| Mooncalf
Join Date: Aug 2009 Location: Boston
Posts: 6,674
Hogwarts RPG Name:
Hazel Martin-Pryce
First Year
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Scout MacIntyre
Daily Prophet Reporter  x4
|  Granddaddy Ravenclaw | | Jermione Granger
Preston nodded as students shared their answers. "Some of you certainly have a flair for the dramatic, but you make some good points. I'll address some of them, and then we'll move on to some spellwork."
Preston stepped in front of his desk and leaned against it. Quote:
Originally Posted by Danika Malik  Danika nodded. This must be, if not the only one, the most brilliant Professor at Hogwarts. Well, the second one if one took Lafay into account. Then again, weren't all Transfiguration Professors brilliant?
And she wasn't going to say anything else, but there was a thought in her mind, "If you vere in the middle of a duel, and someone casts...let's say, arrows at you, then you simply transfigure them into something softer if you do not mean to deflect the spell" like cotton balls, or something else. She should've done that when dueling with Sabel and his arrows, no idea as to why she didn't think of that at the moment.
The arrows will eventually have to be vanished, because the spell wouldn't last forever. "Dueling applications, certainly," he responded with a nod. "To select an appropriate transfiguration spell in the moment requires great familiarity and practice. Reaction time is key." Quote:
Originally Posted by lilithpotter "Yes professor, my apoligies" She said she was only trying to help another student who hadn't bought a scarf for said reasons
"Some survival situations might be if you were being attacked you could transform your surroundings as a wall to protect yourself." She said "Creating barriers, yes," Preston said, crossing his arms across his chest. Quote:
Originally Posted by Roselyn Hmmm, what?
The Slytherin had been too busy fixing her name tag, what with the last name and everything, that she now finally registered that they were talking. Right. Survival. Spells to help with survival? Or Transfiguration stuff to help with it. Uh huuuhh...
"I suppose if you're falling from a million feet in the air, you could transfigure something into one of those parasheet things." That's what it was called right? Preston cracked a smile. "A parachute, Miss Shepard, yes." Quote:
Originally Posted by Macavity Simon tried to think about what could possibly happen in the Tasks that would make using transfiguration beneficial to survival. From the stories that had circulated from the first one he had a few ideas running through his mind and finally raised his hand to answer.
"Couldn't a transfiguration spell be used to help you escape or move somewhere you needed to go?" he questioned. "Like say you come across a stream or something else wet and soft and you need to cross it, making ut something solid would help". Preston nodded. "Indeed. Creating items or changing items to ease passage can be tremendously helpful." Quote:
Originally Posted by MissFeenella Fee listened to her classmates as she thoight of an own example.
"Couldnt a transfiguration spell be used if a wizard or witch was in handcuffs for example", she suggested,"he or she could change them into something soft, to get out." Preston reached up and stroked his chin. "I suppose. But wielding a wand while restrained and actually targeting the cuffs woudl be quite difficult."
He paused. "But someone else could do that for you." Quote:
Originally Posted by CreativeAllie18 Alice thought for a moment. "Well could you transform yourself into something? For example if you are trying to hide from someone coming after you or a dangerous situation, you could transform yourself into an animal or something smaller to hide." Alice wasn't sure if only animagis could do that or if anyone could do it. Perhaps it was only animagis. "Or you could transfer an object into something that could be used to help defend yourself if dueling spells are not enough." Preston frowned. "But remember, if you transfigure yourself, you cannot change yourself back. That puts you at tremendous risk." Quote:
Originally Posted by sweetpinkpixie
Kurumi gulped. There was going to be another maze, wasn't there? They were going to have to use Transfiguration to get through it. At least she had found Jenny - they were a great duo for these sorts of things. Kurumi thought about the Triwizard Tournament for a moment and what possible use of Transfiguration could be possible - despite those possibilities being endless. "If you were facing a creature that had dangerous claws, you could change them into something fluffy like marshmallows..."
"Good, switching spells can be tremendously useful." Quote:
Originally Posted by BanaBatGirl
Ah.... yeah. That. Firing. Fletcher shrugged off the professor's comment, though he was curious where exactly he had worked in the Ministry. In Fletch's most humble opinion, it miiiiiiight be worth it to get fired for such an entertaining stunt, especially if your division was boring.
"The Triwizard Tournament isn't that bad, Sir," Fletcher reassured the professor with a smile. "It sure does take some creativity to get out of those task though... lemme tell ya...."
Oh yes, Fletcher had Stories. Sensing that now would not be the appropriate time to share, however, he instead thought of an answer of needing transfiguration to survive.
"Sir, if you were say, crushed under a giant rock in a rock slide," which could have easily happened to him in the first task of the tournament, "you would want to transfigure the rocks to something much lighter so that you could get them off of you."
Yeah otherwise you would probably die.
Preston frowned again. Having only seen the results of the first task, and not the events itself, it was hard to believe that it wan'st that bad.
"Provided that you could move your arms at all and that your wand was unbroken, sure." Quote:
Originally Posted by dan arjay Jaxon smirked when he heard a fellow student gave an example about prolonging the life of a cookie. He thought to himself. Put the cookie in a tight lid sealed container and hid it so it wont get eaten prolongs its freshness.
He then raised his hands and said, "When people heard of survival, they often think of a fight, a duel or something that involves a dangerous situation, but everyday living is survival." he said pausing for a bit and then continuing. "Like transfiguring a simple tree branch into a floaty when you see someone is drowning or transfiguring a plate into a kettle when you want to boil water for coffee." he said with a smirk. Preston smiled. "Excellent point, thank you. Simple things are sometimes the most helpful."
He stood and made his way to the board. Quote:
Originally Posted by Ameh For means of survival... and then the Triwizard Tournament was brought up, and Raiden was sure that his mind was never going to focus on anything else, ever. Never ever. How did Transfiguration apply to this?
In far too many ways.
"Depending on what you're up against..." he wrinkled his nose. "Had any of us had the presence of mind during the first task, I'm sure one of us could have thought to transfigure the tree branches into some kind of cage or prison, to keep the bowtruckles at bay."
Would've helped a few of them, considering how many had come out bloodied up.
"Vanishing can be used defensively in a lot of situations too." He touched his left arm. "And you can conjure bandages and other things, if you get injured, so you don't... you know... bleed to death."
Not that he'd been in danger of that, but a handful of them had come out rather bloodied up, and who knew what future tasks held for them. "Thank you for mentioning presence of mind, Mister Kururugi. Realizing a spell's potential in the moment is incredibly difficult, and so, we'll be thinking about those sorts of situations this term."
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Flicking his wand at the board, the writing there vanished, replaced by two words: vestis vellus
"Vestis vellus. No particular emphases in speech, but the intention is key here. What we'll be doing today with this is transfiguring your scarfs into large, woolen blankets. Vestis can be used to transfigure items into blankets, cloaks, curtains, and other large, flat pieces of cloth. Vellus gives us the material type - woolen. Concentrating on blanket as opposed to a wrap will make the difference."
Preston paused to let everyone absorb what he had said. Pulling his own scarf out from behind his desk, he rested it on the desk. Black, with dark grey stripes, he folded it into thirds.
"The movement is a simple flourish sort of curly-q," he added, demonstrating as he looped his wand in the air.
"Vestis vellus," he intoned, transforming his scarf into a large, blanket with fringe, folded neatly on his desk. Setting down his wand, he shook out his blanket. It was large enough to wrap around his entire body, and warm enough to provide protection from the cold outdoors.
"I don't expect you to be able to produce a folded blanket, necessarily. You may want to spread out around the room as some of them may be quite large as you get the hang of it."
"You may begin practicing. Recall the reversion spell from last term -- new students, please ask an older student -- and practice several times, altering size and weight with your focus."
__________________
Has anyone ever sung you a lullaby?
You can fly above the rain clouds
Close your eyes
Let the melody carry you
Leave all your fears behind You can float across a rainbow sky
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