Week Two - Task #05. - "Dueling from the Past"

[Prof. Alexander Brighton]

You get a note with the location of the first duelling club meeting. You are nervous, but also excited and can’t wait to get started. You know that this will only be a practice session, but you are still excitedly anticipating that first meeting. You head straight for the first meeting. Only when you get there, you realize you’re an hour early.

You pace around the room, waiting patiently for what feels like forever for the fun to begin until finally your fellow future duellists start showing up. About 5 or 10 minutes after that, Prof. Alex entered the room. He pointed his wand in the air and shot out red sparks which got everyone’s attention and everything went quiet and everyone looked in his direction.

Prof. Alex happily welcomed everyone to the dueling club. He started off with a short speech on the importance of dueling and the differences between friendly and unfriendly spells used in duels. He also mentioned a couple important past duels like the ones during the Battle of Hogwarts and leading up to the battle all those years ago. It was all very interesting.

Prof. Alex ended his speech with “Enough about that, it is time to know more about all of you”.

Task:
Please create a piece of artwork depicting a past battle that you have had. You can do this in a graphic or a drawing. You will earn an extra 10 beans if you include a short description about who you were dueling, when this duel took place, and whether it was a friendly duel or not so friendly duel. I will award the extra beans separately from the activity, and they do not count toward sapphires.

Alternatively, You can write at least 150 words about a duel you have had in the past. Please include who you were dueling, the kind of duel, and the spells that were used.

This task is worth 10 Beans/Sapphires and it's due by March 30th at 11:59 PM HOL Time.

[Dibyarup James Potter]

Imgur Link - Larger Version [1571 X 1111 px]

I was actually duelling my elder brother Albus Severus Potter and the duel took place about 4 months back. It was a friendly duel indeed. Albus was teaching me how to duel in a combat situation when the opponent is stronger than me and using an offensive spell I personally do not know yet. It was a very important lesson where he taught me a lot about stance, situational awareness, proper wand grip, willpower, concentration, and especially improvisation.

Since the lesson primarily focused on fighting someone stronger than me, hence, improvising upon the spells I already know, along with concentration and willpower were some of the most important concepts to learn about and keep in mind, because those three things would be the biggest differentiating factors between winning and losing the duel.

[Scarlet Robloutain]

https://imgur.com/a/LGXCEJ2

Last summer I went to visit my uncle in his house in South-America and he wanted to teach me some duelling tricks. We spent hours laughing because I failed horribly, but eventually I managed to get to him. It was of course all very friendly.

[River Fenwick]

I was dueling a dear friend and dormmate of mine about two months ago, as she felt a bit underdeveloped in her dueling skills. She requested I help her by dueling, but her heart wasn't in it. What started as a friendly duel turned into one based on pride since I may have made some unsavory comments to get her fired up. We're good now, but she didn't talk to me for a week after this.

[Hiya Debnath]

After my first few Defense Against the Dark Arts classes in my first year at Hogwarts, my friend and me decided to practice dueling for an assignment that we were supposed to write. We decided that it would be fun to actively engage in a friendly duel so that we can write the best assignments possible, with the inspiration from the first-hand experience we would have on engaging in dueling. We decided upon a place and time during the weekends, the place being a grassy part of the Hogwarts castle grounds, near the Black Lake, less frequented by other students, and the time being two hours from lunch time in the afternoon. We had decided upon a third-dormmate to be our referee. She is the one who clicked this photograph for us while we were dueling, ten minutes into the duel. We met at the stipulated place and time, not only me and my to-be opponent, but also the person chosen as referee, after revising the rules of a friendly duel. We began by bowing to each other, turning around, and walking ten paces away from each other, then turning around again to face each other and taking our positions. This was a moment captured during our friendly duel, and while we learnt some very useful and engaging dueling tips and tactics throughout the process, it was I who finally disarmed my opponent and won the duel.

[Rosalinda Malfoy]

https://imgur.com/PT4ZOYT
Last summer I was duelling my twin sister. We wanted to practise before a serious competition. I mean it was of course friendly.

[Lex Green]

https://postimg.cc/rzbpVp4v

This was a friendly duel I had with one of my older magical cousins two years ago, when she was teaching me to duel, in my bedroom at home, during the summer before I started Hogwarts, in case I got into any trouble!

[Janne Halla]

I've only dueled as a part of the Hogwarts' Dueling Club. They were all friendly duels, as per the school rules, and with the use of very basic spells.

After the beginning greetings and movements according to the dueling etiquette, we started dueling. I've faced a Slytherin, who immediately attacked with an Impediment Jinx. All thoughts left my head in panic and I've just barely managed to dodge the first spell.

In retaliation, I've cast a pumpkin-head jinx, which the Slytherin defended with a weak Protego. It did force him to step back a little.

Seeing my opportunity, I've started a barrage of offensive, but innocuous spells, to overload his Protego and put the Slytherin on the defensive.

While it worked in nearly bringing the Slytherin to the edge of the dueling area, the spells took a lot out of me. When I flagged, my opponent took advantage and cast a knockback jinx. At the same time, I sent a toenail-growing hex hurling at him. The spells collided and the force threw us both back and out of the area, thus ending the duel in a draw.

[Viviana Kingston]

I had a friendly duel with an upperclassman who was helping me practise the spells I had memorised. The only problem was during the duel, I couldn’t remember any of the offensive spells and had to stick to countering the ones that were thrown at me. For every spell that was thrown at me, I mostly stuck to “Finite Incantatem”, which I still cringe for doing. Eventually my upperclassman got tired of me and decided to cast an antler jinx which unfortunately hit me, causing me to sprout a pair of antlers. Finally remembering a spell to fight back, I cast “Avifors” which she swiftly countered. Losing my confidence, I replied with an “aguamenti” which just made her more determined to get back at me after water drenched her. She cast an “Avis” which backfired because they decided to perch on my antlers instead of attacking or swarming at me. The duel ended on that note, and I was stuck with antlers for a few hours, but it was a good learning experience.