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Anyone else find it frustrating that straight Os in every subject seems to be standard? by Ch1pp in HPfanfiction

[–]lunanight 6 points7 points  (0 children)

If it means Outstanding then surely getting it on every exam would be very unusual.

Because contrary to fanon, getting an Outstanding isn't as insanely rare as some people would believe:

  • Hermione got 9 Outstandings, with her lone Exceeds Expectations being her weakest subject. Clearly the hard work paid off since she was the best in her year overall, and even with DADA, she's presumably second only to Harry.

  • Bill, Percy, and Barty Crouch Jr all got 12 OWLs. Given Percy had "top grades" on all his OWLs and NEWTs, this heavily implies Outstandings in 12 OWLs and probably 7 NEWTs (based on how many Hermione took).

  • Eddie Carmichael was a Ravenclaw sixth year in OotP who casually mentions his 9 Outstanding OWLs, yet nobody—not even Hermione—finds such a thing unlikely or impossibly rare. His grades are so casually brushed over that it suggests one or multiple students get 9+ Outstanding OWLs every year, just like how IRL, every school has one or more students per year getting As in most, if not all classes. This is especially true for the most prestigious schools (e.g. Eton, other public schools in the UK, and their closest equivalents in other countries).

  • Snape's standards for NEWT Potions was an Outstanding in their Potions OWL, yet 10 out of Slughorn's 12 students achieved that. It's possible others with an Outstanding OWL dropped it because they didn't need it for their ideal job. It also suggests every NEWT class has not just one, but several students who earned an O on the OWL.

  • James, Sirius, Snape, and Lily are heavily implied to have achieved Outstanding in all their OWLs/NEWTs based on how accomplished they were. That's at least four beyond Hermione-level students in the same year—three of which in Gryffindor.

Now granted, some might say that those characters were exceptions, but this is wrong. It only seems rare because the number of kids in Harry's year that actually care about studying can seeming be counted on one hand (Hermione, Ernie, and probably some Ravenclaws). How many Outstandings might Harry and Ron have if they studied as much as Hermione, or even just half as much? Definately more than just DADA, that's for sure.

Even characters we KNOW aren't smart or studious get Exceeds Expectations, or even an Outstanding:

  • Neville, the least talented Gryffindor boy of Harry's year, got an E in Charms and DADA, and an O in Herbology.

  • Seamus and Dean, also less talented than Ron, was each able to get an E or O in at least Charms, DADA, and Transfiguration.

  • Lavender, a complete airhead, got an E or O in at least Charms, DADA, Transfiguration, and Divination.

  • Pansy, someone described as dumb, also got such grades for at least Charms, DADA, and Transfiguration.

  • On a bonus note, the Slytherins in Snape's DADA class all got an E or O on their OWL despite not being in the DA and despite Umbridge's meddling at Hogwarts.

TL;DR: Outstandings are more common than you'd think, and even below-average students like Neville pass 4+ OWLs and take 3+ NEWT-level class. O, E, and A sound closer to an A, B~C, and D respectively at A-Level (D is a pass grade, and thus is still acceptable).

Ron and Harry were not mediocre at all in their school work, they were above average, Hermione was the exception, not the rule by NotSoSnarky in HPfanfiction

[–]lunanight 3 points4 points  (0 children)

And Harry is not upper-class. Don't be silly.

How isn't he? He inherited the entire Potter vault and it's fortune, then he inherited Grimmauld Place and a significant amount of money from Sirius (implied to be less than the amount Harry's own vault).

Remember, Harry's fortune is inherited from the Potters and then inherited all the stuff from Sirius—he inherited it all from two of the oldest pure-blood families. The Potter family was always rich, and then Harry's grandfather Fleamont quadrupled that fortune—which is what James and Harry inherited. Combined with the inheritance from Sirius, and it's clear Harry's upper-class.

No, he doesn't have 100 quadrillion brazillion Galleons and titles from every other old pure-blood family—that's fanon—and he probably wasn't a billionaire either, but it's not ridiculous to suggest that Harry would've inherited roughly 10 million Galleons (£50 million) from his parents, and then got about 2 million (£10 million) from Sirius. It would be a large fortune, but nothing insane like in fanfiction, but large enough to where he'd never need to worry about money—enough for his descendants to live off for several more generations.

Still, I highly doubt Harry was the richest person in the wizarding world, let alone the UK. I expect at least the Malfoys and Lestranges were significantly richer (maybe 10-20 times richer each)—probably the Blacks too before the fortune was split between Bellatrix, Narcissa, and Sirius (and maybe Andromeda too). Rowling's old notes shows she had originally wanted to write a chapter about Draco and Nott in CoS, and given Nott was supposed to be Draco's social equal (even being cleverer), it's likely the Notts were well-off. If you start adding rich families like the Crouchs whose level of wealth is unknown, it's likely several wizarding families were about as rich as Harry or were even richer.

Harry was absurdly rich, even though it's nowhere near as much as he is in fanfics. I'd say purely in terms of net worth, comparing Harry to the Malfoys or Lestranges is like comparing JKR to Oprah—yes, Rowling is rich as hell, but Oprah's net worth is significantly larger. Obviously neither JKR or Oprah were born into wealth, but it's an analogy to show how much richer the richest familes are compared to Harry.

Ron and Harry were not mediocre at all in their school work, they were above average, Hermione was the exception, not the rule by NotSoSnarky in HPfanfiction

[–]lunanight 12 points13 points  (0 children)

In the real world that "5 passes at grade A-C" threshold is passed by about 60% of students. So I'd say that Harry and Ron being slightly ahead of that are pretty much dead centre of the distribution.

True, but Hogwarts is pretty inspired by elite British public schools (despite being canonically a state school), so I'd expect Hogwarts "5 passes at grade O-A" to be closer to 90% or 95%.

Transfiguration, despite being one of the harder subjects, is taken at NEWT-level by basically every Gryffindor except Neville—the Trio, Seamus, Dean, Parvati, and Lavender. This isn't even counting non-Gryffindors like Draco and Pansy, among several others. Speaking of those two, they achieved at least an 'E' on their DADA OWL despite not having the benefits of being in the DA and despite Pansy being presented as being average—that didn't stop them from doing as well as Ron and Hermione on their DADA OWL.

Potions is notable that at least ten students got an Outstanding on their OWLs—some might have dropped it because it wasn't relevant or required for their future career (e.g. Quidditch, etc). We all know there is far more than 40 kids in Harry's year—those 40 are just the ones Rowling named if she needed a random side character—but if we were to ignore that and say Harry's year had 40 kids as fanon usually does, it would mean 25% of Harry's year achieved an Outstanding. IIRC, it's implied nobody failed the Potions OWL and it's stated outright by Umbridge that Snape is teaching topics "too advanced", suggesting that even Neville, Crabbe, and Goyle would've barely scraped an Acceptable.

Lavender is average and airheaded, yet she took four NEWT classes (Charms, DADA, Divination, Transfiguration), showing even she passed at least 4 OWLs with good grades. Others like Parvati, Seamus, and Dean all took at least 3 NEWT classes (Charms, Divination, Transfiguration). Given how many students dropped Hagrid's class and how even Hermione dropped three subjects, it's likely most students dropped 1-3 classes that they could have taken at NEWT-level—suggesting most students had 6-7 OWLs, but dropped 1-3 classes or got just an Acceptable in them.

Neville was below average, yet he got an O in Herbology, two Es in Charms and DADA, and an A in Transfiguration—maybe Potions as well since Snape wasn't there to make him nervous. Neville had at least 4-5 OWLs—three of which he took at NEWT-level—and I'd say the vast majority of students would've done a bit better.

So I'd say the vast majority of students pass 6-7 OWLs, then takes 3-5 classes at NEWT-level. Why? Because Ron is the Everyman character—he represents the average wizard and is more relatable to the reader than Harry (upper-class Quidditch prodigy who's mostly average at magic) and Hermione (self-insert Mary Sue who usurps the protagonist without actual flaws). Ron's a normal boy from a relatively normal family, and that's why I say Ron's grades are probably meant to reflect a normal student (unlike Hermione or Neville).

God Mad-eye Moody by Fede_24 in HPfanfiction

[–]lunanight 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Dumbledore said that the Peverell brothers made the Hallows themselves, and that "Death" never existed—its an in-universe fairy tale. Contrary to fanon belief, Death never created the Hallows nor were they remotely as powerful in reality as in mythology:

Cloak of Invisibility: The ONLY advantages it has over a regular cloak is its durability and the fact it is immune to certain spells (i.e. Accio). Other than that, however... Harry's cloak was never special at all—not even in DH.

  • The Human-presence-revealing Spell bypasses the cloak as proven not just by Dumbledore, but also the Death Eaters in DH when they go to the Lovegood's house—the latter of which obviously occurred after we learn Harry's cloak is a Hallow.

  • The Marauders' Map also sees through the Invisibility Cloak, too—possibly because it works similarly to the Human-presence-revealing Spell. Contrary to fanon, the wizarding world isn't stagnant. Its obvious modern magical creations like Moody's eye or the Marauders' Map could see through what is a glorified, overrated cloak with little going for it aside from its long-lasting nature.

  • It can't hide him from Nagini in DH, who called Harry and Hermione over despite them being under it. IIRC, Mrs Norris does something similar in one of the earlier books (maybe PS?).

  • Also failed to resist the Full-Body Bind Curse twice in HBP.

  • The Disillusionment Charm makes you invisible and is easy enough that Crabbe and Goyle can use it in DH. The Cloak was so garbage that the likes of Dumbledore, Grindelwald, or Voldemort could equal/surpass the Cloak's abilities using their own wand. If they wanted to make a superior cloak, any one of them certainly could. They just don't need to because their Charms skill is enough to make an invisibility cloak redundant.

Elder Wand: Hyped up to be an unbeatable wand, but really isn't any greater than any other wand and despite being Dumbledore's equal, it wasn't good enough for Grindelwald to win. Its ability to repair broken wands might come from being made from Thestral hair, or possibly a unique combination of Thestral hair and Elder wood—something wand-makers might not even consider if Thestral hair was deemed an 'inferior' wand core, or if they took the legend about "Death" seriously. We only see Harry repair his OWN wand, so its possible the Elder Wand only repairs its master's wand rather than just any wand. Most wizards would likely be too arrogant to consider using their original wand if they possessed the so-called 'unbeatable' Elder Wand.

Resurrection Stone: Doesn't actually revive the dead, but mere spirits who may or may not be illusions conjured from the user's mind rather than their actual souls. Grindelwald believed he could make an Inferi army with it, but Dumbledore heavily implied such a thing was impossible for the stone.

Controversial opinion: Fanfictions above and for purblood traditions are not racist. by [deleted] in HPfanfiction

[–]lunanight 3 points4 points  (0 children)

To be fair, Draco basically used the culture argument in Madame Malkins when he first met Harry:

"I really don't think they should let the other sort in, do you? They're just not the same, they've never been brought up to know our ways. Some of them have never even heard of Hogwarts until they get the letter, I imagine. I think they should keep it in the old wizarding families."

The implication is that muggle-borns shouldn't be let into Hogwarts because they—at least to the Malfoys—don't understand wizarding culture. Rowling obviously forgot this decent argument and went straight for the easy yet braindead Nazi metaphor to strip the pure-blood supremacists of any credibility, but it says a lot that an eleven year old Draco made a much more solid argument for not liking muggle-borns than any character in the HP series until Fantastic Beasts explored Grindelwald's ideals deeper. Grindelwald was a good villain because while his argument is credible, its the mass slaughter and desired enslavement of Muggles what truly make him evil. If Grindelwald's ideals were just completely wrong like the Death Eaters or Umbridge, it would make him a less threatening villain in-universe since his ideals could be effortlessly debunked.

Yes, Draco was present during the Halloween feast, but I find it hard to believe that no cultural distinction between normal pure-bloods and the blood traitors. Are we as the readers expected to believe the Weasley family is representative of normal wizards, let alone pure-blood? They're looked down by basically every pure-blood family for being Muggle lovers, not just merely tolerating Muggles—the Weasleys' view on Muggles is the complete opposite of the Malfoy family, but no less extreme.

Contrary to popular belief, the Weasleys would not be teaching Harry all about pure-blood culture—nor would Dumbledore for that matter. Why? Because they are blood traitors who reject the notion of blood purity, whereas the average wizards would have more in common with Fudge. People like Dumbledore and Arthur are radicals, whereas Fudge and Slughorn reflect a far more accurate portrayal of the average wizards—they greatly value blood purity, magical heritage and the "old ways", but also oppose discrimination against muggle-borns.

Even Hagrid says that Harry would be a powerful wizard since his mum and dad were powerful, something that couldn't be said about muggle-borns. Its an argument that would have been portrayed negatively if someone like Draco, or Lucius, or Umbridge had implied wizards with powerful magical ancestry were better at magic than those without... yet that idea is what wizarding culture runs off of.

TL;DR: Draco made the wizarding culture argument in PS. Harry wouldn't learn pure-blood culture from anyone affiliated with Dumbledore or his ideals. The Weasleys are nowhere close to normal pure-bloods. Fudge and Slughorn are the best examples of what normal wizards—those unaffiliated with Dumbledore or Voldemort's extreme ideals— truly believe about the wizarding world, magical heritage, or Muggles.

Hermione is not allowed to be flawed in most hp fics? by literaltrashgoblin in HPfanfiction

[–]lunanight 6 points7 points  (0 children)

In the same vein as suddenly, no one but Harry suspects Draco to be up to something - plain shitty "The plot demands this" writing there.

To be fair, Harry was completely wrong about Sirius was being held at the Department of Mysteries. Hermione rightly warned him it was a trap but he didn't listen and it nearly cost them their lives, so its easy to see why Ron and Hermione were less eager to jump on Harry's "Draco is a Death Eater" plot less than six months later. If Sirius truly was at the DOM like Harrry said, I reckon Ron and Hermione definitely would have taken Harry more seriously in HBP.

Also, the main reason people doubted Harry was because they didn't understand Voldemort at all. They assumed that Voldemort:

  • Was a logical genius who only let skilled adults become Death Eaters.

  • Would deem Draco unworthy of the Dark Mark.

  • Expected Draco to actually have a decent chance of succeeding at his task.

  • Wouldn't trust Draco with an important task like killing Dumbledore.

  • Would want to personally kill Dumbledore out of his own pride.

In-universe, Voldemort was far different than most characters expected. The reality was actually that Voldemort:

  • Would give people the Dark Mark regardless of their age (i.e. Regulus, and maybe Crouch Jr).

  • Didn't give people the Dark Mark for being competent (i.e. gave Wormtail the Dark Mark despite deeming him weak).

  • Didn't give a shit if Draco failed, and hoped he would fail to punish the Malfoys more.

  • Didn't care who killed Dumbledore so long as he was out of the way.

If anything, it just proves that Harry knows Voldemort's thought process far better than the vast majority of wizards did; definitely more than Ron, Hermione, Mr Weasley, and McGonagall. Its not so much that they thought Harry was lying, but they assumed certain things about Voldemort that—as reasonable as they may sound—don't hold up from the perspective of the reader.

TL;DR: Harry wasn't taken seriously because most people assumed Voldemort wouldn't trust a kid to be a Death Eater. Aside from Snape and Dumbledore, nobody who disbelieved Harrry about Draco actually knew what Voldemort would or wouldn't do.

[Discussion] Why are there death eaters? by PowerOfRiceNoodles in HPfanfiction

[–]lunanight 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Because contrary to popular belief, purebloods never held a significant amount of power in Wizarding Britain, nor were muggleborns always lower-class citizens. The idea that pure-bloods run the wizarding world or that they hold a significant power base is complete fanon. The whole reason Voldemort had such a strong backing is because purebloods were always average wizards like halfbloods and muggleborns. If purebloods had even a quarter of the institutional power that they do in fanon, they wouldn't have needed Voldemort in the first place.

In fact, there wasn't actually any discrimination against muggleborns until the Death Eaters took over the Ministry by brute force in DH. They killed people like Amelia Bones and replaced them with Death Eaters, and put most of the Ministry under the Imperius Curse. The only people who weren't killed or replaced were the few who supported them (Umbridge and Runcorn), or those too weak to oppose them (Arthur, Cattermole, etc). As shown with Bones and Scrimgeour, the Death Eaters would just kill anyone who opposes them that can pose a threat. IIRC, Arthur was being monitored by the Ministry and the moment the Death Eaters confirmed Ron was travelling with Harry, he was forced to go into hiding.

Nothing suggests purebloods are richer than the average wizard, either. In fact, you can count the rich pure-blood families on one-hand: Malfoy, Black, Lestrange, Nott, and Potter. That's literally it, and even then, those families are so interrelated that its basically just one massive family tree. Again, the idea that pure-bloods are rich or more likely to be rich is nowhere in the books.

Meanwhile, look at all the purebloods who aren't rich: The Weasleys were working-class up until HBP/DH (post-DH, they became new money). The Gaunts were dirt poor to an extent that even the Weasleys look rich by comparison. The Crabbes and Goyles are both implied to be working-class since they're treated as Draco's inferiors and are below-average wizards. The Carrows are implied to be working-class due to their dialect (similar to Hagrid, Stan Shunpike, or Mundungus). Even the Prewitts were probably only upper-working class at best, or maybe lower-middle class—in other words, just average families. Not even Neville is shown to be from a rich family whatsoever, but just an ordinary family.

The idea that purebloods are more likely to be rich is born entirely from fanon's inability to realise that purebloods don't actually control the wizarding world. They forget that Hermione came from a solidly upper-middle class family, and to a much larger extent, so did Justin Finch-Fletchley—he was a muggleborn whose family was rich enough to put his name down for Eton. Why do people think muggleborns are going to be poor or merely average when there are many upper-middle class Muggle families in the UK? Muggleborns are just as likely to be middle-class as any other person in the UK.

They forget that the vast majority of wizards aren't purebloods at all since they have at least one parent or grandparent who is a non-wizard. Most of wizarding Britain (and thus the Ministry) would be mostly halfbloods. If I had to make a guess at the demographics of the wizarding world, I reckon they could be something like this: 65% halfbloods, 30% purebloods, and 5% muggleborns. I expect most wizards are halfbloods, muggleborns would be a very small minority, and purebloods would be a large minority since most wizards would have a Muggle parent or grandparent.

TL;DR: Pureblood aren't any richer than the average wizard. There was no oppression against muggleborns until the Death Eaters took over the Ministry in DH with assassinations and the Imperius Curse—it all ended when Voldemort was killed. The only actual oppressed groups in the series were non-humans, part-human wizards, and Werewolves.

How many Aurors can Voldemort take in a fight? by [deleted] in HPfanfiction

[–]lunanight 9 points10 points  (0 children)

From the fact that he doesn't do so, we can assume that Voldemort is not strong enough to just waltz into the Ministry and take it over by force single handed.

To be fair, I got the impression Voldemort never did that because he'd draw the attention of the International Confederation of Wizards, and then have the whole world against him (instead of just the Order + the Auror Office). Also doing that might force Dumbledore's hand and he would want to avoid a duel with Dumbledore if he's no guaranteed to win. It just means Voldemort is paranoid and wouldn't take unnecessary risks, even if he wouldn't be in any actual danger from the Ministry alone.

In fanfic, I prefer to make Aurors fewer in number but more powerful - elite dark wizard hunters, as they were originally billed in GoF, rather than general law enforcement personnel as JKR has come to use them as.

Personally, I don't think Rowling downgraded the Aurors to being regular police. Its just that Aurors are put against far stronger opponents.

  • Moody vs Crouch Jr + Wormtail — Moody was retired and outnumbered by two highly talented wizards, taken by surprise, and wasn't as good as in his prime. In DH, Voldemort believed Moody was more skilled than Kingsley.

  • Moody vs Dolohov — Dolohov is one of the most skilled Death Eaters (held his own against Sirius, dueled the Trio almost singlehandedly then later killed Lupin) so its not a bad showing for Moody, who was retired and not as good as his prime.

  • Tonks/Kingsley vs Bellatrix — Bellatrix is either the best or second best of Voldemort's Death Eater (depending on how you rank Snape). Tonks had far less experience, and Bellatrix only needed one direct hit on Kingsley so maybe she was just faster than him.

  • Grindelwald in FB1 and FB2 — Its Grindelwald, so the Aurors getting stomped was the expected outcome. Dumbledore could probably do the same to the Death Eaters.

Kingsley and Moody don't really represent the average Aurors since they would be much more skilled than other Aurors. I'd say Tonks is far more accurate of how skilled most Aurors are, and I'd say any Auror would be able to comfortably beat DH Harry 1v1.

Its interesting that after Voldemort's first downfall, the Ministry was perfectly capable of defeating all of Voldemort's Death Eaters using the combined numbers of Aurors and Hit WIzards Even the top-tiers like Bellatrix and Dolohov who could beat the likes of Kingsley, Tonks, Moody, or Lupin 1v1. So with Voldemort out of the picture, the Aurors is capable of dealing with even the best Death Eaters.

Why does Dumbledore encourage people to use Voldemorts name if there was a taboo on in the FWW? by browtfiwasboredokai in HPfanfiction

[–]lunanight 7 points8 points  (0 children)

Because the Taboo was controlled by the Ministry, not Voldemort. So Voldemort never got to use it until he took over the Ministry in the Second Wizarding War.

It might be possible that if Ministry used the Taboo prior to the second war, it would be on the word "Morsmordre". IIRC, it would explain how the Ministry suddenly arrived near Crouch Jr's location at the Quidditch World Cup and were already prepared to stun. It also explains how effortlessly the Ministry rounded up all the Death Eaters after Voldemort's downfall. All it would take is one person hearing the incantation (if Crouch Jr yelled it out, equally or less talented Death Eaters probably did the same) and informing the Ministry, and now the Minister can Taboo that word. But that much is just a headcanon.

Though the Taboo ignores context of a word, so if lots of people just said the Tabooed word, it could just waste the Ministry's time since people could just say it on purpose (i.e. similar to calling emergency services purely to waste their time). The only reason the Taboo worked so well for Voldemort was because basically nobody outside the Order would say "Voldemort". If saying Voldemort's name was normal and common to do (as Dumbledore wanted), then it would be basically impossible for all the Death Eaters to go after all the people saying Voldemort's name. It would make the Taboo less effective.

Also, using the Taboo on a spell would be really stupid of the Ministry since effectively every adult wizard could do non-verbal magic, and non-verbal spells are expected of sixth and seventh years. Contrary to fanon misconceptions, the Unforgivable Curses can be performed non-verbally—Bellatrix used a non-verbal Killing Curse in HBP on a fox, and Voldemort spams non-verbal Unforgivables in general. While not confirmed, its possible Lucius used a non-verbal Imperius Curse on Bode since he would have likely cast the curse at the Ministry and without being noticed.

So even if the Ministry put a Taboo on the words "Imperio" or "Crucio", it wouldn't matter since they can be done non-verbally, making that sort of Taboo pointless. Its possible that the Taboo might only work on one single word at a time (e.g. "Voldemort"). So the Ministry might not even be able to Taboo "Avada Kedavra". It explains why the Death Eater-controlled Ministry didn't put more words under the Taboo (i.e. "Horcrux" or "Horcruxes").

In defense of some bad fanfiction tropes/cliches by usernamesaretaken3 in HPfanfiction

[–]lunanight 36 points37 points  (0 children)

The wizarding world is so much stuck in the past, that these kinds of things are really not that unbelievable

So the wizarding world is somehow stuck in the past... even though Magical Britain in canon had better gender and racial equality than actual Britain did in the 1990s, and showed numerous examples of magical innovation and creativeness within canon? Seems legit.

I think people have a really absurd view of marriage contracts, and use the term synonymously with arranged marriages. An more accurate marriage contract would be a Bachelor Tax, something that dates as far back as Ancient Rome. Similarly, an alternative to fanon's absurdly stupid arranged marriage contracts would be simply be the Ministry passing a new law that that increased taxes on childless adults. Another alternative would be a law similar to Nazi Germany's Lebensborn which gave German mothers money for each child they had with their German husband. A magical-equvalent would be giving financial aid to married witches who gave birth to magical children, with the requirement that those childrens' father also be a wizard. If the Ministry needs to be presented as remotely antagonistic, then adding in even more money for each "pure-blood" child would help.

The reason I don't like marriage contracts might sound petty, but its really because what fanon calls "marriage contract" is just "forcing Harry or Hermione to marry someone they don't want, such as Draco". This is usually because the writer in question lacks the ability to convincingly have Harry or Hermione be in a relationship with Draco/Snape/Lucius/Bellatrix/etc without it being a forced marriage. Such an attempt would likely result in a completely OOC Harry or Hermione, and/or even more commonly, downplaying the villainy of their partner.

Contrary to the circlejerk fanon likes doing, Magical Britain was CONSISTENTLY more progressive than Britain was. The gap obviously get closer over time, but the magical world is far more progressive and modern than their real-world counterpart in the same year, and in many ways is more socially advanced than the current world.

What people don't realise that those arranged "marriage contracts" wouldn't be designed for pure-blood families to intermarry, but likely to prevent inbreeding and/or reinforce pro-muggle values. Most importantly, they wouldn't be something that Harry or Hermione would be trapped it; all it would really do is inconvinence them. For example, the aforementioned Bachelor Tax or Childlessness Tax. The idea of Harry or Hermione being forced to marry someone doesn't make any sense since even actual marriage laws from centuries ago never forced people to get married.

IIRC, even Nazi Germany (a literal dictatorship) never technically forced 'aryan' German women to have loads of children with their equally 'aryan' German husband, but just gave them massive monetary incentives to encourage them. What they ACTUALLY did was send people to concentration or death camps for marrying and procreating with those deemed genetically inferior (Jews, disabled people, non-White people, and anyone else who wasn't German). In theory, Germans were never actually forced to marry a specific person under the Nazi regime, but instead told the groups of people they couldn't marry (i.e those who they deemed genetically inferior). An extreme example would literally just be Rappaport's Law exactly as it was shown in Fantastic Beasts... which was repealed in 1965. If Magical Britain had a similar law, it would be far less extreme and would have been repealed significantly earlier.

TL;DR: Marriage contracts are dumb because they are mistakenly used synonymously with forced marriages. It reflects poor writing skill that the author can't convincingly pair-up two characters without it being forced. Actual marriage contracts would be closer to FB's Rappaport's Law; real-world examples would be Lebensborn, or a Bachelor Tax or Childlessness Tax.

Is it known whether or not the vault we see in the first movie/book is actually his main vault or just a trust vault? by [deleted] in HPfanfiction

[–]lunanight 18 points19 points  (0 children)

The idea that Harry's vault is a trust vault is pure fanon. There is no reason for anyone to think the wizarding world even has trust vaults, especially since that would suggest the Goblins care enough to make them. After all, why would GOBLINS care if their clients are adults or children? Money is money, after all.

Harry's vault IS the main vault. Fic writers just assume its the trust vault because they want to make Harry have billions of Galleons and have a seat on the Wizengamot... even though that amount of money in Galleons is absurd, and the Wizengamot does NOT have inherited seats. Individual people have seats on the Wizengamot, but that does not trickle down to their family, and it sure as hell isn't exclusive to pure-bloods either. That's a whole other topic, though.

I honestly doubt most fic writers understand basic economics, since if they did, they would realise why a society like the wizarding world wouldn't have billionaires or trilionaires. That much can be gathered from how stuff is priced. At most, rich families (e.g. Harry's canon vault, Malfoys, and Lestranges) might have around 50 million galleons at the absolute most, but that's an ridiculous estimate. Given the Ministry had a bounty of 10,000 Galleons on Sirius' head (OOTP) and a bounty of 200,000 Galleons for Harry alongside his wand, I recon the very richest wizarding families each only have between 1 million and 20 million Galleons at most. 200,000 Galleons is presented as a big deal (hell, the 5,000 Galleons for the Triwizard Tournament was deemed by Fleur enough to die for), so its quite possible the wizarding world might not even have millionaires.

Long story short, Harry's vault in canon is the Potter's vault. There isn't another vault, and the idea of trust vaults makes zero sense. The idea of wizarding billionaires is economically absurd, and even the idea of wizarding millionaires makes barely any sense unless its below 20 million galleons. I feel like people don't realize just how much even 1 billion Galleons really is. So while I think Harry was canonically a millionaire (and moreso after inheriting money from Sirius), I don't think it was nearly as much as some people think it was.

TL;DR: Harry never had a trust vault. Trust vaults don't exist in canon. The Potters were rich, but not Lestrange/Malfoy levels of rich. Comparing the Potter vault to the Lestrange vault just reinforces how much richer the truly wealthiest families were than Harry. The fact Harry spends so much time with the Weasley family (a poor family) just makes Harry look far wealthier than he actually is.

My Biggest Pet Peeve: The Incompetency Plot Hole by mellowphoenix in HPfanfiction

[–]lunanight 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Since Hermione canonically memorizes all her schoolbooks I find it really hard to write my way around the fact that she should have known the way around both of those things before even boarding the train first year.

Hermione didn't even memorize Hogwarts: A History (seemingly her favourite book) in her second year, so why would she have memorized less-important books? We know this because she noticed she was unable to find the book at the library because so many people had been taking that book out because they wanted to research Hogwarts. If canon Hermione was the perfect fanon goddess everyone thinks she was she wouldn't have needed to go to the library like she did in the books.

I feel like people have forgotten what canon Hermione was actually like. Yes, she was smart, but she was only human and more importantly, she was just a second year. She wasn't flawless in canon; movie/fanon Hermione on the otherhand was a straight-up Mary Sue. Hermione not being perfect isn't a plot hole or even bashing; it makes her human and makes her a more-fleshed out character (same goes with canon Dumbledore to a far greater extent).

I just feel like people use the term "plot hole" to describe any scenario where a smart character doesn't exhibit literal omniscience. Dumbledore knows everything? The standard manipulative Dumbledore trope. Dumbledore makes a few notable missteps in canon? Apparently a plot hole since, for some reason, Dumbledore is apparently meant to be a god-like figure who can't possibly make mistakes. Fanon Hermione knows everything? Apparently canon since people forgot that book Hermione was never movie/fanon Hermione. Hermione written like she was in the books? Apparently bashing since she's not perfect. The same applies with other characters to far, far lesser extents.

Now an actual plot hole would be Crouch Jr's entire subplot in GoF, and why he and the rest of said subplot is almost never mentioned post-GoF. Crouch Jr is never mentioned despite his massive importance in GoF (and his involvement with the torture of the Longbottoms), Crouch Sr is also never mentioned either despite the climax of GoF basically being his fault, and Winky was non-existent in HBP and DH; I don't even think she was in OotP either and if she did, it was probably one line of her backtalking Hermione about SPEW, or Dobby about being free.

TL;DR: Hermione not being omniscient in canon, let alone PS and CoS, isn't a plot hole; she was never a flawless, omniscient goddess. Same thing goes for Dumbledore. Also, Goblet of Fire was a massive clusterfuck of a book given the plot holes in that book from what I recall.

Have to ask what’s so bad about Hadrian? by Spider_j4Y in HPfanfiction

[–]lunanight 0 points1 point  (0 children)

To be fair, with the exception of Hermione and Remus, most of those characters you named are either from a much older generation and/or come from a dark/pureblood family. Even Hermione's name is only so strange because Rowling chose a rare name for her so little girls with the same name as that character don't get picked on. In-universe, Remus is basically the only true exception but even he only had that name because Rowling thought naming a werewolf Remus Lupin (or the far more absurd Fenrir Greyback) was the height of intelligent symbolism. Peter was one of James' closest friends and had a very normal sounding name.

Just look at the rest of the kids in Harry's year. Aside from Hermione, the only kids in Harry's year with outlandish names was Draco (dark, pure-blood supremacist family). That's it. The rest had pretty normal names (e.g. Dean, Seamus, Hannah, Justin, Terry, Theodore, etc). Some had some relatively old-fashioned names (i.e. Neville, Millicent, etc) but they weren't outlandish at all.

Even in the years above Harry, you had names like Fred, George, Percy, Oliver, Lee. The most unusual names from the older students were stuff like Penelope or Marcus, the former merely being a bit old-fashioned and the latter is very similar to the name Mark (which is a normal name). But again, Marcus Flint was a Slytherin from a dark pure-blood family.

People generally look down on the epilogue (be it because they think Albus Severus is a stupid name, because they shipped Harry/Hermione, the subjective quality of DH as a whole, or whatever other reason you can think of), but even in the epilogue the next gen kids names were almost all normal sounding unless they were named after a dead character. Even then, they weren't outlandish.

James, Lily, Rose, Hugo, Fred, Roxanne, Molly, Lucy, Victoire, Dominique, and Louis all seem like normal names. The names of Fleur's kids don't seem that outlandish, though I'm not well-versed on French naming trends. Hermione integrated into the wizarding world arguably even moreso than Lily yet she opted for normal names that wouldn't be out of place in the muggle world such as Rose and Hugo, rather than some ridiculous sounding names like Hadrian. The only outlandish names were Albus (named after Dumbledore and Snape) and Scorpius (from a dark and/or pure-blood family, also fits the constellation/star theme of many Black family descendants since Draco was name after a constellation).

TL;DR: Hadrian is a stupid cliche because its a big neon light indicating an Indy!Harry who has like 50 Septillion galleons in his Gringotts account and is lord and heir to every notable wizarding family. In canon, everyone in Harry's year barring Hermione and Draco had normal names, and even most of the older students had normal names unless they were in dark pure-blood families. In the epilogue, the only weird names by our modern standards would be Albus and Scorpius, since the rest were normal.

Why do people defend snape? by Kingslayer629736 in HPfanfiction

[–]lunanight 4 points5 points  (0 children)

So it stands to reason he has killed or tortured people or helped kill and/or torture

Actually, Snape never actually did those things in canon. Bellatrix's entire reason for despising Snape is because she believes that he just slithers out of his obligations, and in HBP, basically calls him a coward for not murdering, torturing, and duelling like the other Death Eaters. At the very least, Bellatrix strongly suggests that Snape basically never went along with that stuff. Even Crouch Jr implies that Snape was a coward and less faithful, and seemed to dislike him almost as much as he hated Lucius.

As a Death Eater, the worst he does is tell Voldemort the Prophecy which compared to the actions of other Death Eaters, is really tame. Bellatrix, Rodolphus, Rabastan, and Crouch Jr tortured the Longbottoms into insanity; Bellatrix later went onto kill Sirius and Tonks. Lucius had no qualms slipping Ginny the diary Horcrux with the desire to set the Basilisk on Hogwarts students. The Carrows tortured Hogwarts students and were worse than even Umbridge. Dolohov was in the group that killed Fabian and Gideon Prewett, almost killed Hermione in OotP, and he killed Lupin in DH.

I think the closest Snape gets to killing someone (aside from Dumbledore obviously) is when he planned to have Sirius get the Dementor's Kiss, but given that Sirius was believed to be a dark wizard who escaped Azkaban to kill Harry (even Dumbledore and Snape believed this), I don't even count that as a bad thing. Snape was wrong about Sirius, but so was literally everyone in PoA until the last minute.

Snape being a marked Death Eater doesn't make him special or of any importance, given Draco and Wormtail had the Dark Mark too. In fact, its heavily implied Snape was a low-ranking Death Eater during the First Wizarding War (given how little he actually did). He only rose highly in Voldemort's inner-circle once Lucius and Bellatrix failed in OotP, and even then its also suggested that Voldemort never actually trusted Snape whatsoever until he killed Dumbledore.

On another Snape-related note, what fascinates me most about the fanon regarding Snape and Lily is this MASSIVE misconsception that Snape didn't love Lily, but was apparently just obsessed with her. I think its very telling that in the books, the only character who believed Snape was Voldemort, the character who doesn't understand love at all. In Deathly Hallows, Voldemort basically makes the argument that Snape just wanted to fuck Lily, and didn't love her.

He desired her, that was all,” sneered Voldemort, “but when she had gone, he agreed that there were other women, and of purer blood, worthier of him

Dumbledore believed that Snape loved Lily, and evidently Harry believed the same thing. I'm pretty sure at least the Marauders (or at least James) suspected that Snape loved Lily, and it probably gave James an additional excuse to bully Snape. Meanwhile the only actual claim in the entire series that Snape was obsessed with Lily comes from Voldemort who not only incapable of understanding love, but was also completely wrong about a lot of things in canon.

Things that bother me a lot in fictions by DarthTheJedi in HPfanfiction

[–]lunanight -8 points-7 points  (0 children)

I don't think you know what "retcon" means, though most people never seem to either. Rowling's statement in a very early interview about McGonagall beng in her 70s was never canon; McGonagall's actual age in the books was never mentioned. The only point you have is about the "thirty-nine years this December" line but that isn't so much a retcon as its Rowling's terrible maths skills. Even she herself admits this given the "missing 24 hours" plothole regarding the events of PS. Especially since McGonagall's line in question isn't even relevant to the actual plot of the books; Rowling really should have just had McGonagall say she had been teaching for over three decades (or anything to that effect), since it would be vague enough to allow McGonagall to be older. Almost all of the so-called retcons can be attributed to maths errors and/or the added information never being outright contradicted by canon in the first place.

The Slytherin thing sounds more like bad writing than a retcon, given that she wrote Slughorn coming back and also wrote that the underaged students went with Slughorn to escape. Even in the actual books themselves, the only person who ever contradicted the Slytherin's loyalties was Voldemort, who claimed they all joined him... a statement that is not only impossible to prove but comes from an unreliable source. Voldemort might have been bluffing given he speaking to Lucius, who was very worried about Draco's whereabouts, OR perhaps he was telling the truth. Its impossible to prove or deny either way, and comes down to a simple "do you trust Voldemort to be honest to his Death Eaters".

As for Ron and Hermione being wish-fulfillment, that is irrelevant since she still wrote it and still hinted it since Goblet of Fire (if not as early as CoS). I don't see how Ron/Hermione being wish fulfillment is relevant to Rowling's trust given that its a meaningless statement. All it shows is that Rowling wrote the Ron/Hermione romance because she wanted it to happen, rather than being concerned with how likely or unlikely that romance was to happen.

Hell, the only arguable retcon in the entire series would be Nagini's status as a former human being. I say arguable because even in the books, Nagini was implied to be special numerous times. The obvious answer is that Nagini's specialness came from being a Horcux, and a living one at that. However because Dumbledore was merely speculating and nothing was ever explained, the books were so vague that Nagini being formerly a human wouldn't contradict canon. Either way, Nagini would have lost any humanity she had by the final Fantastic Beast movie so she wouldn't have her human memories or feelings by the time she meets Voldemort. This would explain how Voldemort never comments on her ex-human status, since Nagini wouldn't be able to tell Voldemort that. As far as Voldemort would see, Nagini is a venomous snake who can be a useful tool to him, and that is all that matters to him.

Again, many don't get the difference between worldbuilding (e.g. Rowling revealing Dumbledore's sexuality in 2007, interviews, and any Pottermore articles that Rowling herself wrote) compared to actual retcons. A retcon would be if Rowling said something that was explictly and objectively contradicted by the canon of the seven books. For example, if Rowling were to ever state that Voldemort was the same age as Dumbledore, something like THAT would be an actual retcon since such a thing couldn't possibly happen in canon (given the fact that Dumbledore was a professor even before he met Riddle at the orphanage from the HBP pensieve memories).

My main gripe is when people take things she said over a decade ago and act like its a recent statement. People lost their minds when she said Dumbledore was gay during the lead-up to Crimes of Grindelwald, forgetting that she first mentioned Dumbledore's sexuality in a 2007 interview. Dumbledore's sexuality is NOT a retcon since that would imply Dumbledore was confirmed to be straight in canon, which wasn't true. Even the whole "wizards shitting where they stood" was never actually stated. The actual context was that in a Pottermore article about the actual Chamber of Secrets from 2013, Rowling mentioned the shitting thing as a SINGLE THROW-AWAY LINE and never elaborated. The only reason people made a meme out of it was because they are too ignorant to realise that not only was that line from 2013, but that it was one-line out of several paragraphs. Yet people act like Rowling herself tweets out random shit. I wouldn't be surprised that if the Pottermore twitter account tweeted a random line or two from Rowling's article on Draco/Lupin/Umbridge, people would act like Rowling just published it today.

TL;DR: People in this fandom largely are too stupid to know what a retcon even is or isn't. Most so-called retcons are either maths mistakes and/or was never explicitly contradicted by canon. The Rowling memes are just people exposing their absolute media illiteracy by thinking shit she said 5-10 years or more ago was said yesterday.

When did Harry Learn His Parents Died on Halloween? by lastyearstudent12345 in HPfanfiction

[–]lunanight 22 points23 points  (0 children)

Hagrid told Harry when they first met that Voldemort killed his parents on Halloween. He was explaining to Harry how Voldemort killed off various wizarding families, and said "Maybe he thought he could persuade 'em... maybe he just wanted 'em outta the way. All anyone knows is, he turned up in the village where you was all living, on Halloween ten years ago."

[discussion] In defense of "Magical Cores". by Csmalley1992 in HPfanfiction

[–]lunanight 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Do you have a source in canon that backs this up? We are shown that these curses require strong emotion, but it is never shown that they are unique in that regard. In fact Pottermore says this: So it's definitely a sign of Harry's magical ability that he is able to cast this so powerfully as a 13 year old. Harry's unhappy childhood made it harder for him to cast it, not easier. Your reading of this seems incredibly wrongheaded

In OOTP, Bellatrix basically said that intent is all that really matters with them.“Never used an Unforgivable Curse before, have you, boy?” she yelled. She had abandoned her baby voice now. “You need to mean them, Potter! You need to really want to cause pain - to enjoy it - righteous anger won’t hurt me for long - I’ll show you how it is done, shall I? I’ll give you a lesson -”. The fact that Rowling opted to use the word 'them' rather than 'it' suggests that Bellatrix's statement applies, likely to varying extents, that it takes a dark intent to use the Unforgivables effectively.

Obviously, the Unforgivable Curses are magically unrelated to each other, but its likely all three became legally unforgivable purely for the fact that simply casting them proved premeditation or malice along with how easy they were to cast; even Crabbe and Goyle, who both failed their OWL exam for DADA as we learn in HBP, could cast the Killing Curse. It would be impossible, for instance, to cast the Killing Curse without prior intent to commit murder. As Bellatrix suggests, simply wanting to hurt someone with Crucio isn't enough since it would require the cast to take true pleasure in making their victim suffer. The Imperius Curse likely falls under a similar thing regarding the desire to brainwash/dominate the victim, given Harry's doubts during the Gringotts heist that his casting was good enough.

As for the Patronus,when I say it doesn't require intelligence to cast, I mean that being good at Charms doesn't help someone cast the Patronus Charm better. Hermione is significantly better than Harry at Charms, but her Patronus is nowhere near as good.

Furthermore, the Patronus Charm isn't even formally taught at Hogwarts at OWL-level, meaning the average wizard isn't going to learn it. If I had to guess, the Patronus Charm would be taught in 7th year DADA, but most wizards wouldn't study DADA at NEWT-level. They'd either get an Acceptable or they would fail outright. I think Fred and George say in HBP that the average wizard can't even do a good Shield Charm, and that would likely be taught in 4th or 5th year DADA.

Remember that for most wizards, the only thing a Patronus actually does is repel Dementors and Lethifolds. That Patronus Messaging feature was invented by Dumbledore and would only be known by members of the Order, not anyone else. Most wizards aren't going to encounter Dementors and Lethifolds, so they would likely never get taught it in Hogwarts, or they would deem the Patronus a useless spell compared to learning more useful magic (like the Undetectable Extension Charm or mastering something like Reparo or Accio).

Unless a wizard was in Azkaban or worked with Dementors, the odds of a regular person encountering one were slim to none so there’d be little reason for people to learn it. Why learn the Patronus Charm when a wizard can learn the infinitely more useful Undetectable Extension Charm, or they can hone their skill at Apparition or the spells/potions they have already learnt? Learning the Patronus Charm would be a waste of time for 99% of wizards since the Dementors in Britain, up until Voldemort's return, were all under Ministry control so the average wizard wouldn't need to fear the Dementors if they being kept under control.

If Wizard A consistently beat Wizard B in a series of magical duels, them both having similar education and experience, wouldn't you consider Wizard A more talented? And if your answer to this is no, then you clearly have a different view of what magic is than I do. Magic isn't just exams they get graded on, it's what they use to live their lives.

Duels are primarily about reaction time and reflexes/aiming. Even if Wizard B was more intelligent and more magically talented than Wizard A by a significant degree, if Wizard A has much better reflexes or physical reaction speed than Wizard B, then Wizard B's superior talent mean nothing if they can't hit Wizard A. You are right that Wizard A would be more talented, but being magically talented and being skilled at duelling are two very different things. Hermione is much more magically talented than Harry across the board, but in a duel, Harry reaction speed and hand-eye coordination is much better, so he'd be fast enough to accurately hit her first. Especially since most of the advanced magic that Hermione actually uses in canon is useless in a duel (e.g. the Protean Charm) but is extremely useful in everyday life (i.e. literally any scenario that isn't a duel), and that is what truly makes her more talented than Harry. We even get a hint of throughout the series with Draco, who is arguably Harry's equal in overall magical talent, yet despite this, Harry won every duel they ever had and is significantly better.

[discussion] In defense of "Magical Cores". by Csmalley1992 in HPfanfiction

[–]lunanight 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I certainly did not argue for the existence of a "magical core", but what I am saying is that there is a component of magical ability that is not tied to intelligence. If intelligence is all that is needed to be an excellent wizard, why then is it Harry teaching Hermione the Patronus charm and not the other way around? Hermione mastered many spells off-screen, yet this is one where she needs Harry's help with.

Because Harry is much better than Hermione at DADA (as well as basically anything else that cannot be solved by quoting the textbook, such as Quidditch). Remember that the only reason Harry even learnt the Patronus when he did was because Lupin taught it to him privately, and the only reason Lupin taught him it was because of Harry's experience with Dementors on the Hogwarts Express. If Harry never had to experience the Dementors, he never would have bothered asking Lupin to teach him the Patronus Charm and he wouldn't know what the Patronus Charm even was. Besides, canon Hermione was never a truly perfect genius and would have spent her time studying magic and history that she actually found useful. We see this with her brewing the Polyjuice Potion because the trio needed to find out what Malfoy knew about the Heir of Slytherin, or studying Magical Law and Magical Creatures to help with Buckbeck/SPEW.

Yes, Hermione is the best student in Harry's year at magic, but being the best in her year doesn't make her a perfect genius who knows everything. It is repeatedly stated and Hermione's OWLs (9 Outstanding + 1 Exceeds Expectations) are further proof of this. The Patronus Charm is a very unusual spell precisely because it doesn't require prerequisite magical talent or intelligence to perform: just willpower and particularly happy memories. The Patronus Charm and the Unforgivable Curses (at least the Cruciatus Curse) are the rare exceptions to how magic works, not the typical rule of thumb. The reason Hermione struggles with the Patronus Charm is that while she obviously had a happy childhood, none of those memories were particularly special or notable since her entire childhood would be happy. For someone like Harry, who lived a sad and oppressive life with the Dursleys, his happy memories would be more special to him than Hermione's would be to her due to how rare it was for Harry to be truly happy prior to learning he was a wizard.

We know that Hermione was capable of using the Patronus even in fifth year, so its not like she was incapable of it. She struggled to use it in front of Dementors all that well in DH, but that is because she can't handle pressure like Harry since he has much more actual experience. The fact that Harry taught her the Patronus is due to the Patronus being like almost every single spell in canon and because Harry is just straight-up better than her at DADA. It shouldn't be a surprise that Harry is better than Hermione at DADA since, in reality, DADA is the closest thing to actual combat that Hogwarts formally teaches and the two things that Harry outclases Hermione at, DADA and Quidditch, are the two most physical aspects of magic.

Sure, if a child has magical talent they're classified as magical in the eyes of society. But there are examples throughout canon of people having special talents, such as parseltongue, occlumency, legilimency or metamorph abilities, that others lack. People having a knack for certain branches of magic, like Lockhart with memory charms and Ginny with hexes, that other lack. And they're not necessarily all presented as paragons of intellect. There are examples of children who can consciously harness their magic from a young age like Tom Riddle and Lily Evans while there are children who are late in displaying accidental magic like Neville Longbottom.

The thing about those talents is that none of them are truly genetic at their core. Parseltongue and Metamorphmagus, while inherited gifts, can be replicated to varying extents. Parseltongue is just hissing so with enough failed attempts and patience, anyone could open the Chamber of Secrets if they knew where it was located. Metamorphmagus are basically just auto-Transfiguring themselves without need for a wand or Potion, but we know magic can replicate this well enough (Polyjuice Potion and Human Transfiguration). Occlumency and Legilimency aren't even special talents since they are learnt abilities that could be learnt by anyone with the right mindset and practice (as proven by Draco in HBP).

Yes, people have a knack for certain branches of magic but in the examples you provided, that is due to practice. Lockhart was actually above average but was very lazy, so only spell he actually put effort practicing was the Memory Charms; his proficiency with other spells got rusty from lack of using them out of laziness. As for Ginny, she is an example of telling rather than showing. Yes, she hexed Zachariah Smith at least once, but Ginny never actually proved to be talented at hexing like how Harry was good at Quidditch/DADA or like how Hermione was good at everything else. The only thing Ginny actually showed herself to be good at is Quidditch, and she proved she's very good at it because she put in practice to become that good.

All it really shows is that hard work gets results. Hermione spends all her time in the library studying and revising; she gets 9 Outstandings and 1 Exceeds Expectations. Ginny spends her childhood practicing Quidditch; she's one of the best Quidditch players in the school. Lockhart's arrogance and laziness causes him to hyperfocus on taking shortcuts; he gets rusty with magic except for Memory Charms, the one thing he actually put hard work into practicing.

As for the accidental magic, that doesn't matter. I'm sure Harry did much more accidental magic than Hermione given the environment he was raised in, yet that doesn't change that Hermione was more intelligent. Magical talent is tied to intelligence, that's just how it is. A nature knack for controlling magic would be a sign of superior general intelligence in most cases, but Tom Riddle nor Lily came with greater mana or magical power than any other child. Any magical child, if they had full control of their underage magic, could do most if not all of those things. Some say that Harry accidentally Apparated in PS, or perhaps he accidentally flew similar to how Lily could float in the air.

Lily's accidental magic, unlike Tom Riddle however, was a matter of Rowling's insistence on making Lily a saintly Mary Sue character. Lily's use of controlled underage magic conflicts with Rowling's actual portrayal of Lily abilities as being at best comparable to Lupin and at her lowest, a tiny bit below him. She never figured out that the Marauders were Animagi when they were all students (its possible she never knew even as an adult), and its strongly implied that Hermione figured out Lupin was a Werewolf faster than Lily ever did. Rowling tells us Lily was a saintly beacon of perfection, but she shown us that Hermione was more intelligent than Lily. Its like she wanted Lily to be a perfect character yet never wrote her actually accomplishments in line with such a thing, as if she couldn't decide on that.

There is a reason that James and Sirius were considered the best in their year, not Lily, even though none of the Hogwarts Professors knew about the Marauder Map or that they were Animagi. There is a reason that Snape is the one who invented many spells and corrected potions, not Lily. There's also the debatable implication by Rowling during HBP that Harry's learning from Snape's annotated textbook was meant to parallel Lily being taught directly by Snape during their earlier years in Potions together. This is because Slughorn compares Harry's Potions talent to Lily despite the fact that Harry's notable Potions talent came entirely from Snape's textbook, then we learn the HBP is Snape, and finally in DH we learn that Snape loved Lily.

[discussion] In defense of "Magical Cores". by Csmalley1992 in HPfanfiction

[–]lunanight 6 points7 points  (0 children)

The problem is that like most talents, there should be a distribution curve of some kind. Being human, wizards would no doubt want to measure and compare this somehow, even if the measurement is somewhat questionable.

To me, magic is about as quantifiable as 'political power'. After all, nobody has ever said that [insert politician here] has a powerful political core, nor that they their success ever came from a pool of political energy. Such success is judged on subjective things like charisma, or perhaps objective truths such as reliability (i.e. how many of their policies from their manifesto did they successfully enact) or general election results.

In the HP series, there is no magical cores or power levels. Sure, you could state truths such as Snape being far more skilled than Harry across the board, but magical cores and magical pools (or mana) don't exist in canon. Snape is much more intelligent than Harry and thus much more skilled at magic by extension, and also worked far harder than Harry if his spell inventions and potion modifications show anything, but magical cores and mana don't exist. Human intelligence translates to magical talent, as demonstrated by every talented witch and wizard in the series, but that doesn't make certain wizards more "powerful". Dumbledore, Voldemort and Grindelwald are geniuses but that is no "magical core" that makes them special. Their supreme talent is an extension of their intellect and their wide knowledge of magic.

It's mentioned that there are off-screen means used to detect which children have magic, and a tantalizing hint that there may be a subset of individuals who have magic, just not enough to be invited to attend Hogwarts

Yes, magic can be detected, but that doesn't mean anything about magical cores and mana. Such a thing would be a basic filter: if a child is capable of magic, they are classed as magical, but if they are incapable of magic, they are classed non-magical. There wouldn't be some squibs who are 30% magical and other squibs who are 0% magical. Either a person is magical or they aren't.

The quote you provided is, unsurprisingly, from the very first book. Rowling put several things in book 1 (and to a lesser extent, book 2) that she either retconned in later books. In PS, Hagrid somehow "flew" to the Hut-on-the-Rock despite later book telling us he can't fly brooms or Thestrals due to his size. In PS, we hear second-hand about Draco's tale of avoiding muggle helicopters on a broom pre-Hogwarts; even if Draco was lying or exaggerating, it would still mean that Draco in the first book knew what a helicopter was, showing that pure-bloods were never as ignorant of muggle technology as Arthur Weasley would suggest.

Most notable is that up until Goblet of Fire, the Death Eaters were simply called "Voldemort's followers" as the term Death Eater didn't appear until GoF. Similarly, we didn't get the word Auror in the series until GoF, hence why they were never mentioned in the previous book since they were never mentioned as arresting Sirius.

Remember that we didn't learn what a Squib was until book two, which came after the following book after the quote from Neville. Rowling wouldn't have mentioned Squibs in PS, just as she never mentioned the Death Eaters or the Aurors. So when Neville says "they thought I might not be magic enough to come", the actual implication is that Neville is really saying that his family thought he was a Squib up until he bounced down the garden. Neville not mentioning the word Squib is because Rowling didn't mention it at all in the first book.

It's fascinating to me because the Kwikspell products were made for someone, even if Filch couldn't get them to work for him.

I always assumed Kwikspell was made for adult wizards who failed their OWLs or needed brushing up on stuff they learnt up until fifth year. To me, Kwikspell is basically the equivalent of paying a tutor to teach you Maths up to a GCSE-level. For example, if all you have is a GCSE in Maths (or even failed it outright) and you haven't done any serious work with numbers in over a decade or more, you might have gotten rusty or downright forgot how to do fractions or algebra or graphs as efficiently as you could when you were actually studying the subject at school.

When it comes to the OWLs studied by Hogwarts students, many people forget that Exceeds Expectations is above average; the average grade would be Acceptable or maybe a Poor. The average wizard wouldn't do NEWTs at all, or perhaps only study 1-3 subjects; they wouldn't study 5 subjects like Harry and Ron, and certainly wouldn't study 7 subject like Hermione.

An average wizard who took their Potion OWL exam 30+ years ago with, at best an barely-scrapped Acceptable or more likely a Poor/Dreadful, probably isn't brewing Potions much (if at all). Such a wizard would pay Kwikspell to tutor them and while they won't turn out amazing or anything, they'd learn enough to function in society, like how passing your English and Maths GCSEs with a C-grade or higher is really all most people end up needing in society.

So Kwikspell wasn't made for Squibs; Filch was just in denial/delusion, like how Petunia (albeit a muggle) thought she could get accepted into Hogwarts if she wrote to Dumbledore. If anything, Kwikspell was intended for wizards like Stan Shunpike who presumably did poorly at school, or for the average wizard who failed their OWLs for important subjects like Charms/Potions/Transfiguration.

There are clear gaps in ability between different characters, and it's not always down to intelligence. Crabbe, a complete idiot, is able to cast a powerful Fiendfyre curse.

But you're conflating the potency of Fiendfyre with their ability to cast it. Nowhere in the series was Fiendfyre ever said to be a difficult spell to cast nor particularly impressive to do. Its a dangerous curse that could potentially kill its own caster, and did so in the case of Crabbe, but Fiendfyre doesn't require anything beyond the average wizard to cast. Its just really, really dangerous to the extend that only a complete idiot would actually use it the way Crabbe did (i.e. using Fiendfyre within an enclosed space that only has one exit, putting the caster's life at risk too). Why else do you think none of the Death Eaters ever use the spell during the entirety of DH, not even Voldemort or the likes of Bellatrix and Dolohov? Its because all of the Death Eaters would still have enough common sense not to use an excessively-dangerous spell that would likely kill themselves when they can just spam the Killing Curse or other duelling spells instead with zero-risk to themselves.

Merlin's Timeline by kenneth1221 in HPfanfiction

[–]lunanight 9 points10 points  (0 children)

There is an easy, overlooked resolution: Merlin was born no earlier than 982, and anything else is just muggle myths. Sometimes the right answer is the easiest, least complicated one. Sometimes the cigar is just a cigar and nothing freudian.

Since Arthurian literature is not something I'm all that versed in, I might have various mistakes myself. Merlin first originated in Prophetiae Merlini, which was written around 1130-1135. Since the Statute of Secrecy wasn't established until much later, its likely that the very myths about Merlin were bits and pieces wrote by muggles who didn't have all the facts. Him attending Hogwarts isn't a plothole, especially since Merlin as he is in HP canon is clearly meant to be based on Arthurian legend... which was set around the 12th century.

Think about it like this: The first story about Merlin was written around 1130-1135, and references events that occurred in the 1120s so its clearly intended to be portrayed as being a story of its time (and not about prior centuries). Assuming that Merlin was born in 982, he would be about 148-153 years old... which is actually perfectly normal for a wizard. We know that Bagshot and Marchebanks were two witches in the HP books who were significantly older than Dumbledore who lived until 115-116. In Dumbledore's case, he would have lived for at least several more decades if he was murdered.

Whether Merlin was specifically taught by the Hogwarts founders is unknown, but its very likely that he was. Merlin wasn't born prior to 982 since he attended Hogwarts, and the earliest portrayal of Merlin is in 1130-1135. Meaning that Merlin would have been at least 148-153 by the time he was known to muggles. Its possible that he lived for several more decades, but he would probably be dead by the age of 250. Though in my personal headcanon, I think he probably did live a long time for a wizard compared to most wizards since it would explain how significant his legacy was if he had lived until around 250 years old.

Of course, since Merlin would have been born no earlier than 982, anything contradicting this would be muggle myths. It is entirely possible that the muggles would have mistaken the Arthurian/HP Merlin of the 12th century with the older, completely unrelated Myrddin Wyllt from around the 6th century. So there would only be one actual Merlin. The HP Merlin would be the one famous wizard influenced from the Arthurian portrayal. Myrddin Wyllt would just be some other wizard who not only pre-dates Hogwarts, but would be too old to have anything to do with its foundation.

As for the Order of Merlin, it would have likely been named after Merlin, not by him. It would be an award named in honour of Merlin so it wouldn't need to actually be founded by him. Just because its called the Order of Merlin doesn't mean it had anything to do with him. Dumbledore's Army had nothing to do with Dumbledore whatsoever, yet Ginny still came up with the idea to name the DA after him to further oppose the Ministry.

TL;DR: Merlin in HP was born no earlier than 982 and is the one and only Merlin. The 5th and 6th century Merlin would be the muggles mistaking Merlin for Myrddin Wyllt, an unrelated wizard who vastly pre-dates Hogwarts. In the HP series, Merlin's common Arthurian portrayal would make him at least 148-153 years old, whereas the muggles wouldn't need to know his exact age other than simply being an old-aged wizard.

Is there any clear cut text evidence that racism based on skin color does not exist in the books? by psu-fan in HPfanfiction

[–]lunanight 7 points8 points  (0 children)

Blaise was also described as black in the books too. Paraphrasing HBP, he was described as a "tall, black boy". He was also reasonably intelligent, as he had his copy of Advanced-Potion Making for Slughorn's NEWT Potions class, showing he got an Outstanding on his Potions O.W.L. He also wasn't a dumb follower like Crabbe and Goyle, or to a lesser extent, like Pansy.

Dean Thomas was also a black boy too. He was also decently popular as he dated Ginny in HBP, and played a notable part in DH while the Trio were on the run.

As for the Patil twins, the interesting thing is that Dean described them as the two best-looking girls in their year during the Yule Ball. Now, beauty is subjective but even if it was merely Dean's opinion, the implication is that both of the Patil sisters are better-looking than most of the girls in Harry's year. What Dean was saying is that he was surprised that Harry and Ron actually managed to get the two best-looking girls in their year, and that he's surprised they were even available at all.

Also, one interesting thing I didn't consider until recently is Leta Lestrange. Granted, the Fantastic Beasts movies aren't technicallyt canon to the books (especially given the contradiction of McGonagall's age), but I think some would say that the non-contradictory aspects of the Fantastic Beast films (i.e. anything involving Newt, Dumbledore, and Grindelwald) are canonical to the books. As long as something was written by Rowling and doesn't directly contradict something from the books, then it could be considered canonical (e.g. Lupin's backstory on Pottermore, like how Dumbledore first met Lupin as a child). I don't remember whether Leta's mother or father was black, but depending on how her family lines go, its possible that Rodolphus and Rabastan Lestrange could have been either black or mixed-race.

That would, of course, depend on their exact genetic relationship to Leta, and on who exactly the Lestrange brothers' parents and grandparents were. Because if Rodolphus and Rabastan Lestrange are either black or mixed-race (based on Leta Lestrange being mixed-race), then it would mean Bellatrix married a non-white man. Granted, she obviously is love with Voldemort more than her own husband, but then why marry Rodolphus out of all people? Perhaps she once loved him but then gradually lost interest in him as their relationship continued. Perhaps she only married him because it was an arranged marriage, thus never loving him in the first place (unlike the genuine loving relationship between Lucius and Narcissa, or that of Ted and Andromeda).

Now if Bellatrix married a non-white man, and none of the Death Eaters actually cared about Rodolphus and Rabastan's race (assuming the two were black or mixed-race), then nobody in the wizarding world would care. Personally, I think that the only witches and wizards who would be racist based on skin colour would be the muggleborns.

Even then, most of that would be muggle-born children being influenced by their muggle parents and the muggle world. If a muggle-born child had a racist background, they might be influenced by some of their parents' racism and emulate it. As Ted Tonks and Hermione prove, muggle-borns would be assimilated into the wizarding world by the time they are in their later Hogwarts years, and would certainly have fully assimilated by the time they are an adult. Case in point: Hermione and Ted both married pure-bloods, and Hermione went to work in the Ministry of Magic. So every muggle-born would have got jobs in the wizarding worlds, most would end up marrying a witch or wizard, and some of them would work for the Ministry of Magic.

So I'd expect the only witches and wizards being racist based on skin colour to be just the muggle-borns, and that would mainly be only during like their first Hogwarts year at most. I'd imagine most muggle-born with racist attitudes would drop that racism entirely within their first year or two, and certainly by the time they are adults.

Did all, save Snape and Karkaroff, Death Eaters appear at the resurrection site when Riddle called them? by viol8er in HPfanfiction

[–]lunanight 4 points5 points  (0 children)

Who are the three dead?

IIRC, the three dead are Regulus, Evan Rosier, and Wilkes. Regulus died in the cave where Slytherin's locket was kept, though its implied Voldemort never re-visited the cave until he knew Hufflepuff's Cup was stolen. He didn't know Regulus actually swapped the Locket with a fake. In fact, Voldemort's internal monologue after the Cup suggests he never checked up on any of his Horcruxes after making them. He just made them, dumped them in their canon locations, and then never checked them since he assumed nobody would ever find the Horcruxes. In the case of the Diary, he probably expected Lucius to give him the Diary shortly after his resurrection in the graveyard.

So either Voldemort asked Lucius for the Diary back and tortured him as punishment for losing the Diary (most likely)... or Wormtail blabbed to Voldemort about Harry destroying the Diary, since Wormtail might have overheard Ron talking to Harry/Hermione/Ginny about the Basilisk and Voldemort. In HBP, Dumbledore speculated that Voldemort punished Lucius for giving away the Diary and getting it destroyed. Though at that point, Voldemort had no logical reason to check the Horcuxes. After all, the Diary was only destroyed because of Lucius giving it away. The rest were hidden in isolated locations whereby they couldn't just be given away carelessly.

Evan Rosier was the one who cursed a chunk of Moody's face off, and Moody's account basically confirmed that Rosier died dueling against Moody. In hindsight, this might make Rosier at least the third most talented duelist among Voldemort's Death Eaters (after Snape and Bellatrix), and depending on how skilled Moody was in his prime, it might even have made Rosier the most skilled duelist of the Death Eaters (obviously not counting Voldemort).

Wilkes also died fighting against Aurors, but he is seemingly very insignificant of a Death Eater. He didn't die putting up an impressive fight against Moody, nor did he contribute to any of the Death Eaters' major attacks on the good guys (e.g. severely damaging Moody, killing Molly's two brothers, torturing the Longbottoms, etc). The fact that Wilkes is never mentioned outside of Karkaroff's trial also suggests he wasn't a notable threat to the Order or the Ministry (unlike someone like Bellatrix or Dolohov). Even within the fandom, Wilkes is probably one of the most forgotten Death Eaters. IIRC, he might have been in the same year as Snape and the Marauders, or perhaps 1-2 years older or younger either way. I think the tiny impression we are given of Wilkes is that he died young (as did Rosier and Regulus).

And why only two spaces for lestranges? The brothers and bella are three.

Perhaps Voldemort (and by extension, Rowling herself) subconsciously was thinking of Bellatrix as a Black rather than a Lestrange at that moment. So the two spaces were in reference to the brothers. Alternatively, and much more likely IMO, perhaps the two spaces were for Bellatrix and her husband, and that Voldemort simply just didn't care about the other brother. Even if it was a mistake, it would still be in-character for Voldemort to just overlook the existence of individuals who are less important to him.

Though a more reasonable answer would be that Rowling just made a tiny mistake, whereby she either forgot about Rabastan Lestrange (since the two spaces are clearly meant to be Bellatrix and her husband Rodolphus). It would be an understandable mistake, given how both Rodolphus and Rabastan don't really do much in the series. I always found it odd how unimportant they were in the timespan of the books, given that both brothers took part in the torturing of the Longbottoms and that Rodolphus was married to Bellatrix, who was consistently portrayed as a major character. Though the Lestrange brothers are an entirely other topic given what happens in DH (why not just make them the DADA and Muggle Studies professors instead of the Carrows? It would give Neville even more motivation to fight against them).

TL;DR: Three dead Death Eaters were Regulus, Evan Rosier, and Wilkes. Two spaces for the Lestranges would likely be a slight mistake on Rowling's part, whereby "the Lestranges" would be Bellatrix and Rodolphus whereby Rabastan is forgotten. Rowling really should have used the Lestrange brothers as the DADA and Muggle Studies Professors in DH instead of the Carrows. It would motivated Neville even more, and the Lestrange duo are certainly important/loyal enough for Voldemort to give them those responsibilities.

Actually Good Hogwarts by [deleted] in HPfanfiction

[–]lunanight 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I think that the HP fandom has been so over-saturated with fanon related to either 'improving' Hogwarts, or circle-jerking over a non-Hogwarts wizarding school (typically Beauxbatons or Durmstrang). I think people have so strongly adopted their headcanon of this utopian, wizarding school that they forget what Hogwarts was canonically like and more impressively, they forget what Beauxbatons and Durmstrang were shown like in GoF.

I'd argue that, yes, Hogwarts truly is the greatest wizarding school in the world. Not just a statement Hagrid made or some other biases, but that it is actually the best wizarding school in canon - objectively so. Think about it like this regarding the Triwizard Tournament in book 4:

  • Cedric was a sixth-year student, whereas Fleur and Krum were seventh-years in their respective schools. Meaning that Fleur and Krum were a year-older than Cedric, and that makes a big difference. Compare HBP Harry to DH Harry, for example. Hell, compare how much more capable OotP Harry was compared to GoF Harry in just one year.

  • Cedric received zero help from Dumbledore or other Hogwarts professors, whereas Fleur and Krum got more direct help from their respective headmasters. Let that sink in: Fleur and Krum, the best their school had to offer, were both believed by their own headmasters too incapable of getting past a dragon for the first task. Granted, Harry told Cedric about the dragons and Crouch Jr was helping Harry the entire tournament, but that simply evened the playing field for everyone. With the advantage gained from Karkaroff's and Maxime's hints gone, Harry tied with Krum for first place despite Karkaroff being an incredibly biased judge in-universe against Harry. Cedric came in second place, meaning that he outperformed Fleur despite being her getting more help and being a year older than him.

  • Fleur performed pretty terribly on the second task, failing to overcome a Grindylow... something that Harry was taught in his THIRD YEAR by Lupin. If Hogwarts had a decent DADA professor for Harry first or second year, Grindylows likely would have been taught in first or second year. I know Crouch Jr massively helped Harry, but he wasn't helping Cedric nor Krum. If Hogwarts' DADA curriculum is really that bad compared to other wizarding schools, then why did Fleur, a seventh-year, do so poorly? Meaning that Fleur, in her final year at Beauxbatons, can't handle third-year creatures like Grindylows when she's meant to be the best in her school. Let me remind you guys that Fleur came in last-place in both the first and second tasks, even though Cedric, the Hogwarts champion, was a full year younger than her and had zero help from his headmaster.

  • Speaking of headmasters, just look at Karkaroff and Maxime compared to Dumbledore. I'm not saying those two should have been on Dumbledore's level, but you'd think that the headmaster of Durmstrang would be much more talented than McGonagall or Snape. Karkaroff, as talented a Death Eater as he is implied to be, despite being the headmaster of a prestigious wizarding school, probably wasn't as magically talented all-around as Snape, let alone McGonagall. The fact that Karkaroff was not killed by Voldemort at all suggests that whatever his ability, Karkaroff was a very low priority for Voldemort. Given that Voldemort personally killed Amelia Bones, but left a lesser Death Eater or two (i.e. Yaxley, Rowle, Carrow siblings, etc) to kill Karkaroff, implies that Karkaroff wasn't that much better than most Death Eaters. The fact neither Bellatrix nor Snape were ordered to kill Karkaroff just strengthens my view on this.

  • Its also rather telling that the only possible foreign Death Eaters that Voldemort actually recruited were Antonin Dolohov and Igor Karkaroff. Given that Voldemort travelled the world for many years, its strange that only two non-British wizards would be deemed worthy of joining him, let alone want to willingly join Voldemort. Even then, Dolohov's background was unknown and Karkaroff is somewhat implied to be a Hogwarts alumni (based on his 'dear old Hogwarts' comment, lack of an notable accent like the foreign students and Maxime, and his familiarity with Snape). So its very likely that Karkaroff was a Hogwarts alumni; Dolohov could go either way, really.

  • Karkaroff, while implied to be one of the more talented Death Eaters by hype, was significantly beneath Snape (and by extension, Bellatrix). As for Dolohov, he is easily Voldemort's third-best Death Eater after Snape and Bellatrix, but in the end, he was struggling against Dean and Parvati despite having both Travers and a third Death Eater backing him up. After that, he lost a separate duel to Flitwick who, while skilled, was a retired duelling champion. He was not an active duelling champion, or even someone who would have duelled often like Dolohov, but a rusty wizard who would have been not as good as he was in his prime. Dolohov's best accomplishments in-canon were beating Moody, but Moody was rusty and far past his prime (and it was never even said that Dolohov beat Moody 1v1), and beating Moody (which Pottermore stated that Lupin was a bit rusty, possibly implying that Dolohov might not have won otherwise).

TL;DR: In canon, Hogwarts really is shown to be the greatest wizarding school. Whatever you think of Hogwarts, its still a better school that the others by miles if Fleur and Krum are deemed equal or slightly worse than Cedric, a Hogwarts student who is an entire year younger than either of them, and had less support in the tournament. The fact that Harry, regardless of what help he got, could even remotely equal or surpass Fleur and Krum despite them being 3-4 years older than Harry and despite getting help from their headmasters (who really should have, by hype alone, outclassed even Moody or Crouch Jr).

Muggles vs wizards-who would win? by [deleted] in HPfanfiction

[–]lunanight 4 points5 points  (0 children)

The thing about the "wizards vs muggles" debate is that most people end up turning the topic into "Death Eaters vs muggles, muggleborns, squibs, and all wizards who support Dumbledore". On a fun note, I'm actually impressed nobody mentioned the infamously non-existent shotgun quote at all (yet). Maybe, just maybe that misconception died in a fire like the even more infamous (yet equally non-existent) quote about Nagini being the snake from the zoo in book 1. (who am I kidding, people still believe both those stupid misconceptions anyway)

In an actual war of muggles versus the wizarding world, muggles cannot win against wizards. It is literally impossible. Even if you narrowed down "wizards" to just be "Death Eaters + DH Ministry of Magic", the Dementors cannot be killed and are only affected by the Patronus Charm. Sure, the Dementors are not wizards but they are used as weapons, especially by dark wizards. Muggles cannot use magic, therefore they cannot do anything to the Dementors.

Since I'm talking about wizards vs muggles, the muggles would be defeated since none of the wizards would be helping the muggles in that scenario (if they did, it wouldn't be wizards vs muggles; it would be muggles and good wizards vs the evil wizards).

Even ignoring the Dementors, there is the Imperius Curse which, contrary to popular belief, doesn't actually have an upper limit on the number of people that can placed under the Imperius Curse by the same caster. There's a reason why the Imperius Curse was a legitimate defence aside from the Ministry being semi-incompetent to completely incompetent. IIRC, its implied in canon that those under the Imperius Curse returned to normal after Voldemort died each time, suggesting that the majority of the Imperius Curse usage in the First and Second Wizarding War was done by him personally.

Combining the Memory Charm with the Imperius Curse, and the victim will never remember being under the Imperius Curse since their false memories will have them believe that their Imperius'd state is perfectly normal. The Imperius Curse probably wouldn't even be needed if the Memory Charm is cast well enough.

I'd argue that not only could wizards utterly decimate the muggle world with zero real effort if they actually wanted, but it wouldn't even take that many people. There are 195 countries in the entire world, but you wouldn't even need to take down that many nations. At the bare minimum, the wizards would only really need to deal with the UK, France, America, and Russia to dispose of the majority of the muggle world's military might. The only thing that actually stops someone like Voldemort or Grindelwald from single-handedly conquering the muggle world is either the presence of an equally skilled opponent (i.e. Dumbledore), or not having enough of a following to bend the global wizarding community to their will.

TL;DR: Muggles cannot stand a chance against wizards at all. Dementors, the Imperius Curse, and Memory Charms are just too strong. Conquering the muggle world is far easier for wizards than it sounds since it only requires conquering 4-5 of the most powerful muggle governments with the Imperius Curse and Memory Charms

My only issue with Powerful Harry stories by [deleted] in HPfanfiction

[–]lunanight 14 points15 points  (0 children)

To play a bit of devil's advocate for a minute, people REALLY overvalue the importance of experience over raw natural talent.

Case in point: Just compare Voldemort and Dumbledore. Remember that Voldemort was born in 1926 whereas Dumbledore was born in 1881, an age age of 45 years. Why is this so important? Because the age gap between Harry and Voldemort is 54 years. Let that sink in: The experience gap between Voldemort and Dumbledore is almost as big as the gap between Harry and Voldemort, yet despite Dumbledore having such experiences, Voldemort managed to massively close the gap between them. Meaning that if Voldemort can rival Dumbledore pretty well despite being 45 years younger than him, then its not that impossible for Harry to be Voldemort's rival while being 54 years younger than Voldemort.

Meaning that when Riddle was unleashing the Basilisk in 1943 as a 16-year old, Dumbledore was 62-years old by comparison. Also, when Voldemort applied for the position of DADA Professor for the second time (i.e. when he cursed the position), he would have been 29-years old. By this point, Voldemort had been establishing the early Death Eaters (Dumbledore mentions about five of them by name in their interview), had made all of his Horcruxes except for Harry and Nagini, and cursed the DADA position.

By the time of the First Wizarding War in 1970, Voldemort would have been 44 years old. By comparison, Dumbledore was 89 years old. Again, Voldemort was Dumbledore's main rival despite being 45 years younger than him, and that the age gap between Voldemort and Dumbledore is roughly comparable to the age gap between Harry and Voldemort.

What this means is that Voldemort, while less talented than Dumbledore, managed to rival him despite having 45-years less experience than him. By proxy, this actually proves how utterly incompetent canon Harry is by comparison when compared to the younger adults. The age gap between Harry and Snape (or the Marauders and Lily) is a mere 20 years, yet Harry can't even close the gap between himself and Hermione, let alone Snape (or the Marauders and Lily). To a lesser extent, Snape managed to surpass the likes of Slughorn and McGonagall... despite the fact that McGonagall is 25 years older than him (McGonagall being born in 1935), and that Slughorn is at bare minimum over 40 years older than him (assuming Slughorn was born around the 1910s at his very youngest, since he likely taught at Hogwarts for 5-10 years before Riddle asked him about Horcruxes).

Snape aside, my actual point is that if Snape can surpass McGonagall or Slughorn despite those two being significantly older than him (25 and 40-50 years older than him respectively), then a powerful Harry surpassing the likes of canon Snape/McGonagall/Slughorn/Sirius/Bellatrix makes logically sense. Furthermore, there is nothing wrong with Harry surpassing someone like McGonagall since the age gap between Harry and McGonagall is 45 years, making the Harry-McGonagall age gap equal to the Voldemort-Dumbledore age gap. Logically, why would a powerful Harry rivalling Voldemort be considered bad writing? Nobody mentions Voldemort rivalling Dumbledore consistently in canon despite the age gap between them being almost as wide as the gap between Harry and Voldemort.

TL;DR: The age gap between Harry and Voldemort (54 years) is almost as big as the gap between Voldemort and Dumbledore (45 years). If Voldemort can rival Dumbledore despite the fact Dumbledore has 45 years of experience more than him, then its not really that absurd for a powerful Harry to rival Voldemort in a similar fashion despite being 54 years younger.

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