re: Was Harry Potter a great or average wizard?

I'm not reading all of that, but I'll say he's a really good wizard in certain areas, not in others (see Occlumency). He always excelled at Defense Against the Dark Arts, though.

His strongest trait was that he never backed down from whatever challenge he faced. Always confronted it head on, even if he knew it meant certain death. Dumbledore pointed out that was the biggest advantage Harry had over Voldemort. Voldemort feared death, and Harry "welcomed it like an old friend".


I remember the speech from Spiers in Band of Brothers. Summarizing, said that until you accepted that you were going to die at some point in this war, you couldn't function as a true soldier should.