I mean the canon relationship also makes no sense why is Snape's mother who has magic in an abusive relationship with a muggle? At least this has a reason to explain how and why this became abusive.

 

Fair point, at least its an explanation compared to what canon gives.

I just realised another thing that bothered me reading it. Usually he's very careful and precise about this wording, and doesn't tend to have typos because he relies on the precision of his wording for foreshadowing:

Spoiler

When Harry is talking to Lucius, Malfoy says

"Do you indeed? Like most of our peers in the Wizengamot, I have no love at all for the outcast, but my disdain is so great that it would prevent me from aiding him if an important ally asked me to...and the price were right." Lucius then goes on to accept Harry's price and help Theo.

So either it was a mistype, or its a clue that Lucius didn't want to help Harry and something happened off screen that made him do it.

 

I'd assume it's a typo. Fairly certain his Occlumency is good enough to at least dull the Sanction.

 

This wouldn't work in canon PoS actually as too many people know the secret already and as a result the secret would break instantly.

 

Ahh but what if Dumbledore used his reshape reality spell to do it with his uberwand?

And that's Sesc's point. Introducing a spell that we see has completely altered everyone's memories and personal belongings like textbooks, on something like Luna and her creatures (without effecting Luna herself somehow but we'll ignore that), without setting any limit beyond 'you die if you cast it' means that any and all of the conflict of the story does have an out. If Dumbledore decided to tomorrow, he could set things up, do the God Spell to wipe out anyone who considers themself loyal to Voldemort, and die happy knowing that Voldemort wont be an issue. In absence of a counter to this, which we have no reason to beleive exists, it lessens the conflict and fucks with the power-level of everyone.

The magic he introduces is continually undercutting the stakes of the story. This goes back to why I had a big issue with the time turner, in that Scrimgeour's death goes from one that Harry was responsible for, if indirectly, and he has to weigh the consequences of his actions accordingly, to one where it had to happen because time is a bitch yo but at least we dont have a warewolf apocalypse. The implication of his Time Turner working the way it does is that nothing ever horrific will happen, because the time turner will stop it by sending someone else back. The implication of the God Spell is that all it would take is one desperate person to cast it and it's instantaneous victory for one side over the other, unless its the wrong side and considered too bad by the time turner of course.

You cant think about the bullshit spells too deeply or it destroys any tension in the story.

 

Ah the Imago Dei you could try but per the author: Because Imago Dei is quasi-sentient and has a mean sense of humor when invoked improperly. Someone asked me in a review why someone didn't just use ID to wish Voldemort dead. I responded by directing them to On A Pale Horse, one of those fics where a Dumbledore from a world where LV is winning summons an alt-Harry Potter who has already beaten his own LV under the theory that he'll easily be able to do it again. Except this time, the Harry Potter they get is one who became Master of Death after defeating LV 5 million years earlier. Once summoned, he casually destroys Voldemort before setting himself to the slow painful destruction of Albus Dumbledore, the only person he remembers after 5 million years well enough to still hate.

Edit also given how much the story mentions the issue with getting what you want and the foreshadowing about the Dark God using the Imago Dei might remove Voldemort only to give you the Dark God implied to be an incarnation of wild magic and really bad news.

 

The last chapter of Book 3 was just released

The Next One will be called

Spoiler: Title of Book 4

HARRY BLACK AND THE RESURRECTION GAME

 

Over a million words and we aren't even in fourth year. Don't get me wrong I am enjoying the fic but some of the stuff like the Naga in India seemed kind of pointless unless the author intends to use that sideplot later.

 

We learned one key thing from the Naga for sure Ron will save the life of the BWL at any cost and got another warning about how dangerous wild magic is and that there are things that go bump in the night. It also serves to explain why Parseltongue is perfectly passed down in the male line from Slytherin and why Voldemort doesn't look human anymore.

 

We already knew about wild magic being dangerous considering we are told later(or earlier can't remember) that people are just straight up executed for meddling with it. Wich is a huge sign considering using an Unforgivable (wich in this story is even worse than canon) gets you Azkaban and not an execution. Though that might be motivated by the fact that killing literally harms the soul, though we don't know how much by indirectly killing such as ordering a Dementor to kill the criminal. The Parseltounge thing is interesting though again not really adding anything worthwhile. We already learnt that Parseltounge is learnable so it isn't that big of a leap to guess that Salazar used some ritual or spell to bind it to his blood. The fact that Parseltounge is only inheritable by males is a bit of an odd addition that I'm sure will come up later as an explanation why some woman didn't know of their heritage since they can't Speak. The world building is fine, I'm just worried that the fic will collapse under it's own weight like so many others. Not to mention the Lovecraftian themes sometimes clash with the more grounded Harry Potter theme that I am familiar with. Imago Dei just existing makes so many things irrelevant by the fact one martyr can wipe the whole slate clean. I am still reading eagerly despite my complaints. Can't wait to see more of Voldemort in action. The man has been playing everybody.

 

Agreed we knew that it was super illegal and it was implied you might not even get a trial for using wild magic and we knew that wild magic was dangerous from Luna's memory but to learn that by one action an entire species had to be removed from history to fix the damage. But yes POS is way more of an epic level story than the books.

 

I feel like this has been said a few times already, but +1 to the consensus I guess: this thing, while good in some ways, is barely a story. I'm sure there's a story in there somewhere, but it's suffocating under all the other junk.

The same interlude-fever that plagues many Wildbow serials or Methods of Rationality or Practical Guide to Evil has become terminal here. Large chunks of every chapter are now minor character interludes, reactions, et cetera. And I get that it is probably easier and more fun to write from a lot of fresh viewpoints but most of these belong in the author's own notes not the story.

This desperately, desperately needs editing. Shred it into "Prince of Slytherin" and a separate collection of "Tales from the PoSverse" if the author is unwilling to kill any of his ideas off. But once the excess is out of the way there's at least a chance for this to be a story (maybe even a story about something! even a good story!)

Not a story/5.

 

POS has officially more words than the entire HP series does. To cover the same amount of time (ie end of 3rd year) in the books, Rowling used just under 270,000 words. We're spending 4 times as long on each year as canon HP did.

This needs trimming. Significant trimming. For example, why does he feel the need to include the Oliver reaction in this last chapter. It's setup for future Oliver x Warrington team up stuff... but we already have that with the CPS, and if they are going to do something why not let us be surprised by it. That entire sequence just bloats the story. This chapter had 16 segments, if you're counting each line break as a new segment (which itself I dont like, constantly changing the POV characters so much), and Harry was in 8 of those. Or to rephrase it, half of the latest chapter (and I'm very tempted to extend that to the entire story, it fits my perception of it to say the least) doesnt contain the main character. As a result, there are glaciers finding new real estate quicker than this story progresses with its plot.

3rd year as a whole I'd give a 2/5. Unsatisfying in the extreme, its just setup with the promise that later, things will be interesting.

 

I mean 3rd year also wrapped up a number of mysterious things like how did Sirius end up in Azkaban, what is up with Remus in a world where all Werewolves are monsters in the end, what is Lily's secret ancestry, what is the Prophecy James is so afraid of, when will Peter be revealed, why and how did Harry leave the Potters. Which were all answered in this book. I think book 3 had a lot of payoff.

 

Ok I'm actually glad we're done with Book 3. I picked this story up 4 years ago before book 3 started, and part of me was convinced we'd never see the end of Book 3.

I agree with much of the above - Book 3 had big pacing issues that come from the author trying to cram too many side plots into one story. While Book 2 had side plots, they all centered on either Harry or Jim (with the occasional side bit about Lockhart). The author once mentioned that his original draft for Book 3 was basically "the Marauders reminisce about the past", and I think that comes across here.

TSM said that next year should be more streamlined as it's focused on Harry and the TWT, which I'm looking forward to. I think returning to a Harry (and Jim) centered plot will help pick the story up faster and make it a lot more engaging.

Because right now it's more of a collection of vingettes about the POS-verse (which isn't bad - but I agree that it's not a cohesive "story"). Would be interesting if the author embraced it Rick Riordon or GRRM style (and explicitly called out at the start of each chapter who the main character was).

 

This story is absolute dogshit. Why do people confuse having an identifiable personality as being dumb? The reader is immediately aware of just how pathetic the author's social life is upon beginning, and it gets worse from there. Some complaints:

• Occlumancy levels
• Every single shitty Slytherin!Harry trope has been shoehorned into this
• Magic is no longer fun and instead is analogous to high school linear algebra (Not interesting or requiring brain power at all)
  
• I'm not going to verify but I'm 99% sure there's at least one spell with the maxima suffix
• The execution of what should be fun ideas is simply not there; go no further than the codenames Death eaters are going around with
• I'm 99% sure there's several instances of magical exhaustion
• He hasn't boned Daphne yet
• Harry and his friends seem to be the worst kind of snobby eye rolling ponces that totally lack any and all self awareness
• Certain subplots are genuinely clever; their execution then drags on for 300k words
• Dueling is regressed to a battle of lung capacity and reflexes
• Too many words are italicised

There are more, but this is about a 2/5 that somehow has a cult following. It's trash and belongs at the start of the previous decade.

 

Ok there is a lot to unpack here and I wasn't going to reply as I was almost sure this was trolling but some of this has to be addressed... I will leave aside the issue of the personal attack at the top.

1. First, Occlumancy levels are a short hand tool that works both in universe and on a meta level to explain how skilled someone is in the mind arts and what abilities they would have access to.
2. Second, extra ordinary claims require extra ordinary evidence plenty of the magic introduced into the story is used in fun and interesting ways not to mention that being clever and intelligent has been shown as being very beneficial and to me has been fun (notably the averto ie dueling shield charm or the physical protection variation of the protego charm were both interesting additions).
3. Third, yes there are a few one is Lumos Maxima which is canon fyi:https://harry-potter-compendium.fandom.com/wiki/Lumos_Maxima#:~:text=Lumos Maxima is the incantation,casting before darkening once more. so not sure why Maxima is this crime.
4. Fourth, the only instances of magical exhaustion are James dueling Voldemort where James performs a ton of complex magic in a very short period of time and when Ron uses a healing charm that transfers energy from him into the target of the spell. To me with context this isn't egregious.
5. Fifth, they are 13 what is wrong with you!
6. Sixth, no dueling isn't that at all now while competition dueling does use reflexes as one way to become better at it that is not the only way to get better at dueling and there are ways of dueling that no amount of reflexes can save you from someone who is using Avis Opuggno to attack you. Also if you bothered to read any of the adults in magical fights notably James vs the DEs and Voldemort; James in Hogsmead, the Aurors vs the Rat attack, Auror Burke in Diagon Alley you would see that they use complex and clever applications of magic to win or gain an advantage.
7. I am not going to argue the personal preference stuff like your 5th, 8th, 9th, and 11th points as those are completely subjective.
8. The Slytherin Tropes like evil or incompetent Dumbledore? Oh wait that isn't there. Or maybe you mean that the Death Eaters are the real good people. Nope that one isn't there either. You must mean the Dark Magic isn't evil... wait nope that one isn't there either.

 

Lumos Maxima is canon the same way Harry-Hermione slow-mo semi-romantic dance is canon; really shitty and only in the movies.

At some point, Frank Longbottom uses 'Expelliarmus Horriblis' which can apparently disarm multiple people at once. Modifiers are overused.

Except that magical exhaustion isn't supposed to be a thing at all. In canon, Harry, Ron and Hermione stayed awake from the time the broke into Gringotts till the end of the final battle. Magic isn't exactly energy which is 'spent'.

Slytherin!Harry tropes like no one other than Harry and his few precious friends allies knowing what being a Slytherin means, or the excessive Potters bashing. Just because it is a little lesser than in other fics doesn't mean it is non-existent.