This doesnt actually free Hermonie, just stops them from sending her (or anyone) to azkaban.
Side bonus Harry cannot predict: This would probably also convince Lucius that he isnt Pottermort.
Step one: Stand up and loudly explain how a patronus works, and what a dementor actually is, under the guise of arguing for a diffrent punisment—This will make the entire wizengamot, including the aurors controling the dementor present incapable of casting expecto patronum. Destroy the dementor before it eats anyone.
I don’t think that simply telling someone is enough to take away their ability to summon a patronus, they’d have to believe you. The members of the Wizengamot don’t know Harry has any noteworthy insight or intellect, and so it’s likely they would not believe him unless he destroyed the dementor, thereby providing evidence that he does indeed have exceptional insight regarding the nature of dementors.
… That isnt actually a weakness in the plan, you know. He could stand up, explain the entire theory, slowly walk over to Hermonie, hand her his wand, and ask her to destroy the dementor as proof of her righteousness and disbelief would probably keep everyone (except Dumbledore. Note: Ask him to not intervene) from interfering right up until the point where she vaporizes the dementor. After which they would be unable to deny the truth of the theorem, and be fucked.
They might let him stand up and explain his theory of how dementors work without interrupting him, I’m pretty certain they wouldn’t let him walk over to the defendant and hand her a wand.
Just because they don’t expect her to be able to accomplish much with it doesn’t mean that they wouldn’t stop it as a matter of policy. You don’t let a character witness walk up and hand anything to a prisoner on the stands without clearance.
A whole lot of plans proposed here seem to rely on the assumption that Harry can treat the Wizengamot as a captive audience who’ll humor any attempt he makes to sway them or prove his points. The Wizengamot is a highly authoritarian court of law, and Harry is a first year student. They have little incentive to humor him about anything.
The blunt force way to play it is to just expecto patronum the dementor into oblivion and go “Would you like me to explain how I did that”? They would almost certainly make him do so, veritas serum, legimens and the whole nine yards. And once they know, they are fucked. I dont think the wizengamot would go for collective obliviation of the events of the trial, so once the cat is out of the bag, its not going back in.
I wasn’t that happy with that plan to begin with, but the more I’ve thought about it, the more I’ve started to like the elegant simplicity of it. He’d get tremendous political turmoil, and possibly throw suspicion on himself with respect to the Bellatrix breakout, but he can still deny that, and they’ve got another suspect anyway. At the same time, he has a chance to sink Azkaban in one shot. I’m calling this one the Damn The Torpedoes Option.
In his place though, I wouldn’t necessarily encourage them to find out how I did it (he can resist veritaserum and leglimency,) but I’d tell them that it’s already too late for them to stop the dissemination of the spell, thus rendering dementors and azkaban obsolete.
Bluffing would be dangerous—if he doesnt actually publish the information, killing him makes the problem go away. And if he commits to “Tell the world, make dementors useless” Then the wizengamot entire are simply more information pathways, and are in fact far better ones than just about anyone else he could tell because it is much harder to obliviate them than Jane Q Wizard,.
If he doesn’t get a chance to arrange, say, for messages to be sent out in the event of his death or incapacitation, then his best bet might be to tell them, but if it looks like he can get away with it it might be better for him to imply that he’s already told some people, but not reveal who. That way they will conclude they can no longer rely on dementors, but the secret doesn’t actually escape.
He did already give Hermione that letter which she could use to find out the secret, but it’s probably too late for her to make any use of it. It would have been a good idea for her to read it as soon as she was told that she was accused of murder, except she probably never had the chance to do that, and anyway she won’t have a wand in Azkaban.
This is the answer that I thought of when I read the chapter (specifically with the ‘blunt force’ amendment below). Unfortunately, it doesn’t fit in with the narrative clues that we’ve been given: there’s no taboo trade-off, and it doesn’t treat the Wizengamot as individuals. Nevertheless, it would be awesome.
Because there is no way Voldemort would be able to cast the true patronus. The nessesary mindset is much to altrusitic. Hmm. Since Hermonie could likely also master the true patronus, wrecking the animal form of the spell for everyone probably shields her from excessive punishment in general as well, at least until such time as a significant number of people other than her and Harry master it. The optimal version of this play is to have Hermonie destroy the dementor present´, but that requires enough time to prep H. Timeturner?
We think it’s likely that Voldemort can’t cast it, but Lucius and the Wizengamot do not, and the only information they have regarding it being a sign of altruism is Harry’s word on the subject.
It’s even more of a stretch to say that Lucius would be convinced that Harry is not Voldemort, because the Patronus alone isn’t enough evidence.
Point. Correction: It would eventually convince Lucius that Harry isnt pottermort once the implications have been worked out and someone else indepenantly verifies what the nessesary mindset is—likely by legimens on Hermonie. It still makes Harry and Herm indespensible right away.
I’m not even completely sure that’s true. Maybe Voldemort could cast it with a sufficiently strong-willed rejection of death for himself (and for his allies), and out of hatred of dementors=death, if he knew how.
Step one: Stand up and loudly explain how a patronus works, and what a dementor actually is, under the guise of arguing for a diffrent punisment - This will make the entire wizengamot, including the aurors controling the dementor present incapable of casting expecto patronum. Destroy the dementor before it eats anyone. Now the wizengamot has to shut down azkaban (Because the secret would get out). This would not exactly endear him to anyone at all, but they cannot seriously retaliate, because they need him to kill off the dementors before they run out of aurors who havent heard the truth yet. This doesnt actually free Hermonie, just stops them from sending her (or anyone) to azkaban.
Side bonus Harry cannot predict: This would probably also convince Lucius that he isnt Pottermort.
I don’t think that simply telling someone is enough to take away their ability to summon a patronus, they’d have to believe you. The members of the Wizengamot don’t know Harry has any noteworthy insight or intellect, and so it’s likely they would not believe him unless he destroyed the dementor, thereby providing evidence that he does indeed have exceptional insight regarding the nature of dementors.
… That isnt actually a weakness in the plan, you know. He could stand up, explain the entire theory, slowly walk over to Hermonie, hand her his wand, and ask her to destroy the dementor as proof of her righteousness and disbelief would probably keep everyone (except Dumbledore. Note: Ask him to not intervene) from interfering right up until the point where she vaporizes the dementor. After which they would be unable to deny the truth of the theorem, and be fucked.
They might let him stand up and explain his theory of how dementors work without interrupting him, I’m pretty certain they wouldn’t let him walk over to the defendant and hand her a wand.
Eh, she is a first year at hogwarts—from their perspective, what is she going to do with it? Apparate out?
Just because they don’t expect her to be able to accomplish much with it doesn’t mean that they wouldn’t stop it as a matter of policy. You don’t let a character witness walk up and hand anything to a prisoner on the stands without clearance.
A whole lot of plans proposed here seem to rely on the assumption that Harry can treat the Wizengamot as a captive audience who’ll humor any attempt he makes to sway them or prove his points. The Wizengamot is a highly authoritarian court of law, and Harry is a first year student. They have little incentive to humor him about anything.
The blunt force way to play it is to just expecto patronum the dementor into oblivion and go “Would you like me to explain how I did that”? They would almost certainly make him do so, veritas serum, legimens and the whole nine yards. And once they know, they are fucked. I dont think the wizengamot would go for collective obliviation of the events of the trial, so once the cat is out of the bag, its not going back in.
I wasn’t that happy with that plan to begin with, but the more I’ve thought about it, the more I’ve started to like the elegant simplicity of it. He’d get tremendous political turmoil, and possibly throw suspicion on himself with respect to the Bellatrix breakout, but he can still deny that, and they’ve got another suspect anyway. At the same time, he has a chance to sink Azkaban in one shot. I’m calling this one the Damn The Torpedoes Option.
In his place though, I wouldn’t necessarily encourage them to find out how I did it (he can resist veritaserum and leglimency,) but I’d tell them that it’s already too late for them to stop the dissemination of the spell, thus rendering dementors and azkaban obsolete.
Bluffing would be dangerous—if he doesnt actually publish the information, killing him makes the problem go away. And if he commits to “Tell the world, make dementors useless” Then the wizengamot entire are simply more information pathways, and are in fact far better ones than just about anyone else he could tell because it is much harder to obliviate them than Jane Q Wizard,.
If he doesn’t get a chance to arrange, say, for messages to be sent out in the event of his death or incapacitation, then his best bet might be to tell them, but if it looks like he can get away with it it might be better for him to imply that he’s already told some people, but not reveal who. That way they will conclude they can no longer rely on dementors, but the secret doesn’t actually escape.
He did already give Hermione that letter which she could use to find out the secret, but it’s probably too late for her to make any use of it. It would have been a good idea for her to read it as soon as she was told that she was accused of murder, except she probably never had the chance to do that, and anyway she won’t have a wand in Azkaban.
This is the answer that I thought of when I read the chapter (specifically with the ‘blunt force’ amendment below). Unfortunately, it doesn’t fit in with the narrative clues that we’ve been given: there’s no taboo trade-off, and it doesn’t treat the Wizengamot as individuals. Nevertheless, it would be awesome.
Why would Lucius be convinced by that?
… True Patronus? Voldemort?
He already interrogated Draco under Veritaserum, so he knows that Draco saw his patronus light. That seems not to have swayed him.
Also, if there were going to be a wizard to discover a charm that does something completely impossible, my bet would be on Dumbledore and Voldemort.
Because there is no way Voldemort would be able to cast the true patronus. The nessesary mindset is much to altrusitic. Hmm. Since Hermonie could likely also master the true patronus, wrecking the animal form of the spell for everyone probably shields her from excessive punishment in general as well, at least until such time as a significant number of people other than her and Harry master it. The optimal version of this play is to have Hermonie destroy the dementor present´, but that requires enough time to prep H. Timeturner?
We think it’s likely that Voldemort can’t cast it, but Lucius and the Wizengamot do not, and the only information they have regarding it being a sign of altruism is Harry’s word on the subject.
It’s even more of a stretch to say that Lucius would be convinced that Harry is not Voldemort, because the Patronus alone isn’t enough evidence.
Point. Correction: It would eventually convince Lucius that Harry isnt pottermort once the implications have been worked out and someone else indepenantly verifies what the nessesary mindset is—likely by legimens on Hermonie. It still makes Harry and Herm indespensible right away.
I’m not even completely sure that’s true. Maybe Voldemort could cast it with a sufficiently strong-willed rejection of death for himself (and for his allies), and out of hatred of dementors=death, if he knew how.