How do you find the idea of Harry hiring a tutor? The bare bones premise of my story is that Harry is not in Britain; rather he is spending time on the continent, around the Mediterranean, Middle East, North Africa etc, so learning from the horcruxes is out because he has no knowledge of them.

I guess I picture it like Snapes lessons, just without the animosity and personal baggage. So it would still be hard, and he couldn't just drop 1000 galleons and learn to be a master in a few weeks.

Sidebar, how much should Occlumency lessons actually cost if you had to pay out of pocket?

 

The real cost of being taught Occlumency by a paid tutor would be exposing his mind to that person, and that their mind might be exposed to him. It seems like the only people who have learned Occlumency in canon (to the point that they can teach it) are untrustworthy at best.

If you're going to 'outsource' it, Harry should lose something valuable that he wasn't aware he'd be risking - like the tutor insists that Harry bring them into the Chamber of Secrets to recover the Basilisk remains, or Harry discovers at the end of the last lesson that his Cloak of Invisibility was taken while he was collecting that last sack of coins.

[Or maybe, because he learned Occlumency he wasn't aware of Nagini attacking Arthur Weasley on guard duty and thus Arthur dies]

 

Plotting out a flight of fancy fic, at least for the moment. The idea is that it's a 7th year redo fic, or I guess an 8th year fic, depending on how you look at it. Honestly, I know they exist, but it's been forever since I've actually read one, and I don't think I've read one that wasn't Harry/Ginny. So two questions:

one - who would make the best new DADA teacher? Perhaps not necessarily the best, but the most competent. Honestly, I don't really know who is usually picked for this kind of thing, since it's been a really long time since I read this kind of fic. But, the first person that comes to mind is Bill Weasley. He works in a specialized DADA field, that of cursebreaking and did so for like 10 years, so he knows his shit. He was Head Boy, so he knows the system. He's young enough to connect with the students and he was there at the battle of Hogwarts. Being a teacher would keep him closer to his wife, especially if he plans to start a family, instead of being in egypt for long periods of time. The only con i can think of is that he doesn't have any teaching experience, but going by previous canon, I'm not sure how much that matters. I will also say that the Aurors are likely far too busy to be able to spare even a single one to teach, especially if their loyalties are uncertain.

two - how should I actually handle retaking classes? The logical thing for me is to just have all the teachers be super accommodating. But obviously, the last year of schooling was ranged from non-existent, to barely adequate. So there is an argument to be made to just have everyone redo the year. Not really fair to be forced into that, so perhaps it could be optional. But, on the other hand, society as a whole should be understanding of it considering the circumstances, and they could just accept that they will be in the history books for the first 8th year class(es). Another option is to just try and play catchup. The teachers are going to be super busy as is, but every single year could have a new curriculum made specifically to help catch everyone up on what was missed the previous year, while still teaching the current year stuff. For early years, it could even be spread out over multiple years. There's a few things I'm trying to accomplish. First, I don't want there to be a massive first year (incoming first years combined with the first years that should be second years). Secondly, I don't want Ginny and Harry to end up in the same year and taking classes together. Thirdly, of course, I want Daphne in the story, and there needs to be a plausible reason for her (and potentially others who werent targeted by the Callows) to want to retake their final year. If retaking a year is optional, very few people will actually chose it as opposed to some catch-up tutoring. And, if they don't plan on taking NEWTS, some students should just be allowed to graduate with an incomplete final year, given the circumstances.

Thoughts? Am I overthinking it? I've already got Daphne's (and Harry's) character more-or-less mapped out in my mind, but making the world fit around the circumstances is like a giant puzzle. Everything needs to make sense.

 

If you don’t want to use an Auror or go with the most prominent/obvious choice in Bill, I’d say Hestia Jones is a possibility as DADA teacher. She’s an order member, was part of the 5th year escort and helped to transfer the Dursleys away from Privet Drive, so she’s presumably somewhat competent at the very least.

As far as excuses to bring everyone back for an extra year of schooling go, my solution would be to just make attendance mandatory for OWL and NEWT qualification at the end of the year, and make everyone retake their classes as well – it could be Ministry policy, one of Minister Shacklebolt’s first major controversies, and hark back to the lingering question of Minostry influence over Hogwarts affairs. Spread out the curriculum, give everyone time to review what they learned in the previous year and, towards the spring, introduce topics for the 7th-years that perhaps wouldn’t have been taught in previous years for a lack of time. Special charms, advanced human transfiguration, something like that.

 

I think the simplest thing would be to say that everyone in Harry's year never took the NEWT and the material that was being presented to them by the fraudulently installed Death Eaters didn't reflect what was on the Ministry test. Hogwarts simply grows a bit to accommodate the extra year of students, though obviously a few things would be off balance and it's not easy for the same amount of teachers to be teaching more people, especially not with some amount of conflict between the students still brewing.

 

NEWTs were definitely my first thought. But, I don't think there's an actual requirement that you need to attend Hogwarts in order to take them. I'm not sure how typical English schooling works in that regards, like, what about homeschooled kids? Anyways, the point is that given the choice to retake a whole year (a year in which you actually attended school and weren't persecuted), or get a few months worth of tutoring to fill in all the gaps, taking an extra year seems a bit weird. Or maybe I'm just overthinking it. It's Hogwarts after all - who wouldn't want to go for as long as possible?

 

It's true that the NEWTs and OWLs weren't given during Snape's headmastership. The Battle of Hogwarts was in May and little of the school was left afterwards to continue classes.

In that situation, I could see McGonagall arranging for returning 8th years to be sharing classes with 6th and 7th years or performing independent studies to prep for a special pre-Yule exam. The 8th years may also be shanghai'd into helping the ongoing efforts to rebuild the castle, leading to sneaky sorts trying to include their own back doors or searching for special items among the wreckage that would 'never be recovered'.

I'd probably have the 8th years build and occupy an offsite dorm in Hogsmeade to keep them separate from the traditional final year students.

 

I will start by saying that this story hasn't actually left the planning stages yet. Not sure if it ever will, but that doesn't mean it's not worth thinking about.

The idea I'm leaning towards is that retaking the year is completely voluntary. Some students might opt for private tutoring at a later date, some might retake the year immediately, some might just say fuck it. I am leaning towards the idea of it being more of an "8th year" thing, so they still wouldn't be taking courses with the previous year, yet their actual classes would be more of a year 7.5 than 8, so it redoes some of what they learned while also going over new material not necessarily in the 7th year curriculum. Anyways, the idea is the Harry chooses to go back to school. And since it's his choice, it would be kinda weird for Bill to just go easy on him, since why would Harry bother going back if he didn't actually learn anything. I think Harry would be the type of person to think that all because he killed the Dark Lord doesn't mean he's actually qualified to do anything, though others might thing otherwise.

As for who actually takes the 8th year, I've got a rough idea. I'm picturing a lot of muggleborns and others who simply did not attend Hogwarts during that year. How many muggleborns there actually are is a whole different argument, as we only see a handful actually named in canon. There's also Hannah Abbott, who left in 6th year and didn't return until the Battle of Hogwarts. I assume there's others like that. Only a handful of Slytherins - I imagine there has to be some sort of vetting process, or investigation (and to be fair, I wouldn't just aim it at them). Neville should be there as well. Overall, I think it's going to be a fairly small amount of people who take the 8th year. I tentatively have Ron and Hermione not going. The cliche is to send them off to Australia to find her parents after several months of funerals and volunteering to help rebuild Hogwarts, and I think that works here. Also, Harry going back to school means he has a ready-made excuse for not being paraded around ministry events and such once it starts, and I suspect he did a lot of those during the summer when he wasn't attending funerals or trials.

Anyways, the story is not so much about going to class and learning. It's about dealing with the aftermath of the battle, and Harry trying to figure out his place in life, now that he has a future. He's adrift. People are still trying to saddle him with more responsibility that he doesn't want. He can make a difference, but he hates how it has to be him. He's seen the failure of the Ministry first hand, and doesn't want to just become another cog in that.

Ultimately, the 8th year is just a setup to the actual story, and that's Harry reviving the old tradition of travelling the world post-Hogwarts.

 

I've run into a complete dead end on one of my stories, so here goes. The story's In Cold Blood and I'll start with a quick summary for those who need it. Obviously, spoilers ahead.

In book four, Summer Knight, Dresden thinks to call for Titania when Aurora lays dying. As a result, Titania saves her daughter and realises what's wrong with her. Consequently, so does Mab. Maeve's purged of Nemesis. Time passes and one day Dresden finds Mab and Maeve in his apartment and they've a job for him. He's asked to go to a little town called Innsmouth and with Maeve investigate what's going on there. They've vague rapports, but nothing certain, so off they go.

The place has a Midsommer Murders kind of a vibe and everyone's super friendly. Dresden eventually learns of a couple whose child have gone missing, which is the first warning bell. Maeve later learns of a group of college students who are back in town to celebrate the memory of one of their friends who they think drowned there. Skulking about, Dresden and Maeve find a group of people in hoods and cowls, having a spooky meeting, but before they can find out who they are, someone approaches and they're forced to book it out of there.

All along, there are mentions of an upcoming harvest festival. Oh, and some of the villagers are subtly trying to persuade Maeve and Dresden that the town may be a nice place to stay.

***

Now, what is happening here is that several of the central OCs are have lived in the village for a long time and yet have not aged. They're trading in sacrifices for eternal life. The missing kid and the supposed drowned college student are both such sacrifices, given to a Naga (I think that's what I was going with, but at this point that's not super important.)

The problem I run into is as follows: How do I have Dresden and Maeve clue into the cult, who they're taking, why, etc

I had Dresden follow Maeve, suspecting she may be up to something, and they find those cult dudes in robes, which was meant to establish that there was a spooky group doing something. The main problem with this is: How the hell did Maeve know this group was gathering?

The goal is to tie this all into the reveal where there's not just one person (again this is sorta undermined by the dudes in robes) whodunnit, but everyone's frickin' dunnit. The cute old lady whose hotel you've been staying at, who you thought was frail friendly? Yeah, she's going to jump over the counter and charge at you. The idea for the climax was a mad dash out of the city, followed by a regrouping and then killing shit.

I'm not sure if any of this made any sense. It barely makes sense to me. If anyone has any idea on how to fix it all smoothly, that'd be awesome. I'm perfectly happy to kill a few darlings to make it work.

 

Thanks. They're all old people, so any sporting would be extra gross... And yeah, you wouldn't like this story, I think. Maeve does go pretty hard on the seduction, which may be in character but which also kind of distracts and detracts from actual plot.

I suppose she could've run into them by pure coincidence, but even in a village that small it feels a tad contrived. I may just be better of cutting that part out of the story entirely in the end.

 

Maeve is the Lady of the winter court, and you could draw parallels between the locals extending their lives unnaturally, and the way preservation is tied to winter. Maybe it’s something that’s been nagging her since she came in, and she hasn’t been able to put her finger on it. The anticipation from the meeting stirs at the edge of her perception, and she goes looking for something- she’s not sure what.

She runs into something that defies her- isn’t that what preservation is used for? Food being preserved to endure through winter, and she catches a bit of that preservation feeling. But this time it’s not the feeling of wholesome victorious preparation against the oncoming storm, but instead a desperate grasp at preserving life at a cost that harms the soul.

And what she senses is that wrongness. It’s not an Outsider, but ever since then she’s taken that sort of wrongness personally, and goes to hunt it down.

Hope it helps, or at least sets the ball rolling.

 

So I've had this rough concept of an idea for years and years, and think it's finally time for me to take a shot at actually writing it.

Basically it'd be a Sixth Year retelling/AU with a heavy Arthurian Theme. Though don't worry I don't intend for Harry to become the Once and Future King who can kick Liz's arse off the throne whenever he wants. Anyways as I start to plan a little more I'm running into what I think off as the "Hogwarts problem". A lot of my ideas seem to work better outside of the Castle but I don't know how to get Harry (and others) away logically.

Then I thought about going to back to my original original version of idea which featured Azkaban!Harry after the confrontation between Umbridge, Fudge and Dumbledore in OotP, he's arrested as a co-conspirator. But then I started to wonder why Voldemort wouldn't just have someone taken him to the Hall of prophecy while he was in Ministry custody. Perhaps he wouldn't be that logical in canon, but I'd like him a bit more competent.

So Yeah I'm feel a little stuck here.

 

If you're trying to get him out of the castle, you could blow it up or something. Does Hogwarts need to continue to exist for the plot or the characters?

 

I think @Andrela once mentioned that if Hermione wasn't around, Ron and Harry would've had to start working harder on their own. That's been on my mind for a while. I also want a story where Ron is more fleshed out. I was thinking of a year 2 divergence, but I'm not sure how far reaching the consequences of Hermione dying are.

Key differences:

a) Voldemort never made horcruxes.
b) the diary was just a "shade".
c) in year two, instead of petrifying her, the Basilisk's gaze kills Hermione
d) Dumbledore is ousted as headmaster, and Minerva takes over. With Dumbledore out of the way, Malfoy Sr. pulls some strings, and some of his less than savory friends become teachers. The class name remains DADA, but the content has a decidedly offensive and dark arts tilt, History of Magic has a very pureblood bias, and Gryffindor certainly doesn't win the house cup as often.
e) Harry is determined to avenge Hermione, and the events in the Chamber play out more or less the same way they did in canon, with Lockhart getting obliviated. However, Ron manages to make it through with Harry and helps out. They save Ginny, and the Weasleys still go to Egypt, and Sirius escapes.

With Voldemort not constantly breathing down his neck, Harry and Ron have a somewhat normal Hogwarts experience. Hermione isn't around to help, so they slowly start taking their studies more seriously. They certainly don't take both Runes and Arithmancy, but they also don't take the path of least resistance like they do in canon. I also want to feature magical creatures in this. I definitely don't want to be writing 100k words of training montage, so I was thinking of starting the story somewhere in year 4 or 6.

Now there's a few problems. If Dumbledore's ousted, what's he up to? To sidestep that issue, I was also considering having Dumbledore go on a horcrux hunt (then ignore points a and b) after he's ousted, and then he dies some time after destroying the last horcrux, leaving Harry to take care of the rest of the problem.

Where's the source of conflict, if Voldemort isn't around? There's been a lot of stories focusing on the defeat of Voldemort, but there's often the argument made that he's got decades of experience on Harry, and instead of coming up with a reason to power up Harry, I figure I'd get rid of Voldemort, and introduce another, more down-to-earth threat. If he'd truly been gone for good, would Lucius and some of the other Death Eaters be the main threat? What's their goal/purpose?

I haven't been able to think past this in over a year, but then I don't know how to plot. So I figured I'd post this here.

 

There's plenty of ways to get Harry and Co out of the castle, though without knowing the thematic goals and background narrative for what you're aiming for, it's hard to give good recommendations. Right off the top of my head, some options are:

1. The Ministry decides to close Hogwarts as it's too tempting a target for Voldemort.
   
2. Harry's car in the Hogwarts Express gets magically yoinked on the way to school, maybe Voldemort attacks and an emergency portkey charm on the car kicks in
   
3. Harry and friends walk into the Room of Requirement early in the year and are transported off somewhere
4. Fawkes, being somehow connected to Arthurian legend, swoops in out of nowhere and brings Harry and friends where they need to be
5. The black lake is connected to Nimue in some fashion and they get pulled in only to climb out at the shores of the lake of legend
6. During the summer, Harry gets a mysterious visitor, much like Dobby before second year, and the meeting drives him to investigate and they get trapped away from Kings' Cross and all that
7. Dumbledore decides to bring Harry and friends with him as they all go Horcrux hunting/training instead of trying to let Harry finish his childhood "normally"
8. Dumbledore comes clean/Harry figures out the whole Horcrux thing earlier than cannon and so Harry gets the band together and they set off to find the things immediately instead of waiting for the next year
9. Voldemort straight up besieges the castle and the students are forced to flee it

Etc, etc.

I could go on, but hopefully one of these sparks some ideas. Feel free to pm me if you want to brainstorm some other possibilities.

 

Whenever I've thought of writing fanfiction, I've always hit a roadblock with the issue of the skill discrepancy between Harry and Voldemort, and finding a reason to have Harry vanquish the Dark Lord, and not Dumbledore, like he did Grindelwald. Now, with a year 2 point of divergence, if Dumbledore dies after getting ousted from Hogwarts, then Harry is completely fucked. How is he even gonna figure out what a horcrux is? That could make for an interesting story. And if Dumbledore lives, then why can't he get rid of Voldemort?

There many stories with that status quo, and many of them lose steam as things get more interesting. When I read canon, I remember feeling disappointed that Harry never really fought the Death Eaters. There are so many stories where Harry trains and then starts fighting the death eaters, but most of them end somewhere around there. I've never written a complete story, and I want to write something that's 50k-75k words that ends with Harry killing Tom. So, I was thinking of an earlier point of divergence.

Lily having explored weird sacrificial magic is what saves Harry. What if instead, her sacrifice saves both Harry and James? When Voldemort casts the killing curse, Lily dies but like in canon, weird stuff happens and Voldemort dies too. He's not a weird wraith or anything, but his horcruxes are still around. He entrusted them to Lucius and Bellatrix, I imagine, to possess them and slowly resurrect himself in the unlikely event of his death.

At any rate, Harry isn't a horcrux, and neither is he the boy who lived. James raises him, and he has a relatively normal childhood. He goes to Hogwarts, gets sorted in Gryffindor, and loves flying. While he takes after his father and Sirius to some extent, Harry tries really hard to find any kind of connection to his late mother. So, he cares about school a bit more than canon!Harry did, but more for the sake of learning magic than grades, and quits the quidditch team a lot earlier than in canon. No reason to make a hobby into something he *has* to do.

Snape and the Potters don't have the easiest of relationships, but with James around, Harry has someone to support him when he stands up to Snape's bullying. Harry doesn't know that James and his friends are chummy with Snape, and that they all mess with a bit of dark magic. Think BajaB's Dark Marauders, and Shinysavage's Dumbledore who obliviates when necessary. Harry only finds out later, and that's basically an excuse to have Harry do some cool stuff.

After OWLs, Harry studies for NEWTs in Transfiguration, Defense, and Charms. In his spare time, he chills with Ron, and pines for Tracey Davis when he really should be focusing on his girlfriend, Katie Bell, but it's tough to date someone who's just left Hogwarts. The romance won't really be a part of the story, but it's just there to show Harry's had a regular life so far. Other than his mum dying, nothing bad ever happened to him. He does well in school, he has hobbies, and he has a decent social life. Remus teaches DADA on and off, on account of the curse on the position, his lycanthropy, and his general lack of reliability. Sirius and James are aurors, but Amelia Bones is still head of the DMLE.

In year six, Peter Pettigrew, the Lestranges, and the rest of the Death Eaters escapes from Azkaban, and Dumbledore reforms the Order, but there isn't much for them to do. There's a few isolated incidents of muggle baiting, but not much else. However, they know that it's only a matter of time before Voldemort comes back. At some point in 1997, somewhere in the Albanian forests, Bellatrix forces Pettigrew to drink unicorn blood from Hufflepuff's Cup, and through his death, a young-ish Voldemort rises, kinda like how the diary would have resurrected a 16 year old Tom. This Voldemort is still very powerful, but not as powerful as endgame Voldemort, and this Harry has more of a chance to fight him, what with most of the Marauders being around, and Dumbledore being here to help too.

Chapter One of the story would be the summer before Harry's seventh year, and when he's shopping for stuff in Diagon Alley, there's the first Death Eater attack in decades, and Voldemort shows up. Chapter Two, he goes to Hogwarts, but Voldemort isn't breathing down his neck. He's busy doing Voldemort stuff, trying to take down the Ministry, and scaring people. Maybe Voldemort figured the muggleborn witch was his downfall, or maybe it was believing in a stupid prophecy. But that doesn't mean Harry won't take the fight to him. That's about as much as I've got so far. I'm not really sure about the specifics, but I know I want to write a story about Harry and his friends being directly involved in the war against Voldemort, like his parents were in the 70s. I guess that's where I'm stuck...any ideas or interest even, in something like this?