Editing The Dresden Files RPG (section)

====The White Council====
A collection of the most powerful mortal magic users on the planet (wizards) that's existed since the Dark Ages (maybe even before). Entry could be seen as the equivalent of getting a Master's degree or earning your blackbelt in magic. Is extremely powerful but is ridiculed by the other factions for being obsessed with tradition and inflexible (which it is, to an extent). What most of these other factions don't seem to appreciate is that without the Council acting as an Inquisition for magic users by upholding the Laws of Magic, the rest of them would be forced to contend with insane black magic users breaking reality left and right, shattering the Masquerade and burning them alive from the inside out for shits and giggles. Also, the Council would have even more phenomenal political and destructive power if it weren't constrained by the very Laws it upholds and if it weren't run by conservative geezers obsessed with the status quo. If a human breaks the Laws of Magic, the Council's grey cloaked Wardens drag them to a random black site and execute them, no exceptions, no second chances (mostly). Since mortal magic users exude a murphyonic field around themselves, complex mechanical and electrical devices short out around them (shit breaks when they're nearby). This isn't that much of a handicap, since they only short out stuff built after WWII (roughly, it isn't a hard cutoff) and even then only if its complex like a computer, and even then it mostly happens when they actually use their magic. Most of them have found magical workarounds to compensate for this. For some reason no wizard has ever created magical computers, despite the fact that basic binary computing is actually very simple, and we've seen wizards use much more complex magic throughout the series. The EMP effect is actually relatively recent, wizards have a probability effect that changes from time period to time period, it used to give them warts or cause fires to burn weird colors.

[[Image:HarryDresden.jpg|thumb|right|Harry, on the job]]
*'''Harry Blackstone Copperfield Dresden''': Our titular character, a wizard and private investigator. A very tall and profoundly (un)lucky man, Harry Dresden is almost the perfect archetypal noire detective, but with a heavy dose of modern snark and humor. Born to an actual witch and a stage magician and orphaned at a young age, Harry Dresden is adopted by a friend of his mother and trained in the ways of magic. Sounding pretty generic, right? WRONG! His adoptive father, Justin DuMorne is actually a Warlock (black magic user) and was training Harry to be a loyal enforcer. When his adoptive father tries to put him in a psychic headlock of forced loyalty, Dresden ends up burning him to death in an impromptu wizard's duel. Naturally, the Wardens (Wizard Cops) show up and arrest Harry for killing with magic, a violation of the Laws of Magic that Harry was never told about. He barely avoids getting beheaded, due to the fact that he was acting in self defense against Black Magic, and because elder wizard Ebenezar McCoy speaks on his behalf and agrees to foster him. He's then placed under parole, with the penalty for violation being death, for the majority of his young adulthood. Being by far the most powerful mage of his generation and an the only openly practicing wizard, mortals see him as a charlatan or a looney; much of the wizard community sees him as a loose cannon at best, an unrepentant warlock at worst, although a good chunk of the White Council's younger generation look up to him as someone who is not afraid to call the senior council out. While low-level practitioners generally see him as a walking disaster and bully like they see all wizards (although their opinion shfits greatly as he grows in fame, joins wizard-KGB, and founds a mage neighbourhood-watch network). Other supernaturals generally treat all wizards with distrust and respectful fear, but over the course of series Harry's (partially misguided) reputation among non-human supernaturals grows from "Be afraid" to "OH FUCK HE'S AFTER ME!". Because of this he's become something of a loner, though he does have a few close friends. He's been in several relationships, but most ended in blood, tears, or flames. An honest man, he tries to do the right thing, but often, the right thing gets you put on the shit lists of vampire lords and the like. He's chivalrous to a fault, causing him no shortage of pain. It ''might'' be fair to call him honorable in that he prefers not to lie and will do his best to help the helpless, but he's not above fighting dirty or weaseling his way out of a deal, especially where his Godmother is concerned. Despite being a generally good person, he sees his own power as something he needs to carefully hold in check. He's well aware of the fact that with all his power he's one moment of careless rage away from burning down a building or blowing up a gas station, so he sees the careful and righteous use of power as being very important, though he never hesitates to use his power where he feels it's needed (read: burn down any building that looks at him funny). Harry has a bad habit of focusing a little bit too much on the features of attractive women, if this seems a little sexist, know that this is an intentional and acknowledged character flaw that is a result of Harry's messed-up upbringing; his sexual development was intentionally manipulated to make him easier to control, he gradually loses this flaw over time(only to have it replaced with paranoia, self-loathing, and more loneliness) and he himself constantly works to control his libido. His immense magical power is severely hampered by the lack of control and refinement resulting a very low cost-effectiveness with "quick and dirty" field magic - his fire evocations are huge explodey fireballs, his shields are direct force absorbers and his telekinesis can throw a car but cannot hit a button across a room - for this reason most wizards and many of the other supernaturals see him as kind of a brute. This often backfires on them as they underestimate his intelligence and take his maverick facade for granted. His enemies who know him better often go too far on the other side of misreading his character and think his "magical brute" facade is entirely fake and he's far more devious and masterful than he really is, which is kind of understandable as the pile of bodies he leaves behind grows over the course of series and includes things a wizard of his caliber have no business surviving against. Later his evocation skill grows to a respectful level only for him to often find himslef fighting without his focus tools at hand which pretty much brings him back to "wasting raw power on flashy and powerful but barely controlled spells" level. Meanwhile his thaumaturgy is way more refined and controlled as he fucking ''loves'' tinkering with rituals, artifacts and potions in his free time and the majority of his day work also revolves around using thaumaturgical rituals to find people or lost things.
**'''Subconscious Harry''': The manifestation of Harry's subconscious mind, "Id Harry" is what Harry could be if he were to stop trying to be so selfless and concerned with being a good guy. Unlike most repressed alter-egos, Id Harry is presented as neither wholly evil nor wholly good, he's nothing more than Dresden's self preservation instincts, sex drive, and untapped potential (which also kind of makes him Harry's super-ego, sort of), if Harry were to stop putting himself in danger for others and let go of all the baggage that the universe heaped on him, he'd be more wealthy and confident, but he'd also be kind of a dick. He also tends to notice and understand things that Harry doesn't consciously know, so take that as you will. Whenever Harry meets his Id he always points out that his Id is dressed darkly, black leather duster, black shirt, black dress trousers, smart black shoes, neatly trimmed goatee, tidy hair, all of which speaks to Harry's fear of his repressed desires making him evil. Something which Id Harry calls boring and uninspired.

*'''The Original Merlin''': founder of the White Council(at least its current incarnation) and the most powerful human magic user ever recorded. A former student of Odin, he created the Council to regulate magic use and protect mortals from black magic, as of ''Cold Days'' its implied that the stuff about regulating magic is merely secondary to the Council's true purpose, defending reality from the Outsiders. Despite laying down the Laws of Magic, he himself is confirmed to have broken the Sixth Law, performing a single action at different points in the time stream, simultaneously(try wrapping your brain around that), adding credence to the theory that Laws 1-6 are a smokescreen for the 7th. According to Arthurian myth, he's not entirely human, so he might have been a Changeling(or a Changeling who Chose to be human) or a Scion. His surviving enchantments defy all known laws of physics and all known understanding of magic.

*'''Margaret LeFay''': Harry's mom who died shortly after giving birth to him. Harry's got a rose tinted view of her, since he believes his life wouldn't have been so shitty if she had been around. But as the series progresses, its become increasingly clear that she was involved in shady business and was practicing Black Magic, and that her unsavory connections and actions are actually the reason why his life has been so crappy. "LeFay" is an epithet given to anyone who is deeply involved with the Fae Courts. Opinions differ as to whether she was just a misguided idealist or an irresponsible contrarian. She was over 100 years old when she became pregnant with Harry, though given how much time she'd spent in other parts of reality, it's entirely possible that her theoretical age was different from her practical age.

*'''Samuel Peabody''': The council's main Bureaurocromancer and the guy who takes the minutes at each of the meetings. It's stated that the council would be nowhere as efficient as it is without him. He dislikes untidy things to a rather pathological degree and is rather poor at German as his book "Die Lied der Erlking" a collection of poems and lore about The Erlking Has a glaring mistake right in the title. (The actual title should be "Das Lied des Erlkönigs")

*'''Klaus "The Toymaker" Schneider''': A small wizard with a round belly and cheeks, and white hair. Klaus has long been the running contender (in the Merlin's opinion) for the next open seat in the Senior council, losing it to both Ebenezar McCoy, and Gregory Cristos. He's described as an enchanter with a reputation for skill and honesty, and what little we've heard of him has been positive. WoJ says that Klaus's method of channeling magic is the Author's favorite, but he's never had a chance to publish the short story he wrote about it. From the interview.
 "My favorite is probably from an unpublished short story I wrote, set in the Dresden Files universe, but during the Battle of the Bulge. The Nazis had a sorcerer operating out of an old monastery, and the White Council dispatched the Belgian wizard, Klaus the Toymaker. Klaus's magic is all based around using children's toys as focii. My favorite moment was when he killed a couple of SS-summoned demons with a windup wooden duck." 

=====The Senior Council=====
The seven "ruling" wizards of the White Council. While the position is usually awarded for being one of the most ancient, experienced, influential wizards on the planet, positions can be selected due to political bullshit and the Senior Council tends to be aged and crotchety because of this. Contrary to what their name might imply, they actually have very little authority over the day to day lives of council members. Rather than a member of a ruling body, a position on the senior council could best be thought of as combining the responsibilities of Judge, Arbiter, Diplomat, Administrator, and in some cases Generals and Champions. There is also a certain amount of delegated authority given to certain members of the senior council. For example, Ancient Mai is implied to be responsible for diplomacy, Arthur Langtree seems to be responsible for arbitration within the council, Listens to the Wind commands the medical staff, the Gatekeeper is responsible for keeping Outsiders Outside, etc. Whether this is formal assignment of duties or simply wizards assuming the role they are best suited to is unknown, though it's strongly suggested that the Gatekeeper and The Merlin are formalized positions.
*'''The Merlin/Arthur Langtry''': The Merlin is the formal leader of the white council. The current Merlin, Arthur Langtry, is a wizard and politician who believes in keeping an image of strength and solidarity against the terrors of the world above all else. Though he and Harry find themselves at odds often, he's not implied to be directly evil or malicious, just calculating, proud, and utterly ruthless in his politicking for the council. He's good with defensive warding magic. Like really, ''really'' good. As in, he once held off an entire court of vampires and outsiders with an improvised ward which had nothing to anchor itself against. As Harry points out several times, he didn't get his title by collecting bottlecaps.
*'''The Gatekeeper/Wizard Rashid''' Rashid The Gatekeeper is the most mysterious of the current Senior Council, his purpose has something to do with "the Outer Gates", and it's heavily implied he has some ability to see the future, or at least is well connected with someone who can. Until "Cold Days" that's all we know, and even after that he's almost cryptic as before. Without going into major spoilers territory, we come to find out in later books that he's one of, if not ''the'' most important council member, as far as his role is concerned. He's one of the few characters that is taller than Harry putting him at somewhere around 6'10-7'00
*'''Ebenezar McCoy/The Blackstaff''' Harry's second mentor, Ebenezar McCoy is a Scottish hill-billy (native to Scotland, immigrated to the US during the 17th century) who currently owns a ranch in the Ozarks. <s>He is also the Blackstaff, the Senior Council's secret wetworker who is exempt from the typical punishments those who broke the laws of magic would face. He is responsible for the Krakatoa Eruption, the New Madrid Earthquakes, and the Tunguska Event </s>. '''There is no such position within the council, no member would dare breach the laws of magic, and to imply such is subversive misinformation spread to weaken the council from within. If you hear any such seditious falsehoods, report to Wizard McCoy for summary Debrief and Reeducation.''' Despite his work for the council, he doesn't get along with the Merlin, as they fought on opposite sides of the French and Indian War. He specializes in evocation, specifically Earth and Gravity magic, and is mentioned as being one of the top evocators in the world. For example, he once pulled a derelict Russian satellite out of orbit against his enemies. Think about that. He had the magical strength to reach up into fucking ''ORBIT'' to pull down a several ton satellite, and was able to control the insane force of its meteoric descent enough to bring it down on a specific target. 
*'''Joseph Listens-to-Wind/Injun Joe''' A genuine Illinois medicine man, Listens-to-Wind is a Native American Wizard/Shaman, and one of the few truly decent people in the Dresden Universe. He is both a master of shapeshifting magic and healing biomancy, which isn't counting the fact that he goes back to medical school every few decades so he can keep up with current medical techniques. Generally level headed and calm, but holds plenty of anger about the fact the White Council's laws forced him to sit back and watch as his nation was destroyed. He's also a fucking genius. Think of how complex something like brain surgery is. Now imagine doing brain surgery with a current of energy you're controlling with your mind, without disrupting the electricity within the brain you're working on. Now imagine doing this and work like it every day for centuries. Call him "Injun Joe" without being Ebenezar McCoy at your own peril.
*'''Martha Liberty''' An exceedingly tall African-American Wizard, very little is known about her. Worthy of note is that she's one of the few ancient wizards who lives with her family. Most wizards move away from their families after a century or so, to avoid the pain of seeing multiple generations of your family die. Martha lives with some of her great great granddaughters. 
*'''Ancient Mai''' The scariest old (human) woman you'll ever meet, ancient Mai lives up to her name. Despite being over over 400 freaking years old, she's said to retain much of her beauty, being compared to the flawless emptiness of a porcelain doll. She may or may not be the person in charge of handling contact with other supernatural powers as she sent out emissaries to both Faerie courts at the beginning of "Summer Knight", and becomes very formal and diplomatic in the presence of other supernatural powers, as we see in "Turn Coat". Her preferred form of magic is Enchantment and she is responsible for the Council's many magical constructs and golems/Wardhounds, beyond that, she is said to have "precious little gift for combat magic."
*'''Gregory Cristos''' The newest member of the Senior Council. He leads a large multi-national bloc of wizards that represent nations that have been largely neglected by the White Council. His appointment was largely to avoid a split in the White Council which would lead to a civil war when they need it the least. While this allowed him to gain his position, he neither has seniority nor much respect from the rest of the senior council. Harry and Ebenezar consider if he's a member of the '''Black Council''', a highly placed catspaw whose rise to power they engineered, or just a useful idiot that fell into place. Considering his personal shows of wealth and desperation to make peace with less savory supernatural community members as diplomatic victories, he's likely just a well-meaning, but useful idiot to the Black Council. Harry and Ebenezar suspect that he's either a Mole or Incompetent; Ebenezar complains that Incompetents are more dangerous every time.

=====The Wardens=====
The law enforcement and military arm of the White Council. Wizards trained in combat, investigation, and warfare. Wardens enforce the Seven Laws of Magic with extreme prejudice. You break the laws, the Wardens cut your head off. Every Warden is given a unique nigh-indestructible sword that can cut through magic, and a grey cloak that doesn't stain. Considering the amount of blood involved in cutting off heads this last one is important. When the Council goes to war with the Red Court they had to increase recruitment, so a lot of the Wardens are really young, some even in their late teens. This creates a dynamic of the conservative old guard disapproving of the young upstarts' willingness to use more aggressive and unorthodox methods, while the new Wardens disagree with the old geezers' excessive caution and overly rigid interpretation of the First Law. Harry is liked by many of the younger wardens, and most of the old guard hold him in a mix of suspicion and wary respect.
*'''Anastasia Luccio''' Currently the Captain of the Wardens, formerly field commander, she is responsible for the organization, logistics, and training of the Wardens, due to necromantic body-switching psychic fuckery that ripped her out of her original body and into the much younger, magically weaker body of a grad student. She is still on of the scary members of the white council, as this switch did nothing to diminish her years of experience or masterful control, though it did weaken her magically, so she's no longer capable of forging the warden's swords as she once did (though goodness knows why she doesn't forge the enchantment while someone else does the magical heavy lifting, something the series has firmly established can be done). She's so good at fire evocation that some of her "fire" spells are more comparable to cutting lasers than anything else.
*'''Donald Morgan''' The Field Commander of the Wardens. Morgan is fanatical in his service to the White Council, and especially the Merlin and Luccio. He's down paranoid and stern after years of seeing the horrors of black magic. He specializes in Earth Magic, and was said to be one of the best evocators alive, capable of doing quick and dirty like no one else. In a singular moment of unrivalled badassery he once lured a nigh-unkillable evil shapeshifter called a skinwalker (Naagloshii) onto a nuclear testing site, and escaped to through a portal seconds before the nuke went off. 
*'''Carlos Ramirez''' A "classically Spanish" Warden, Carlos is the youngest ever Regional Commander in the wardens, and one of Harry's few allies in the White Council. Witty, skilled, courageous, and something of a womanizer (though he may or may not actually be a virgin). He specializes in Water magic, specifically entropy magic, and is more than capable of hurling disintegration beams around in combat. 
*'''"Wild" Bill Meyers''': Warden in charge of the Southwest, specializes in earth magic and has been seen toting around a double barreled shotgun and a combat knife.
*'''(Yuki?)Yoshimo''': Japanese Warden known to use biomancy and wind magic, carries around a silver katana, distant relative of Shiro Yoshimo(see: Knights of the Cross)
*'''Justin DuMorne''': Harry's abusive adoptive father and first magic mentor. A former Warden and secret Warlock (Black Magic) user, DuMorne adopted Harry with the intent of raising him to be his Black-Magic-using underling. When Harry got lucky and stumbled onto his mentor's plans before he could impliment them, DuMorne tried to mentally enslave him. Harry began his long and illustrious career using Nike-Jutsu and ran the fuck away. Harry escaped into the "care" of his godmother, the Leanansidhe, after a brief stint of robbery and Outsider-Slaying. Lea then offered to make a faustian pact with him: she would give Harry the power required to defeat DuMorne. In exchange, he would belong to her. Harry then killed DuMorne in a magic duel, and did everything he could to snub his godmother on the deal. He may or may not have been a member of the Black Council.

=====The Seven Laws of Magic=====
The Laws of Magic that the White Council enforces, for damned good reasons.
# Thou Shalt not Kill (no murdering... with magic, anyway)
# Thou Shalt not Transform Others (no human transmutation)
# Thou Shalt not Invade the Mind of Another (no mind reading)
# Thou Shalt not Enthrall Another (no mind control)
# Thou Shalt not Reach Beyond the Borders of Life (no resurrecting the dead)
# Thou Shalt not Swim Against the Currents of Time (no time travel)
# Thou Shalt not Open the Outer Gates (no inviting Cthulhu and his buddies over for a beer)
It's worth noting that the first five laws are as such because they involve the usage of Black Magic. Black Magic twists and corrupts the user, eroding their self control and making them more likely to use Black Magic in the future. The Sixth and Seventh Laws are there because violating them is a Bad Idea, as mucking with time or summoning outsiders tends to fuck reality to a larger or greater extent. It's theorized that messing with time or summoning the wrong outsider could destroy time and space, but considering that time and space still exist, many beings question this. The laws are also really, ''really'' nebulous sometimes. Does it break the first law to push a rock off a cliff if that rock crushes a person? Does it break the second law to repair a congenital deformity? Does it break the third law to help heal someone whose mind has been damaged? Does it break the fourth law to put someone to sleep to help them avoid being damaged by mental magic? Does it break the fifth law to resuscitate a patient whose heart has stopped? As for the sixth and seventh laws, it's worth pointing out that if you're moving (which literally everyone is '''all the time'''), you're technically altering your own flow of time (for some reason Merlin was capable of using relative positioning in time to create a five-dimensional prison, but somehow didn't write any relativity clauses for his Laws? Come on Merlin, this shit is important). If you slow down your own movement through time relative to Earth, you aren't "swimming against the currents of time," you're just grabbing a rock and holding on for a bit. As if that weren't enough, different places within the Nevernever have time that flows faster or slower than Earth time. If you step off into an area of the Nevernever whose time moves faster than Earth's, for the express purpose of giving yourself more time relative to Earth, does that break the sixth law? The seventh law is the only one that's pretty much black and white, and is also the most important by far. Laws 1-5 only apply when the victim is a human being, so you can do whatever you want to vampires, ghouls, demons, demon-possessed, faeries, etc.