[RPG] What are some good skills and stunts for a mortal lawyer in Dresden Files

To try and simplify mirv's answer:

The way it works is you go through all of the questions, getting unique answers from your players (they should be writing these down!). Once all the questions are done they need to take whatever questions were related to them and turn them into aspects.

There aren't a whole lot of rules when it comes to deciding aspects, other than it should be as precise as possible and should describe the character somehow.

Yes.

The books never explicitly say that the GM should or must tell the players the difficulty, but that's because it takes it for granted. (It really should say, because – as you point out – keeping players in the dark is just so normal for so many GMs.)

There is circumstantial evidence in the text that the GM is supposed to set difficulties "in the open", but they're scattered throughout hundreds of pages and can be subtle. The most obvious, undeniable one is on page 311 of Your Story (emphasis mine):

Difficulty as Plot Device

Sometimes, assigning an unexpectedly high or low difficulty to an action can create an interesting detail for your game. For example, if the PCs are breaking into a small company’s office building, they probably expect most of the locks to be Good difficulty or lower. Finding one that’s Great or Superb difficulty would be unexpected, and this will serve as a flag to indicate that not all is what it seems. […]

Likewise, if the same PCs are infiltrating a Mafia don’s safehouse and all the locks are Average difficulty, it should be an indicator to them that something is wrong.

Note that there is no way that this bit of GMing advice makes sense in a system where difficulties are kept secret. If difficulties are secret, they can't serve as flags that something is up. If difficulties are normally secret and the GM reveals only the "odd" difficulty that's out of place, then the advice straight up doesn't make sense because the players won't have any other difficulties to compare with; and the simple fact that the GM is suddenly telling them difficulties would be the indicator, not the actual difficulty. It would be less artificial to just say what's out of place instead of "indicating" or "flagging" with difficulties. This bit of GMing advice simply wouldn't be in the book if it wasn't simply assumed that difficulties would be played in the open.

So yes, this passage is just a bit of sidebar GMing advice, but it reveals the underlying context of a system that is written with the solid bedrock assumption that players will be told the difficulty of every roll they make.

On top of that, as you point out there are many disadvantages with keeping difficulties secret:

• It slows down play significantly
• It makes in-character strategising (which in FATE is done via Aspects) impossible
• Players have no way of knowing what their characters do know – how their own world, bodies, and expertises work
• It robs the players of narrative power in a ruleset that is designed to be hugely collaborative (and functions poorly when it isn't)
• Playing "guess what the GM is thinking" is almost never fun. This is particularly true in the case of Fate's core mechanic, since uncertainty about target numbers adds no suspense while adding lots of drudgery.

I asked Fred Hicks via Twitter if there is an official rule either way, and he responded:

fredhicks
@sevensideddie I think Fate works best with difficulties in the open; you say jump, they ask how high, and you tell them. :)
_{4:26 PM - 14 Dec 12}

So this is as official as it gets: The game doesn't require anyone to play with difficulties in the open, but the designer thinks people should and designed with that in mind. That's consistent with the books: they don't have a rule for it, but they consistently, subtly, assume that you'll play that way.

In sum, playing with secret difficulties is like voiding the warranty. You can do it, but the game is not guaranteed to perform as designed if you do. As you're discovering (and as I hope your GM can begin to appreciate), this game you're in is suffering somewhat for having its warranty voided and isn't operating at full capacity.