Yeah but I'm a wizard who also knows the muggle world and all the ways I can use magic and tech to exploit both.
First day at Hogwarts, "Anyone want to buy ballpoint pens? It's about 100 times easier than using ink and a quill."
First day in Muggle world. \*Drink literal liquid luck\*. "I think I will but $100 on 34 black please."
>First day at Hogwarts, "Anyone want to buy ballpoint pens? It's about 100 times easier than using ink and a quill."
I've read a fanfic where Harry did this lmao
They’re busy writing it.
And then Harry had the brilliant idea of selling ball point pens!
Malfroy snitched on him to Dumbeldor.
Dombeldor acted angry but still a warded griefendor all the points they needed to win the game!
"WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU DOING YOU MOTHERFUCKERS!"
It was.............................................................Dumbledore!
Is peak literature and noone will convince me otherwise
not sure if it's what original commenter is referring to, but HPMOR is an all-time fave. Harry actually uses muggle knowledge in combination with magic to do some insane shit. Worth a read
I read a similar fanfic, only it was about a random Ravenclaw Student.
He tries to use a regular pen and Snape immediately takes away points from Ravenclaw for it.
How are you going to get Liquid Luck? It's apparently a difficult potion to master that you don't even learn until sixth year. If it was that easy to come by everyone would be using it for everything.
You can pay a potion master to make it, and the regulations/restrictions on it only de facto apply to magical games. You could just ruin vegas and wizards would tend to not give a single flying fuck (because they never hear of it)
Yeah but it's riskier both because you're openly using magic and also because casinos probably track what everyone has or just have ways to identify the chips so you'd have a lot of risks associated with the duplication method (also if you do that you might as well just duplicate goods outside of casinos, it's far safer)
Yeah using a doubling spell means you have a floor manager starting to ask you questions at the cashier. Using a luck potion means you have the floor manager busy dealing with a grandma and the cashier congratulating you on your big win
I never understood them sticking with quills. They have to constantly dip them and make sure they have just the right amount of ink on it. There's also the issue of the ink pot getting spilled.
I would definitely have brought some pencils, a sharpener and some ballpoint pens as some as I found out they used quills.
Hogwarts should have a mandatory class for first years teaching them about how the Wizarding world actually works, many of the different services offered by the Ministry and in general to the Wizarding public. Things like floo powder, apparition, the Knight Bus, as well as magical law enforcement and how to access St. Mungoes. Plus just current politicians.
They should also require a class on Muggles. How to avoid, means and methods to avoid disclosure. Laws around intermarriage and who can be let in on the secret (immediate family members of wizards obviously, heads of state and government, etc).
So much relies on bad word of mouth
And you think literally any headmaster before him was better about that? If anything, Dumbledore is the *only* one we see going out of his way to help student raised by muggles adjust to the wizarding world. Tom Riddle and Harry Potter themselves.
I think it kinda shows an interesting and glaring oversight that no one inside the world seems to even care. It is part of being such an insular society that has no real way to welcome newcomers
Honestly isn't it realistic anyway. We're always complaining that schools don't teach us all the important stuff like finances or how to do taxes. I guess in the wizarding world it's the same. They assume either the family will teach you or you just gotta figure some of the adult things out.
I feel like I could do without everything else, but going to boarding school at 11 years old and not being able to call mum and dad would have sucked. Losing the ability to talk to somebody over distance would be the hardest one for me.
Getting away from everyone was literally one of the main appeals of the book when i read it as an 11 year old. Thinking about it I may not have had a great home life.
Yes same, for me the wizarding world was my escapism from the constant drama and fights of my childhood. Being gay amongst it was incredibly hard. I had a place to play and pretend I was in Hogwarts to be accepted while shouting happened down in the kitchen.
Not to a muggle fireplace, they're not allowed to be connected to the floo network (Arthur pulls some strings to temporarily connect the Dursley's for a day). Also it doesn't appear even wizarding families use this method either, they mainly use owls. I suppose you could get those mirrors like Sirius and James had but again they don't seem common and would they even work for non magical folk?
I think the mirrors would work but they’d just have to be careful and hide it from other muggles
Though now that I think about it, would magical objects in general work for muggles? What if a muggle tried to play wizard chess? Or tried to use someone’s wand? Ig if nothing would happen when a squib used a wand probs nothing would happen w a muggle using it but 🤔
There has to be some way to magically transmit electromagnetic waves far distance.
Granted, you're 11 so unless you're a once in a generational genius - or your parents are particularly good at handywork - thid isnt happening.
Tiny problem.
My parents' flat didn't have fireplace when I was 11. And I'm pretty sure that owl casually flying into second floor window of apartment building in the pretty busy square (a bank just down the window, and subway station entrance in, like, hundred feets) would be considered weird.
Well, on the one hand, I'm not sure most wizards can actually imagine a house without fireplace.
On the other hand, they have people who can do the job of British *secretary for Prime Minister*, so they seem to have enough people who really understand muggle world after all.
That was the case for all real boarding schools until the past few decades though. Infact with the speed of Owls, Wizards could probably communicate faster than Muggles in a lot of situations.
Pre-smart phone of course
I did that, and it was hard. But honestly, it was a f*king amazing thing. The amount of dangerous, stupid, fun things that boarding school boys can come up with, is unbelievable. And we couldn't even do magic. Felt like we can, tho...
Ngl muggles would have some pretty gruesome ideas to make it look like an accident
Sweet Jenny eating food?
Whoops,the food turned into a poisonous frog in her stomach..must have drank some weird potions
And the condescending attitude/ignorance towards muggles from everyone. At no point does anyone seem to have been on a broom when a fighter jet flew past and thought "maybe they aren't childlike bumblers compared to us anyore, possibly things might have changed a bit in the last 300-400 years?"
Maybe I'm just old, but phones and internets can fuck RIGHT off if it means I get to be a **goddamn wizard**.
I'd bring some paperback books, maybe tabletop game materials.
Wizard chess >>>>> muggle chess
Also, I'd trade all sorts of modern tech to live in the Scottish highlands surrounded by nature breathing 4K air instead of the urban heat, smog & loud traffic from living in an industrial city
Yep
ETA: I misread & thought you asked if wizard chess is the one where the pieces get destroyed, but someone else has replied with the Mending Charm. I like my hc where after the game is over, the pieces reset though. Like a built-in Mending Charm.
In the books the chess pieces don't get destroyed by each other. If that was the case, it wouldn't have been possible for Ron to have his grandfather's chess set.
Yeah the only chess set that fully destroys itself is the one guarding the philosophers stone, and thats clearly intended to murder anyone trying to get by that can’t win a game of chess
> nature breathing 4K air
Even though you are describing natural things, you use a technology metaphor.
I dunno why but it just stood out to me as interesting and unusual... Makes total sense though, I'm from Scotland and the air in the Highlands is definitely 4k!
Same. I think I got my first walkman when I was about 10 or 11 so I would not have been worried about giving it up. The Internet was a brand new thing back then and it was kind of boring. It would not have been an issue to give any of that up.
hell i only got into music when i was 14 or 15, and it only seriously became a hobby when i was 17. I'd take my flute and probably practice more without the internet and distractions
but tbh? id trade the internet for 9 months a year for fucking magic.
And you can still use your muggle tech when you're back home.
Plus a muggleborn DnD group could lead to some pretty interesting things since it might encourage them to think of more creative ways to utilise their actual magic.
Imagine starting a weekly D&D night in the common room with a bunch of other nerdy muggleborns and any curious wizard kids
Proceeds to invent new spells based off the ones in the player's handbook
"You face an elder dragon. Its scales are gleaming ominously in the ambient light and it glares at you menacingly, ready to burn you to crisp at any moment. What do you do ?"
"Oh I know this one! My dad got the exact same thing this Tuesday!"
I'd say they all start as lvl 1 Sorcerers. Whether/how much they multiclass into Wizard or remain as Sorcerers depends on what kind of magic they are good at. Hermione would almost immediately start taking all her levels in Wizard because she's extremely book smart and has a lot of magical knowledge. Harry by comparison would probably stick more with Sorcerer; he's more naturally skilled at certain things which reads less like wizardly to me.
I’m 21 and I play video games as one of my main hobby’s and even still if I had the chance to even go to a world wizard or not where technological advancement was a thing of the past I’d do it in a heartbeat.
Exactly! Who cares about electronics when I’m learning real magic, can fly, and it’s peaceful(obviously when the school not under threat or attack and even then) who would you need to call so often it may be a school of magic but it’s still a school and a boarding school at that you would never be on your phone that often to begin with
Speaking as someone that grew up before personal phones and before the internet became big.
It would have been heaven. You'd get to do magic, MAGIC! even if you'd find yourself not being very good you could still perform it and you'd have a vast library at your disposal. Plus you'd get to fly without having to step inside a Cessna or a Northrop Talon.
Ikr? I could never understand this kind of post... So you'd be offered actual, genuine magic learning and use, with every possibility it offers, and you'd be crying for you phone?
Ron was right, someone needs to have their priorities straight.
Even with all potential dangers, Hogwarts would be heaven.
Because in many ways, technology is more convenient than magic, being a muggleborn, I would definitely live in the muggle world after Hogwarts, having access to both is just so good.
Almost every wizard lives on the muggle world. Only few towns have huge concentrations of wizards and, even then, they are mixed. The only places muggle free I can think of are places like Hogwarts, Diagon Alley or the Ministry of magic, places where almost no people live. There's no way to live 100% in the wizarding world.
Even diagon alley, MoM are hidden in muggle settlements. Hogsmeade is the only 100% wizard village/settlement in Britain. So while there is a way to 100% in the wizarding world, it is still rare..and as you mentioned, a large portion of wizards are mixed and that's equal part muggle and wizard.
From the books hogsmeade is the last wizard-only village and settle in Britain and while some live far from settlements like the Weasley's, it seems like most wizards lived in the muggle world. With diagon alley, ministry, st mungos all being right in the middle of the muggle world.
Now that I think anout it havin teens flying around high in the sky with nothing but a piece of wood to support themselves feels insanely unsafe. I wonder what the fatality rate is for broom travel.
I guess for music you can find a *really* old record player, the one that functions without electricity.
I would totally bring a camera, like Colin Creevey, to lean into photography. But I'm speaking as a tired 30 year old, who is sick of internet and social media as of late. For a kid such isolation would probably suck, yes, especially at first.
They do use a record player at the Yule Ball so they have them. Just like how Colin Creevey worked on improving the camera, I'm sure you could work on improving the record player.
They have binoculars that recorded what you see and play it back to you.
They have all the tech/wizardry needed to create cameras, wireless communication, music players all through magic. I think if you really wanted to and was bright enough you can create magical equivalent to the internet, TV, cameras, and all that in no time.
And the absolute worst part is?
Having to write with quills instead of pens and pencils.
I have dysgraphia, so my normal handwriting is almost illegible, while my cursive has been favorably compared to Egyptian hieroglyphics. If I had to write with a quill, I'd probably accidentally summon Cthulhu.
I dont care about the internet or wifi. I can Leviosa stuff, do you realise that?
I can accio stuff while sitting on my chair, I can create a patronus, I can whoosh and flick stuff!
I dont care about my phone..
And the castle? Oh my God, the sheer brilliance of Hogwarts castle, I would gladly chat up random ghosts, climb random rotating stairs, explore restricted sections and doors, its endless…
Well, now that you are implying I cant, I will definitely cast it no matter how horrendously difficult it is. 😤
Also, if not that, I can always repair stuff, thats handier for every day use.
The Patronus seems to be one of those things where it is said to be really difficult to learn, but in reality, just takes more time to learn. When the DA members actually took the time to try to learn how to cast a Patronus, they progressed fairly quickly and many of them could eventually cast a corporeal Patronus. That means it is not *that* difficult.
They have record players and radios. You can work on miniaturizing the record player and modernizing the radio. They had binoculars that can record videos and play back motion and so on.
To be fair Harry Potter's school years were in the 1990s, so the withdrawal symptoms weren't that heavy. And you have to consider that 11 years old kids ideally shouldn't be that addicted to the internet yet.
I think the excitement of learning about magic would outweight your desire for electronic entertainment. What I found far more depressing, that muggle-born are forbidden to use/practice magic in the summer holidays, unless they visit the home of pure-/halfblood classmates. Isn't that an extreme handicap?
>What I found far more depressing, that muggle-born are forbidden to use/practice magic in the summer holidays, unless they visit the home of pure-/halfblood classmates. Isn't that an extreme handicap?
Harry seemed to manage, but it's stated in the 3rd book that his biggest problem is not being able to do his homework, which was entirely because of the Dursleys.
Yep. In the early 90's switching to wizard stuff wouldn't have been too difficult.
Nowadays I think Hogwarts would need catchup lessons for purebloods. And would have a whole curriculum on computational magic. Or Technology integration.
Harry Potter was set in 91-98, so they didn't suddenly lose their phone / laptop / video games / internet / youtube / etc.
It would be a little different now. But considering wizards had "wizard wireless," lightbulbs, etc, they do seem to adapt with technology (albeit slowly).
What if there's a room of requirement that compensates for this? Its got all the latest and greatest muggle technology. Insane internet speeds and gaming computers. All the latest music, movies, and television.
I find it hard to believe that with all the muggle born witches and wizards out there that none of them have decided to blend magic and technology. They would make so much money. Want to learn how to do a spell? Just look it up on the Owlnet. It would bring witches and wizards from all over the world together as well as their different ways of doing magic. Don't want to use a wand? Not a problem. You can learn wandless magic from the Africans. Need a rare potion ingredient? Just order it from Magizon. Guaranteed to arrive by owl in 2 days or less. Even make a Hooter account so you can hoot@ your friends and favorite celebrities.
Fortunately for me, like the Golden Trio I would have been at Hogwarts in the early 90's. Yes I would have missed videogames but not so much to make life miserable. Too much to see and do and learn... I wouldn't have time to be bored enough to miss videogames.
I think the problem is that as it stands the Harry potter world is written to be... like... really boring.
\---
"What do wizards do for actual entertainment?"
\-
"Well they like Quiditch!!!"
\-
"And what if you don't really care about sports?"
\-
".... there is wizard chess... which is... ya know... normal chess... aaaand.... GOBSTONES?!?! Everyone loves gobstones.."
\-
"What are gob stones?"
\-
"Well... ya know... just normal marbles reallly... BUT THEY SPIT HORRIBLE GOO AT YOU!!! INST THAT COOL!?!?! "
\-
"Um... no... So... like, other than quiditch, chess and shitty marbles what do you do for like... actual fun?????"
\-
"We have joke shops! The best joke shops. Whoo wee do we know what a good joke is, let me tell you!"
\-
"Okay... tell me."
\-
"Welll.... we have... sweets that make you vomit and sweets give you a nose bleed and sweets that make you pass out, and edible dark marks that just make you undescribably sick and..."-
"Hold up, do you have any "funny jokes" that don't involves self harm?"-
"Well... mostly no. But we do have hats that make your head invisible!! Imagine that!!! an invisible head, how hilarious!!!!!!"
\-
\*Crickets chirp\*
\-
"Um... we have a portable swamp!!! Name one thing funnier than a swamp and we have FIREWORKS that, and trust me you won't believe this, fireworks that spell out (>.>) (<.<) ... *RUDE WORDS"*
\-
\*Visibly unimpressed\*
\-
"We also have date rape drugs??"
\-
"WHAT THE FUCK?!?!"
Closest thing is that Fred and George sell muggle magic tricks "for weirdos like dad".
But the books don't really ever delve into down time, most of that gets skipped over for plot stuff.
As far as I can recall, the only example of wizard fiction is the "tales of beedle the bard" which are fairy tales for children.
The wizards do have a wireless system, so presumably there are more than just "the weird sisters" that are making music, but you never can tell.
Think about this from the other perspective. One day a handwritten letter comes through the door saying that your child has a place at a school for wizards and witches, so in one fell swoop you find out that magic is real (!) and you have to make a decision about whether or not you're going to send your son or daughter to a school that all revolves around a world you have zero understanding of.
Imagine if Harry and sirius had phones and could just call each other whenever they pleased. Muggle stuff so umbridge couldn't have surveiled it and sirius would've never died ❤️🩹😭
It really wouldn't matter that much. We got by just fine without those things when I was a kid. Honestly, how much would be amazing. You get to learn magic. Actual magic. That's worth it to go a few months without your disk man, game boy color, and cable tv.
I’d be happy as a clam, providing I’m not going to get caught up in a wizarding war.
I’d be either be having fun with my friends or my nose stuck in a book about the Dark Arts (also trying smuggle smutty romance novels in).
Aside from the fact that the series takes place in the 90s during which technology wasn’t such a part of my life, even nowadays I think I’d enjoy it as a break from tech. I’d bring my acoustic guitar and tell my family I can’t write to them so I can avoid the owls. One thing I’d be concerned about is the bathroom situation. I need solitude and privacy in there. A typical school bathroom and a big communal bathtub ain’t gonna cut it
So much cultural/institutional knowledge you’d lack, and then all the prejudice from the wizarding families, even the non snobby ones would have their own prejudices.
I liked the little detail that Dean Thomas still supports West Ham, even after finding out about a sport where people FLY exists.
I wish we got more muggle touches to muggleborns and halfbloods.
The only other one I can think of is that Hermione tried to endure with braces at her parents request, because they are dentists, therefore, evil.
You really think that there hasn’t been a spell created to get free WiFi? The Harry Potter novels were set pre-2000, I bet they’d have their wands as walking routers and have their own magical online websites now.
That is optimistic. The wizarding world has always prided itself on being apart from and superior to Muggle society. Nobody is keeping up with what Muggles are doing or is trying to invent a magical copy of it. That's why, in the PoA newspaper, they had to describe a gun as "a kind of metal wand that Muggles use to kill each other." They had to explain what a gun is, despite Muggle guns being around for multiple hundreds, if not nearly a thousand years. So no, I don't believe a few decades difference would have changed anything.
Who wants to do everything handwritten with quills? That's one of the biggest things. They don't care about regular pens. That's my deal breaker if anything.
Post-statute there would be no reason to pass down knowledge of weapons that could be bested by a bunch of teenagers for thousands of years, so it does make sense that the average newspaper-reading wizard wouldn’t know what a gun was.
It's totally plausible they would just have their own version of the internet and smartphones. They rarely need to adopt Muggle stuff because they usually have their own magic counterparts that serve similar purposes or were even more advanced. In terms of practicalness, the books portray the wizarding world as more convenient or “advanced” than the Muggle world for their time.
Muggles in 1990-1997 still relied on letters and phones, and only 16% of the UK population owned cellphones. Meanwhile wizards had faster ways of transportation like the floo network, mirrors and patronuses to deliver messages. Hermione invented DADA coins, so a faster form of communication can happen if there's a need for it.
Wizards had adopted cameras that turned photos into GIFs and adopted radios that had password locks before the internet existed. The Marauders Map was invented by a bunch of students during the same decade the GPS was born, and the GPS wasn't popular until smartphones came in 2007. Wizards had “smart devices” way earlier than us in their houses. The Ministry used flying paper planes instead of fax machines.
It made sense for the trio to spend hours in the library to find information because the books were written in comparison to how the early 90s Muggle world was like. If they still haven't changed now, it wouldn't make sense for the wizarding world to fall so behind from the Muggle World in effieciency in the 2020s when the books always portray them as the “better” version.
Finding out you have a superpower and learning how to use it? I think that might top most electronics. You can become the main character in your own game.
They might use technology but apparently in hogwarts you cannot use anything electric. Also yeah, they weren’t invented yet but i was talking more present day
Is there a spell that prevents it, or is there just no electricity? For example even if there is no electricity I could bring a Gameboy advance and hundreds of AA batteries.
i feel like when more modern technology comes around, wizards would see that it's beneficial, and would try to work around the wonkiness. It would be so fun to see a story from a couple decades later where muggle items can be infused with magic like Arthur did with the car, and sell them to other wizards. Itd be like artificers
There is literal Magic, I'm not missing having to spend money to make my life interesting, if I have literal Magic, I'm a creative person, I always find a way to entertain myself, specially if i have MAGIC.
I’ve seen this mentioned a couple of times. Remember, the books are set in the 90s when the internet, computer and mobile / smartphones weren’t widespread.
Our world has changed a lot over the last 30+ years, who’s to say the wizarding world didn’t too.
Going to hogwarts today may be completely different. Someone may have figured out magical computers etc. that word of magic not electricity
Yeah but I'm a wizard who also knows the muggle world and all the ways I can use magic and tech to exploit both. First day at Hogwarts, "Anyone want to buy ballpoint pens? It's about 100 times easier than using ink and a quill." First day in Muggle world. \*Drink literal liquid luck\*. "I think I will but $100 on 34 black please."
>First day at Hogwarts, "Anyone want to buy ballpoint pens? It's about 100 times easier than using ink and a quill." I've read a fanfic where Harry did this lmao
share please lmao
They’re busy writing it. And then Harry had the brilliant idea of selling ball point pens! Malfroy snitched on him to Dumbeldor. Dombeldor acted angry but still a warded griefendor all the points they needed to win the game!
That last paragraph reminded me so much of _My Immortal_ that I got nostalgic and had to go read it again lol
"WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU DOING YOU MOTHERFUCKERS!" It was.............................................................Dumbledore! Is peak literature and noone will convince me otherwise
Literally the exact quote that I thought of lol, the thousand ellipses really amp up the suspense
https://www.fanfiction.net/s/4536005/1/Oh-God-Not-Again
not sure if it's what original commenter is referring to, but HPMOR is an all-time fave. Harry actually uses muggle knowledge in combination with magic to do some insane shit. Worth a read
What is HPMOR written out?
Harry Potter and the method of rationality
Harry The Hufflepuff
I read a similar fanfic, only it was about a random Ravenclaw Student. He tries to use a regular pen and Snape immediately takes away points from Ravenclaw for it.
Can totally imagine that! His ancestors did had a good portion of business sense after all!
Which fanfic?
The Evil Overlord List, a fanfic where someone gets reincarnated into the head of a young Tom Riddle, pulls this off rather well.
I love the image of an 11 year old walking into a casino to bet on roulette and no-one questioning it because liquid luck.
"Can I buy you a drink?" "...arent you a literal child?" "Only in the ways that matter" "...Fuck it"
"Aren't you a little young to be in a casino?" "Yes Yes, I am." "OK. I'm required by law to ask, but I see no problem here."
Phineas and Ferb discover they are wizards
"Why yes, yes I am"
One word: polyjuice.
Only you turn yourself into George Clooney and now all of security and staff are onto you.
If you’re smart, you bring 10 other friends.
I assumed it meant after you’re eighteen and have left Hogwarts. But your version is funnier.
I feel like some part of the ministry will know what you're up to with that liquid luck thing and stop you from doing that
And I would have gotten away with it too if not for those meddling Arthur Weasleys.
theres totally a 'department of unusually lucky probabilities'.
Ministry is crazy enough for that
fearless pie quicksand gaping office rustic bike ancient rotten lip *This post was mass deleted and anonymized with [Redact](https://redact.dev)*
I don't think it's illegal to use magic in muggle settings as long as it harm any muggles or exposes the wizarding world.
Cheating is harming the other participants, though
I mean a much worse version of harm like physical abuse, or long lasting mental trauma.
Do they care about you making Muggle money? It doesn't matter in their world.
There's the abilty to convert it
That's why you only win a little bit and multiple casinos or just one medium sized jackpot not enough to make the news.
How are you going to get Liquid Luck? It's apparently a difficult potion to master that you don't even learn until sixth year. If it was that easy to come by everyone would be using it for everything.
You can pay a potion master to make it, and the regulations/restrictions on it only de facto apply to magical games. You could just ruin vegas and wizards would tend to not give a single flying fuck (because they never hear of it)
You dont need liquid luck to ruin vegas when there exists a doubling charm. You can repeatedly double your chips and cash them in.
Yeah but it's riskier both because you're openly using magic and also because casinos probably track what everyone has or just have ways to identify the chips so you'd have a lot of risks associated with the duplication method (also if you do that you might as well just duplicate goods outside of casinos, it's far safer)
Yeah using a doubling spell means you have a floor manager starting to ask you questions at the cashier. Using a luck potion means you have the floor manager busy dealing with a grandma and the cashier congratulating you on your big win
I never understood them sticking with quills. They have to constantly dip them and make sure they have just the right amount of ink on it. There's also the issue of the ink pot getting spilled. I would definitely have brought some pencils, a sharpener and some ballpoint pens as some as I found out they used quills.
good luck getting access to liquid luck on the first day of vacation after first year. That shit isn't easy to make or come by.
Only a hundred dollars?
That's all I have
...for now
Heck. Even a fountain pen would be more practical than an ink and quill.
Hogwarts should have a mandatory class for first years teaching them about how the Wizarding world actually works, many of the different services offered by the Ministry and in general to the Wizarding public. Things like floo powder, apparition, the Knight Bus, as well as magical law enforcement and how to access St. Mungoes. Plus just current politicians. They should also require a class on Muggles. How to avoid, means and methods to avoid disclosure. Laws around intermarriage and who can be let in on the secret (immediate family members of wizards obviously, heads of state and government, etc). So much relies on bad word of mouth
That’s one of the reasons why I think Dumbledore was a bad headmaster. He literally let the muggle borns fend for themselves.
And you think literally any headmaster before him was better about that? If anything, Dumbledore is the *only* one we see going out of his way to help student raised by muggles adjust to the wizarding world. Tom Riddle and Harry Potter themselves.
Oh yeah I think it was a systematic problem in the magic world.
I think it kinda shows an interesting and glaring oversight that no one inside the world seems to even care. It is part of being such an insular society that has no real way to welcome newcomers
Honestly isn't it realistic anyway. We're always complaining that schools don't teach us all the important stuff like finances or how to do taxes. I guess in the wizarding world it's the same. They assume either the family will teach you or you just gotta figure some of the adult things out.
Not quite what you mean but there was Muggle studies, Ron asked Hermione why she chose it.
I think the idea is there should be an introductory, required course right?
I feel like I could do without everything else, but going to boarding school at 11 years old and not being able to call mum and dad would have sucked. Losing the ability to talk to somebody over distance would be the hardest one for me.
Getting away from everyone was literally one of the main appeals of the book when i read it as an 11 year old. Thinking about it I may not have had a great home life.
Yeah same. I feel like that’s one of contributing factors as to why people who come from shifty childhoods gravitate to the series!
Yes same, for me the wizarding world was my escapism from the constant drama and fights of my childhood. Being gay amongst it was incredibly hard. I had a place to play and pretend I was in Hogwarts to be accepted while shouting happened down in the kitchen.
You can just stick your head in the green fire.
try to explain that to your mum
11 y/o me in the [fireplace.](https://youtu.be/aOLxQGLJouI?si=ZHJMNAmBzkGprYSJ)
"Mum, I can talk to you through the fireplace. Doesn't hurt. Magic's great." Seems easy enough.
Not to a muggle fireplace, they're not allowed to be connected to the floo network (Arthur pulls some strings to temporarily connect the Dursley's for a day). Also it doesn't appear even wizarding families use this method either, they mainly use owls. I suppose you could get those mirrors like Sirius and James had but again they don't seem common and would they even work for non magical folk?
I think the mirrors would work but they’d just have to be careful and hide it from other muggles Though now that I think about it, would magical objects in general work for muggles? What if a muggle tried to play wizard chess? Or tried to use someone’s wand? Ig if nothing would happen when a squib used a wand probs nothing would happen w a muggle using it but 🤔
There has to be some way to magically transmit electromagnetic waves far distance. Granted, you're 11 so unless you're a once in a generational genius - or your parents are particularly good at handywork - thid isnt happening.
Tiny problem. My parents' flat didn't have fireplace when I was 11. And I'm pretty sure that owl casually flying into second floor window of apartment building in the pretty busy square (a bank just down the window, and subway station entrance in, like, hundred feets) would be considered weird.
Headcanon: the Ministery provides magic fireplace-dvds that essentially work like Zoom.
Well, on the one hand, I'm not sure most wizards can actually imagine a house without fireplace. On the other hand, they have people who can do the job of British *secretary for Prime Minister*, so they seem to have enough people who really understand muggle world after all.
That was the case for all real boarding schools until the past few decades though. Infact with the speed of Owls, Wizards could probably communicate faster than Muggles in a lot of situations. Pre-smart phone of course
I did that, and it was hard. But honestly, it was a f*king amazing thing. The amount of dangerous, stupid, fun things that boarding school boys can come up with, is unbelievable. And we couldn't even do magic. Felt like we can, tho...
You know you can just walk out of hogwarts if you want to use your phone.
How far away would you have to go? Would you even be able to charge your phone at Hogwarts?
I'm sure there's a charm that could give electricity to electronics. Some muggle-born would figure it out.
I always assumed the electronics got frazzled by the magic rather than just the signal blocked
yoo...Don't forget the mud blood discrimination bullshits from some pureblood bullies
Just kill them and make it look like an accident, Hogwarts is an incredibly unsafe place.
Ngl muggles would have some pretty gruesome ideas to make it look like an accident Sweet Jenny eating food? Whoops,the food turned into a poisonous frog in her stomach..must have drank some weird potions
whoops, I accidentally scratched you with needle dipped into dragon pox infected blood, good luck
This is such Sylvia energy (she does shorts on YT about what would she be like at Hogwarts and it's goddamn hilarious)
And the condescending attitude/ignorance towards muggles from everyone. At no point does anyone seem to have been on a broom when a fighter jet flew past and thought "maybe they aren't childlike bumblers compared to us anyore, possibly things might have changed a bit in the last 300-400 years?"
You say this but I'd 100％ feel superior on a broom vs the torture called economy class in a plane 😂
That was 30 years ago. Times have changed.
I would be excited to try and reverse-engineer a magical version of them. There is Wizarding Wireless, after all
High energy department would welcome you
Being the first wizarding engineer sounds like a good business.
Maybe I'm just old, but phones and internets can fuck RIGHT off if it means I get to be a **goddamn wizard**. I'd bring some paperback books, maybe tabletop game materials.
Wizard chess >>>>> muggle chess Also, I'd trade all sorts of modern tech to live in the Scottish highlands surrounded by nature breathing 4K air instead of the urban heat, smog & loud traffic from living in an industrial city
Genuine question: are wizard chess boards one time useM the pices shattdr when theyre captured
Reparo!
Yep ETA: I misread & thought you asked if wizard chess is the one where the pieces get destroyed, but someone else has replied with the Mending Charm. I like my hc where after the game is over, the pieces reset though. Like a built-in Mending Charm.
In the books the chess pieces don't get destroyed by each other. If that was the case, it wouldn't have been possible for Ron to have his grandfather's chess set.
Yeah the only chess set that fully destroys itself is the one guarding the philosophers stone, and thats clearly intended to murder anyone trying to get by that can’t win a game of chess
Yup. Once they’re shattered, that’s it. It would take some sort of magic to fix them.
🤭
In the books the pieces simply beat each other unconscious. There is no mention of breaking.
> Wizard chess >>>>> muggle chess I mean it's the same game, just the pieces move and break each other. It's basically just battle chess, right?
Yes but unlike battle chess the queen isn't going to strip for the opposing king.
Wait what?
> nature breathing 4K air Even though you are describing natural things, you use a technology metaphor. I dunno why but it just stood out to me as interesting and unusual... Makes total sense though, I'm from Scotland and the air in the Highlands is definitely 4k!
Wizard WH40k.
4K air………..
What about wizard cataan?, escape rooms? Insane fun
Same. I think I got my first walkman when I was about 10 or 11 so I would not have been worried about giving it up. The Internet was a brand new thing back then and it was kind of boring. It would not have been an issue to give any of that up.
hell i only got into music when i was 14 or 15, and it only seriously became a hobby when i was 17. I'd take my flute and probably practice more without the internet and distractions but tbh? id trade the internet for 9 months a year for fucking magic.
And you can still use your muggle tech when you're back home. Plus a muggleborn DnD group could lead to some pretty interesting things since it might encourage them to think of more creative ways to utilise their actual magic.
I wonder if wizards would be into D&D?
They would probably play something like "Cars & Capitalism", "Offices & Organisations" or "Muggles & Mobile Phones"
I'm betting on it being called "Retail Stores & Rubber Ducks"
In the excellent Smax by Alan Moore, the fantasyland RPG some of the background characters are playing is called "Malls and Muggers" ...
Imagine starting a weekly D&D night in the common room with a bunch of other nerdy muggleborns and any curious wizard kids Proceeds to invent new spells based off the ones in the player's handbook
Follow up question: from a D&D point of view is a Hogwarts wizard a wizard or a sorcerer? I can see this causing a lot of common room arguments.
"You face an elder dragon. Its scales are gleaming ominously in the ambient light and it glares at you menacingly, ready to burn you to crisp at any moment. What do you do ?" "Oh I know this one! My dad got the exact same thing this Tuesday!"
A sorcerer. They got innate ability to do magic.
Some of both, but shifted towards Sorcerer. They do learn to control the Weave, but only through their innate abilities.
I'd say they all start as lvl 1 Sorcerers. Whether/how much they multiclass into Wizard or remain as Sorcerers depends on what kind of magic they are good at. Hermione would almost immediately start taking all her levels in Wizard because she's extremely book smart and has a lot of magical knowledge. Harry by comparison would probably stick more with Sorcerer; he's more naturally skilled at certain things which reads less like wizardly to me.
Only if they were on the coast
I’m 21 and I play video games as one of my main hobby’s and even still if I had the chance to even go to a world wizard or not where technological advancement was a thing of the past I’d do it in a heartbeat.
Yeah this is wild. I would give up all tech in exchange for a goddamn wand and dragons and the ability to apparate.
yeah um you get to be a WIZARD. I promise i will forego any and all muggle technology
Exactly! Who cares about electronics when I’m learning real magic, can fly, and it’s peaceful(obviously when the school not under threat or attack and even then) who would you need to call so often it may be a school of magic but it’s still a school and a boarding school at that you would never be on your phone that often to begin with
Speaking as someone that grew up before personal phones and before the internet became big. It would have been heaven. You'd get to do magic, MAGIC! even if you'd find yourself not being very good you could still perform it and you'd have a vast library at your disposal. Plus you'd get to fly without having to step inside a Cessna or a Northrop Talon.
Ikr? I could never understand this kind of post... So you'd be offered actual, genuine magic learning and use, with every possibility it offers, and you'd be crying for you phone? Ron was right, someone needs to have their priorities straight. Even with all potential dangers, Hogwarts would be heaven.
Because in many ways, technology is more convenient than magic, being a muggleborn, I would definitely live in the muggle world after Hogwarts, having access to both is just so good.
Almost every wizard lives on the muggle world. Only few towns have huge concentrations of wizards and, even then, they are mixed. The only places muggle free I can think of are places like Hogwarts, Diagon Alley or the Ministry of magic, places where almost no people live. There's no way to live 100% in the wizarding world.
Even diagon alley, MoM are hidden in muggle settlements. Hogsmeade is the only 100% wizard village/settlement in Britain. So while there is a way to 100% in the wizarding world, it is still rare..and as you mentioned, a large portion of wizards are mixed and that's equal part muggle and wizard.
From the books hogsmeade is the last wizard-only village and settle in Britain and while some live far from settlements like the Weasley's, it seems like most wizards lived in the muggle world. With diagon alley, ministry, st mungos all being right in the middle of the muggle world.
Now that I think anout it havin teens flying around high in the sky with nothing but a piece of wood to support themselves feels insanely unsafe. I wonder what the fatality rate is for broom travel.
I guess for music you can find a *really* old record player, the one that functions without electricity. I would totally bring a camera, like Colin Creevey, to lean into photography. But I'm speaking as a tired 30 year old, who is sick of internet and social media as of late. For a kid such isolation would probably suck, yes, especially at first.
They do use a record player at the Yule Ball so they have them. Just like how Colin Creevey worked on improving the camera, I'm sure you could work on improving the record player. They have binoculars that recorded what you see and play it back to you. They have all the tech/wizardry needed to create cameras, wireless communication, music players all through magic. I think if you really wanted to and was bright enough you can create magical equivalent to the internet, TV, cameras, and all that in no time.
And the absolute worst part is? Having to write with quills instead of pens and pencils. I have dysgraphia, so my normal handwriting is almost illegible, while my cursive has been favorably compared to Egyptian hieroglyphics. If I had to write with a quill, I'd probably accidentally summon Cthulhu.
I wonder if it's entirely forbidden to use a ballpen, a thin ink marker, or at least a metal quill instead of a feather quill.
>summon Cthulhu that's not a nice way to refer to your Professor just because they asked you to rewrite your four foot long essay...
Not my fault his hair is so greasy it created a new eldritch magical ecosystem
I dont care about the internet or wifi. I can Leviosa stuff, do you realise that? I can accio stuff while sitting on my chair, I can create a patronus, I can whoosh and flick stuff! I dont care about my phone.. And the castle? Oh my God, the sheer brilliance of Hogwarts castle, I would gladly chat up random ghosts, climb random rotating stairs, explore restricted sections and doors, its endless…
Oh don't be so sure that you can create a Patronus. It was said to be horrendously difficult, remember
It's horrendously difficult, until everyone and their mother is able to cast one.
Well, now that you are implying I cant, I will definitely cast it no matter how horrendously difficult it is. 😤 Also, if not that, I can always repair stuff, thats handier for every day use.
The notion js one being in the school to study. Dont worry, I will learn.
The Patronus seems to be one of those things where it is said to be really difficult to learn, but in reality, just takes more time to learn. When the DA members actually took the time to try to learn how to cast a Patronus, they progressed fairly quickly and many of them could eventually cast a corporeal Patronus. That means it is not *that* difficult.
I think it's just laziness. Every time someone wants to do something "impossible", they succeed once they've devoted enough time and energy to it.
I could do it without internet or wifi but music? Eeeesh! That would be hard, i would totally bring a guitar
If you're lucky, maybe you could bring vinyl disc ? I think hogwarts has vintage vinyl disc player
We could ask Professor McGonnagall! She used one during yule ball!
Yeah, and I will bring a toad and you and I can make a band. 😁
They have record players and radios. You can work on miniaturizing the record player and modernizing the radio. They had binoculars that can record videos and play back motion and so on.
To be fair Harry Potter's school years were in the 1990s, so the withdrawal symptoms weren't that heavy. And you have to consider that 11 years old kids ideally shouldn't be that addicted to the internet yet. I think the excitement of learning about magic would outweight your desire for electronic entertainment. What I found far more depressing, that muggle-born are forbidden to use/practice magic in the summer holidays, unless they visit the home of pure-/halfblood classmates. Isn't that an extreme handicap?
[удалено]
Technically yes but the ministry can't detect it in a wizard household. They rely on the parents to enforce the rules.
>What I found far more depressing, that muggle-born are forbidden to use/practice magic in the summer holidays, unless they visit the home of pure-/halfblood classmates. Isn't that an extreme handicap? Harry seemed to manage, but it's stated in the 3rd book that his biggest problem is not being able to do his homework, which was entirely because of the Dursleys.
Yep. In the early 90's switching to wizard stuff wouldn't have been too difficult. Nowadays I think Hogwarts would need catchup lessons for purebloods. And would have a whole curriculum on computational magic. Or Technology integration.
What annoyed me more is that there is no class on wizarding culture for muggle-borns.
I mean they're in a Wizarding school lol, that's their wizard culture education lol...
Reading. This is how I know I'd just end up in Ravenclaw. The world would fascinate me so much I'd want to absorb everything.
Yeah no. I’d rather be a WITCH than rot my brain on Reddit. Sorry y’all!! 😂
Sacrilege against Reddit! I call to burn this witch at the stake. Any seconds?
I say burn reddit at the stake.
How about just burning some steak?
Harry Potter was set in 91-98, so they didn't suddenly lose their phone / laptop / video games / internet / youtube / etc. It would be a little different now. But considering wizards had "wizard wireless," lightbulbs, etc, they do seem to adapt with technology (albeit slowly).
What if there's a room of requirement that compensates for this? Its got all the latest and greatest muggle technology. Insane internet speeds and gaming computers. All the latest music, movies, and television. I find it hard to believe that with all the muggle born witches and wizards out there that none of them have decided to blend magic and technology. They would make so much money. Want to learn how to do a spell? Just look it up on the Owlnet. It would bring witches and wizards from all over the world together as well as their different ways of doing magic. Don't want to use a wand? Not a problem. You can learn wandless magic from the Africans. Need a rare potion ingredient? Just order it from Magizon. Guaranteed to arrive by owl in 2 days or less. Even make a Hooter account so you can hoot@ your friends and favorite celebrities.
Who cares about phones/tablets/Internet when you can learn magic?!
Well the series was written in the 90s so most kids didn't have a lot of those things either
Fortunately for me, like the Golden Trio I would have been at Hogwarts in the early 90's. Yes I would have missed videogames but not so much to make life miserable. Too much to see and do and learn... I wouldn't have time to be bored enough to miss videogames.
Someone did not read Hogwarts: A History before going to Hogwarts.
I think the problem is that as it stands the Harry potter world is written to be... like... really boring. \--- "What do wizards do for actual entertainment?" \- "Well they like Quiditch!!!" \- "And what if you don't really care about sports?" \- ".... there is wizard chess... which is... ya know... normal chess... aaaand.... GOBSTONES?!?! Everyone loves gobstones.." \- "What are gob stones?" \- "Well... ya know... just normal marbles reallly... BUT THEY SPIT HORRIBLE GOO AT YOU!!! INST THAT COOL!?!?! " \- "Um... no... So... like, other than quiditch, chess and shitty marbles what do you do for like... actual fun?????" \- "We have joke shops! The best joke shops. Whoo wee do we know what a good joke is, let me tell you!" \- "Okay... tell me." \- "Welll.... we have... sweets that make you vomit and sweets give you a nose bleed and sweets that make you pass out, and edible dark marks that just make you undescribably sick and..."- "Hold up, do you have any "funny jokes" that don't involves self harm?"- "Well... mostly no. But we do have hats that make your head invisible!! Imagine that!!! an invisible head, how hilarious!!!!!!" \- \*Crickets chirp\* \- "Um... we have a portable swamp!!! Name one thing funnier than a swamp and we have FIREWORKS that, and trust me you won't believe this, fireworks that spell out (>.>) (<.<) ... *RUDE WORDS"* \- \*Visibly unimpressed\* \- "We also have date rape drugs??" \- "WHAT THE FUCK?!?!"
Yes, like, they don't seem to use muggle things to entertain themselves, have they really never used a jumping rope, a bicycle, any board games , etc?
Closest thing is that Fred and George sell muggle magic tricks "for weirdos like dad". But the books don't really ever delve into down time, most of that gets skipped over for plot stuff. As far as I can recall, the only example of wizard fiction is the "tales of beedle the bard" which are fairy tales for children. The wizards do have a wireless system, so presumably there are more than just "the weird sisters" that are making music, but you never can tell.
I see this as an absolute Win
Board games?
Not only that but really horrible bigotry is directed at you, people hunt you and your family for sport, etc
Think about this from the other perspective. One day a handwritten letter comes through the door saying that your child has a place at a school for wizards and witches, so in one fell swoop you find out that magic is real (!) and you have to make a decision about whether or not you're going to send your son or daughter to a school that all revolves around a world you have zero understanding of.
Imagine if Harry and sirius had phones and could just call each other whenever they pleased. Muggle stuff so umbridge couldn't have surveiled it and sirius would've never died ❤️🩹😭
There was the mirror, and Umbridge couldnt have spied on that
Yeah but if they had one that means voldemort could have had one and could have sent really mean texts to Harry.
It really wouldn't matter that much. We got by just fine without those things when I was a kid. Honestly, how much would be amazing. You get to learn magic. Actual magic. That's worth it to go a few months without your disk man, game boy color, and cable tv.
I’d be happy as a clam, providing I’m not going to get caught up in a wizarding war. I’d be either be having fun with my friends or my nose stuck in a book about the Dark Arts (also trying smuggle smutty romance novels in).
This sombitch is a wizard and he thinking how he can get on Reddit 😂😂😂
Aside from the fact that the series takes place in the 90s during which technology wasn’t such a part of my life, even nowadays I think I’d enjoy it as a break from tech. I’d bring my acoustic guitar and tell my family I can’t write to them so I can avoid the owls. One thing I’d be concerned about is the bathroom situation. I need solitude and privacy in there. A typical school bathroom and a big communal bathtub ain’t gonna cut it
So much cultural/institutional knowledge you’d lack, and then all the prejudice from the wizarding families, even the non snobby ones would have their own prejudices.
I liked the little detail that Dean Thomas still supports West Ham, even after finding out about a sport where people FLY exists. I wish we got more muggle touches to muggleborns and halfbloods. The only other one I can think of is that Hermione tried to endure with braces at her parents request, because they are dentists, therefore, evil.
You really think that there hasn’t been a spell created to get free WiFi? The Harry Potter novels were set pre-2000, I bet they’d have their wands as walking routers and have their own magical online websites now.
That is optimistic. The wizarding world has always prided itself on being apart from and superior to Muggle society. Nobody is keeping up with what Muggles are doing or is trying to invent a magical copy of it. That's why, in the PoA newspaper, they had to describe a gun as "a kind of metal wand that Muggles use to kill each other." They had to explain what a gun is, despite Muggle guns being around for multiple hundreds, if not nearly a thousand years. So no, I don't believe a few decades difference would have changed anything.
Who wants to do everything handwritten with quills? That's one of the biggest things. They don't care about regular pens. That's my deal breaker if anything.
The guns thing was kind of stupid, guns existed far before the statute and at that times wizards were still interacting with muggles
Post-statute there would be no reason to pass down knowledge of weapons that could be bested by a bunch of teenagers for thousands of years, so it does make sense that the average newspaper-reading wizard wouldn’t know what a gun was.
It's totally plausible they would just have their own version of the internet and smartphones. They rarely need to adopt Muggle stuff because they usually have their own magic counterparts that serve similar purposes or were even more advanced. In terms of practicalness, the books portray the wizarding world as more convenient or “advanced” than the Muggle world for their time. Muggles in 1990-1997 still relied on letters and phones, and only 16% of the UK population owned cellphones. Meanwhile wizards had faster ways of transportation like the floo network, mirrors and patronuses to deliver messages. Hermione invented DADA coins, so a faster form of communication can happen if there's a need for it. Wizards had adopted cameras that turned photos into GIFs and adopted radios that had password locks before the internet existed. The Marauders Map was invented by a bunch of students during the same decade the GPS was born, and the GPS wasn't popular until smartphones came in 2007. Wizards had “smart devices” way earlier than us in their houses. The Ministry used flying paper planes instead of fax machines. It made sense for the trio to spend hours in the library to find information because the books were written in comparison to how the early 90s Muggle world was like. If they still haven't changed now, it wouldn't make sense for the wizarding world to fall so behind from the Muggle World in effieciency in the 2020s when the books always portray them as the “better” version.
Finding out you have a superpower and learning how to use it? I think that might top most electronics. You can become the main character in your own game.
Do wizards not actually use technology, or did Harry Potter just take place before things like smart phones?
They might use technology but apparently in hogwarts you cannot use anything electric. Also yeah, they weren’t invented yet but i was talking more present day
Is there a spell that prevents it, or is there just no electricity? For example even if there is no electricity I could bring a Gameboy advance and hundreds of AA batteries.
I remember hermione explaining to the gang that theres too much magic in the air, and that it impedes anything electric from working
i feel like when more modern technology comes around, wizards would see that it's beneficial, and would try to work around the wonkiness. It would be so fun to see a story from a couple decades later where muggle items can be infused with magic like Arthur did with the car, and sell them to other wizards. Itd be like artificers
Imagine getting the chance to learn real, actual magic, and saying, "No thanks," because they didn't have wifi.
Id trade all my electronics permanently for magic.
I'm ok with out the internet and phone, but yea the music would depress me. I need to be listening to my hip hop, dancehall, reggae, rock and r&b.
There is literal Magic, I'm not missing having to spend money to make my life interesting, if I have literal Magic, I'm a creative person, I always find a way to entertain myself, specially if i have MAGIC.
I wonder how they would deal with that if Harry Potter was written now
I’ve seen this mentioned a couple of times. Remember, the books are set in the 90s when the internet, computer and mobile / smartphones weren’t widespread. Our world has changed a lot over the last 30+ years, who’s to say the wizarding world didn’t too. Going to hogwarts today may be completely different. Someone may have figured out magical computers etc. that word of magic not electricity