My theory is that potions which don’t involve magical ingredients are obscure because they’re usually less powerful and because they require a greater investment of energy from the creator to do the reshaping (explaining why Harry doesn’t do very much in that battle). Given that Flitwick and McGonagal had suggestions of books to make at all after hearing what Harry wanted, it seems very likely that such potions do exist, just not in the standard textbooks. It seems very likely that Harry got his potion out of a book, because potions research is dangerous and presumably very time consuming, and because Harry with the ability to invent potions would be powerful enough to wreck the story.
Harry with the ability to invent potions would be powerful enough to wreck the story.
Harry with time travel would be enough to wreak the story. Harry with an invisibility cloak would be enough to wreak the story, Hell, harry with rationality would be enough to wreak the story.
That is, unless the other obstacles were ramped up to deal with it. Give Harry a time turner and enemies clever enough to know how to check on him. Give harry an invisibility cloak but add spells that can detect the presence of a deathly hallow. Give Harry mastery of potions but make creating them slow or just plain difficult.
If potion invention is slow, Harry must have gotten the light potion from a book, since I don’t think there’s enough time between battles to do serious potion research safely between classes and homework, even for Harry’s 30 hours a day. If he can invent potions that fast, he potentially has a huge number of instant win conditions available (that’s what I really meant, that rapid potion invention would be a huge pain in the ass to write around). I think at this point it’s clear that Harry probably does know enough to invent potions, but not without probably months or years of experimentation per new recipe. If he didn’t know enough to be dangerous he wouldn’t have freaked out Flitwick.
My theory is that potions which don’t involve magical ingredients are obscure because they’re usually less powerful and because they require a greater investment of energy from the creator to do the reshaping (explaining why Harry doesn’t do very much in that battle). Given that Flitwick and McGonagal had suggestions of books to make at all after hearing what Harry wanted, it seems very likely that such potions do exist, just not in the standard textbooks. It seems very likely that Harry got his potion out of a book, because potions research is dangerous and presumably very time consuming, and because Harry with the ability to invent potions would be powerful enough to wreck the story.
Harry with time travel would be enough to wreak the story. Harry with an invisibility cloak would be enough to wreak the story, Hell, harry with rationality would be enough to wreak the story.
That is, unless the other obstacles were ramped up to deal with it. Give Harry a time turner and enemies clever enough to know how to check on him. Give harry an invisibility cloak but add spells that can detect the presence of a deathly hallow. Give Harry mastery of potions but make creating them slow or just plain difficult.
If potion invention is slow, Harry must have gotten the light potion from a book, since I don’t think there’s enough time between battles to do serious potion research safely between classes and homework, even for Harry’s 30 hours a day. If he can invent potions that fast, he potentially has a huge number of instant win conditions available (that’s what I really meant, that rapid potion invention would be a huge pain in the ass to write around). I think at this point it’s clear that Harry probably does know enough to invent potions, but not without probably months or years of experimentation per new recipe. If he didn’t know enough to be dangerous he wouldn’t have freaked out Flitwick.