About Slytherin....

[Bart Lidofsky]

No: HPFGUIDX 187909

Alla:
> I am not sure I understand, do you think that author agrees with Dumbledore here or not? Because this is book 7 and not book 1 and I would think that if the idea was to show that Slytherin house is just as the same as any other house in Hogwarts and has his good qualities and bad qualities, it is really strange to make Dumbledore say it.
>   
 Bart:
Around the time Book 3 or 4 came out, I started coming up with a design 
for a Harry Potter collectible card game; I figured the best way to 
handle it would be to set it up as Quidditch, with various tactical 
maneuvers. There would have been standard maneuvers and House specific 
maneuvers. Each player had to come up with a team of at least 5 players 
from the same House, with no more than 2 "substitutes" from other 
Houses. The relevance now was that each House had maneuvers which 
matched the characteristics of the House, at least as I saw it. 
Gryffindor specialized in offensive moves, but was weak in defense. 
Hufflepuff was the opposite; strong in defense, but weak in offense. 
Ravenclaw's moves depended on complex tactics usually involving 
teamwork; their weakness was that the moves took more than one turn to 
execute, and could therefore be short-circuited by the other team.

And then, there was Slytherin. Slytherin's strength was the abilty of 
the players to cheat and get away with it. Or at last had a much better 
shot at getting away with it. Their weakness? Since they would cheat 
more often than the other teams, they would suffer more penalties.

But that's what I saw it coming down to, even as early as POA. That the 
specialty of Slytherin was the ability to take short-cuts, and not be 
concerned with things like morality and what other people might think. 
That, of course, would be a reason for being drawn to dark magic; one 
must assume that dark magic gives more power more easily than other 
magic, or else it would not be a temptation. However, it also means that 
the Slytherin mind is very much about weighing the risks, and choosing 
the path with the highest probability of the best outcome.

I do want to point out another "good Slytherin", although I suspect 
there might be some (many?) here who disagree with me: Phineas Nigellus 
Black. Say what you want about him, Finny was one of the very few who 
was always 100% straight with Harry. And, with his manner, he was also 
one of the very few who could actually get Harry to LISTEN to his 
advice. Frankly, I consider Finny superior to DD; at least you always 
knew where you stood with Finny.

Bart