PTNS-501 Lessons

Today feels like a day filled with conflicting emotions. On one hand, you have survived yet another year of Potions, and the school vacations are close enough for you to taste them. On the other hand, there’s still a beast you must conquer before you reap your rewards: your O.W.L. examinations. Getting a good grade on this test is extremely important, and you can’t help but wonder what would happen if you don’t pass.

The professor paces around the room, briefly talking to each student. You cannot discern exactly what is being said, but most of them seem to feel more relaxed after hearing his comment. You begin to wonder what is being said, deep enough in thought to not realize that the tall man is now standing right next to you.

“I’ve seen your work before, and I know you have nothing to fear. I don’t know whether you intend to continue with your studies in this class, but I am expecting your presence and, in my mind, have already saved a spot for you in my N.E.W.T. classroom”, he states resolutely and earnestly before walking to the front of the room.

For a brief moment, you see a faint smile form on the face of the ever-strict professor. Maybe things will turn out fine after all.

Introduction and History of Felix Felicis

Welcome to your final class for the year - and, for some of you, the end of your education in the field of potioneering. I want to make a brief remark before we begin today’s class: regardless of whether you get a good or a bad grade in your O.W.L.s, what truly matters is whether you are better than the person you were yesterday. Your path is not limited to the grades you get, and there have been brilliant potioneers across the eras that simply dropped out of school altogether in order to tread their own path. What matters the most is whether you have the curiosity to take this world by its horns and the drive to make your passions come true at the end of your journey.

Fortuitously enough, today we are going to talk about a genius who made his own path - but before we do so, we ought to start from the beginning. Today we are going to talk about Felix Felicis, which is arguably one of the most noteworthy potions in the wizarding world.

Those who took thorough notes in Year Four will probably recognize the person we’re going to discuss today - that is to say, the famous potioneer Zygmunt Budge, who was likely born in and attended Hogwarts during the 16th century C.E. In spite of his eccentric behavior, Zygmunt was considered a stellar potioneer, to the point that he had enough knowledge to correct the incumbent Potions Masters that taught at the time.

Owing to his knowledge, Zygmunt believed that he was the best-suited candidate to represent Hogwarts at the Wizarding Schools Potions Championship - a competition devised to test one’s brewing skills, problem-solving ability and resourcefulness with what’s available at the time. However, Mr. Budge was not even a N.E.W.T. level student at that time, and for that reason he was not eligible to participate - as only those in their seventh year of education can partake in the Wizarding Schools Potions Championship.

Irate with that outcome, Zygmunt Budge decided to walk his own path. He left Hogwarts and opted to live all by himself, developing his own brews and testing them on some friendly sheep that kept him company at the island of Hermetray. It was at this time that Zygmunt developed Felix Felicis, a potion that later made its way into his famous book titled “Book of Potions”. Zygmund might have been a brilliant potioneer, but he was not the most creative writer that has ever lived.

Effects of Felix Felicis

You probably have heard this before: Felix Felicis makes a person extremely lucky for a given amount of time, usually ranging from 12 to 24 hours depending on the dose ingested. During this time, everything that can go right will happen in the best possible way: you will likely win any bets you wager, plans that you create are bound to work flawlessly and you will find yourself coming across objects, people and situations that strongly benefit you.

While we will discuss the multiple theories on why that happens soon enough, there is no debate on what the effects of Felix Felicis are - a fact that proves that understanding why things happen a specific way can frequently be much more daunting than getting a potion or charm to work from a practical perspective.

The effect of this potion  is a polar opposite to the bite of a creature that you have already studied in the past. I see some raised hands already and would like to confirm your suspicions: yes, I am indeed referring to the Mackled Malaclaw. Some theorize that Felix Felicis is a substance that could counteract the effects of a Mackled Malaclaw’s bite, although there is still no conclusive research on the topic due to a simple reason: owing to some ill-fated coincidences, no controlled study involving someone being bitten by a Mackled Malaclaw has been seen to completion.

Conversely, other studies attempted to reverse the order of factors by putting people under the effects of Felix Felicis and then getting them bitten by Mackled Malaclaws. For still undiscovered reasons, these tests were also inconclusive - those affected by Felix Felicis were not bitten by the Mackled Malaclaws, even when putting their hands right in front of the creatures and attempting to harass them for a reaction. Many theorize that there is something about Felix Felicis (be it a chemical, smell, or magical aura) that Mackled Malaclaws are particularly averse to, leading to these outcomes. This is the most accepted explanation, albeit this fortuitous result is not yet fully understood.

As a last note, some comment on the side effects of Felix Felicis is also warranted. Not only is the potion toxic if consumed in large quantities or over a protracted period of time, it can also cause giddiness and even recklessness in some users depending on their innate biology. However, some potioneers state that those effects cannot be considered true side effects, as there is a possible correlation between the giddiness or recklessness promoted by Felix Felicis and its mechanism of luck generation. This is, incidentally, our very next topic for the lesson.

Theories on Felix Felicis

There is absolutely no controversy about the effects of Felix Felicis, but much to be discussed about the reasons why this potion can affect a phenomenon as subjective as luck. After all, a fact perceived by some as lucky could very much be unlucky for others - based on that, how can the potion draw these faint lines in order to make its drinker have a perfect day?

There are four main theories on the topic, with none of them constituting a near-consensus or even a clear majority. For the sake of thoroughness, we shall explore all four of these theories in order to allow you to reasonably select the stance you agree the most with.

The first theory, and arguably the one that most people subscribe to, is called the Chronesthesia Theory. In simple words, chronesthesia refers to mental time travels, as opposed to physical time travels created by apparatuses such as Time-Turners: rather than sending your body back to the past or into the future, chronesthesia simply sends your mind to a potential future in a simulated reality.

Consequently, a person that is under the effect of Felix Felicis is simply experiencing, at a given time, thousands of simulated realities inside their brain - however, our minds have not been devised to hold such vast amounts of information, and for that very reason all of this knowledge does not make its way to our conscious mind. Rather, our subconscious parses all possibilities and, based on our interests, selects the path that is the most beneficial to us. This explanation also accounts for the reason why Felix Felicis can unwaveringly lead a person to good luck, even when definitions of what is auspicious are quite subjective: rather than creating luck per se, the person who drank Felix Felicis is merely making the decision that would make them happier, albeit without knowing that consciously.

Another popular theory - the Acuity Theory - is also very similar in result to the Chronesthesia Theory, albeit its methods are slightly different. Proponents of the Acuity Theory state that Felix Felicis does not send a person’s consciousness to simulated futures; rather, it allows one to make full use of their present-time potential, enabling them to see details that would usually go unnoticed and that can be exploited. However, the consequences of this line of thought are nearly the same as above: these minute details are noticed by the subconscious mind, which then makes use of the acquired information in order to reach the most beneficial decision.

Those who defend the Acuity Theory also mention another reason why this stance is potentially the correct one - namely, the fact that Felix Felicis is also correlated to other positive traits related to one’s mental status, such as self-confidence and psychological relaxation. However, critics of this theory mention that this potion is also linked to recklessness, which would be inconsistent with an increase of one’s logic.

The third theory is less based on getting extra information to make a decision and more based on the fact that we already have the tools to decide perfectly. Those that ascribe to the Deprogramming Theory believe that all humans are able to make decisions that make our lives meaningful and happy - in other words, in ways that we would consider lucky - but that we betray our innate instincts through social programming in order to coexist with others. Therefore, Felix Felicis does nothing more than remove this social barrier and allow us to act freely upon our true desires, without any fear of judgment.

A similar substance used by Muggles that acts as an apt analogy is alcohol. Most people who consume alcoholic drinks experience a state of relaxation and elation that resembles the giddiness caused by the consumption of Felix Felicis, and for that reason some argue that the aforementioned happiness is yet another piece of evidence for the suitability of the Deprogramming Theory.

The last theory, on the other hand, presents a completely different narrative from all of the others. While the Chronesthesia Theory, the Acuity Theory and the Deprogramming Theory all believe that the changes caused by Felix Felicis arise from an internal perspective, the so-called Regulation Theory believes that the magical effects of Felix Felicis affects the external world.

Proponents of the Regulation Theory defend that Felix Felicis acts in a way similar to the Mopsus Potion, guiding the flow of the drinker’s magical energy so it can effectively interact with the external world. In other words, every external effect is a result of an application of magical force: objects flying in your direction missing the target and people agreeing to do what you want, among other effects, can easily be explained by a Levitation Charm or a form of emotion-altering magic respectively.

Nevertheless, testing which of these theories is accurate has been an exercise in vain so far. It is expected that the experiments on the interaction between Felix Felicis and the bite of the Mackled Malaclaw will shed more light on the matter if and when they succeed; however, for the time being we have nothing but conjectures and informed guesses on the matter.

Basics of Felix Felicis Brewing

I believe that you are all excited to brew your first batch of Felix Felicis, but I must be the bearer of bad news this time around. You see, not only is the potion inordinately complicated and involve several steps that require absolute finesse, but also the entire process takes longer than six months in order to be completed. Given the fact that you have an O.W.L. examination to take soon, demanding such a task from all of you would not be reasonable.

Still, that limitation allows us to take a very unique approach in how we discuss this brew - rather than giving you the directions on how to manufacture this potion, I can instead relay the basics and test your ability to come up with plausible guesses on how Felix Felicis is made. This will be, in fact, the topic of your last mandatory written assignment for the year.

First of all, let us discuss brewing times. Felix Felicis has an Estimated Brewing Time of 2 months, 4 days and 16 hours for a pewter cauldron, from which a total of 14 days and 16 hours are related to steps that last for the same duration regardless of cauldron type. The potion also requires maturation for 4 months and 8 days after brewing.

Next comes stir counting. This potion requires 102 stirs in total, with 56 of these stirs being counterclockwise and 46 being clockwise. Furthermore, not every single one of these 102 is directed at the cauldron: 6 counterclockwise stirs and 7 clockwise stirs are directed at a mortar, although these stirs are not necessarily all used on a single mixture.

The potion fluctuates in temperature 13 times across a total of six different brewing parts, with one of these temperatures being 777 Kelvin. Furthermore, at the end of the second and fifth parts of the process, an effect related to the surface of the potion occurs in the cauldron.

One charm is required to brew the potion - be aware of that in advance and do sufficient research on the topic, as most books disclose the essential spellcasting components for this spell, and both willpower and concentration can be reasonably inferred. Last comes the ingredient requirements, which are arguably the most relevant part of the recipe: Felix Felicis requires you to use Ashwinder egg, squill bulb, Murtlap tentacles, tincture of thyme, Occamy eggshell, powdered common rue, Fern Flower, Mackled Malaclaw bile, the blood of one magical mammal, the leaves of a magical plant that burrows itself when alarmed, two tertiary ingredients that you can find in a Muggle grocery and two more ingredients that I will not give any hints about.

Other than these crucial elements that must be respected, I shall let you create your own theories on how Felix Felicis is brewed.

Where Do We Go From Here?

Here we have it - congratulations are in order for surviving yet another year. Those who have been following the syllabus closely know that in your next year - provided you stick with the course and get a high enough score to remain enrolled - we shall take a look into offensive, defensive and utility potioneering. However, before you are allowed to set foot into my classroom, you need to defeat the ever-threatening O.W.L. examinations.

At this point, I would like to make my expectations clear on who will be allowed to proceed with N.E.W.T. level Potions. As a general rule, you will only be allowed to continue with the course if you get an Outstanding in your O.W.L.s - however, it is my philosophy that hard work should trump an occasional bad grade, and as such I will also take into account students who deliver excellent practical work. To be more specific, those who have an Outstanding grade in their optional research thesis will also be allowed to proceed with the course, provided they get at least an Exceeds Expectations in their O.W.L.

Do not think you are off the hook until the day of the exam comes, however. We shall not have a final exam for Year Five; however, you will have a brief quiz and a mandatory essay on what you believe the recipe for Felix Felicis looks like. Furthermore, you will have three optional assignments to complete if so you wish - in addition to your regular optional Potioneer’s Log and Research Thesis tasks, you may also write an analysis on the potential interaction of Felix Felicis in some unconventional cases related to luck.

For now, and for some of you for the last time, dismissed.

Original lesson written by Professor Vaylen Draekon
Image credits here, here, here, here, here, here and here