User blog comment:ChrysieeBoo Lovely/Banshee/@comment-1613839-20140224141120

Taking a practical look at the info our HP world has on the Banshee I am forced to conclude that I think any character playing a banshee would naturally be overpowered (the scream alone being fatal would make it a one sided fight against most characters). That being said, next I decided to look for some way for a half-banshee to exist, and honestly I don't see it. Vampires and certain other creatures are considered part humans (here). However, Banshees aren't on this list, and looking at their page again, I don't think they ARE part human, but fully a creature, similar to a Dementor, and you don't see any half dementors floating around (as the union between one and a human would be impossible). So...while I do like what you have written up above, and I can tell you're really excited about the idea, I'm afraid that looking at our Canon sources I don't see any way to play a Banshee without it being overpowered, and I don't see a way for a half-banshee to exist in our Harry Potter world.

I do like the fact that you obviously have done your own research, and included that above, and added in limitations and showed an understanding of the rules, with reguards to Hogwarts and the wiki. I really like what you have written above, and I think the ability to sense death around you would be interesting from a RP perspective (and would probably make a character rather demented, but interesting).

Now, I know that sometimes we do pull from other sources, and we don't always follow Canon (though we do try very hard, and when we don't it's often because we don't realize it), but in this case I don't see a way to make it fit. Even if we did allow the racial change, the character would probably not be allowed at Hogwats, in the same way that Hogwarts isn't allowed to teach elves, vampires, or goblins wand magic, they wouldn't teach a banshee even if she had the ability and aptitude to learn it (which from their description is unlikely). I know that there have been a few cases of accepting a half into Hogwarts (Scathach Waters), but again I doubt the Ministry or Headmaster (looking again at Canon sources, and not the specific personalities of our Minister or Headmaster) would allow this at Hogwarts, as the danger to the other students wouldn't warrent the risk.

So...I'll sum up my thoughts like this. I think you did a great job thinking this up as it's a really cool idea, and trying to balance it so that it's not too overpowered. Given the updates you've made and the limitations I don't see it as being particularly overpowered by itself (though I do notice other comments below about other things the character has that when combined may cross that line). I think something like this would make a character very interesting and would give it unique and useful skills, which would make it fun. However, I don't think a character like this would exist in our HP world. If the character was created, and were allowed to use wand magic, they would have to learn it from a private teacher or teach themselves as Hogwarts wouldn't be an option. They would also not be allowed by the Ministry, and thus would naturally be seen as a dark creature and hunted as such. Since I don't think that's really what you had planned for this, I'm going to have to say that while the idea is very interesting that we cannot allow a character like this right now, if for no other reason than the timing.

I think a lot of interesting half breed characters COULD be possible without being overpowered, but that even if that's true right now isn't the time for them as we're already a bit low on active members and admins. This plays a role since the administration would have to be involved to deal with the influx of new halfbreed characters (rules, regs, sorting, Hogwarts, Ministry, etc) and we would need more active non-admins as well (to regulate them, have more aurors or control of magical creature agents, to RP with them even) and right now I don't think our wiki with our smaller number of users can support these types of changes to our wiki. If we get more people who are interested in playing these kinds of characters (and more users on the wiki) at the point we might be able to look at expanding our 'playable races' (such as we did with ghosts), but until that time I'm afraid that even if it was a cut and dry case (and I don't thik this is due to the Canon issues) I don't feel we can expand and have characters like these.

I hope you understand we're not trying to quash your creativity, but that right now your request just isn't possible to grant. I can tell you put in a lot of thought and time, and I hope you're not too disappointed. At some point I really would like to try and expand different character races...but right now just isn't that time.