Anyone else think there is lack of good villains in HP for the hero to triumph over? I mean Voldemort himself lacks it. Yeah he is evil and all but he keeps getting twarted by HP all the time it's hard to take him seriously. Then Snape we think he might be a good villain by the end of HBP but he turns good in the next book. The Death Eaters are all lacking. None of them stands out except Bellatrix but she is killed by a housewife which kills her character. Draco is just pathetic.

Other fantasy series like Dresden, Asoiaf, First Law, Stormlight have a great roster of villains.

Imagine if we had a villain like Joffrey, Tywin or Ramsay in the HP series would make HPs triumphs even better.

 

In the Rowling books? Who cares. Anyway the scariest (though not the most powerful) villain in the Rowling books was Umbridge rather than Voldie.

In fanfic, be th fic you want to read . Besides Voldie and amped-up versions of same, we get everyone from OC's, to Herpo the Foul, Baba Yaga, and probably even Cthulhu if you count the crossover possibilities.

Here, listen to this:

https://tomsmith.bandcamp.com/track/rocket-ride-13

 

Do you mind explaining why you believe Voldemort lacks potential? He was unstoppable in the first war, and managed to take over in little more than a year in the second one. While his plans were thwarted by Harry, a lot of it was through sheer nerve and a lot of luck.
PS: Lily's sacrificial protection saves Harry. Voldemort didn't understand 'The Power of Love', and could not have predicted this.
CoS: Fawkes turns up with the sorting hat. Sixteen year old Riddle was still quite in control, until Harry stabbed the diary out of the blue. While he should've kept a closer eye on the Diary, he was only a teenager at this point.
GoF: Brother wand effect. Again, nothing he could've predicted.
OotP: Dumbledore makes his dramatic entry. He couldn't do much after that.
DH: From Voldemort's point of view, the greatest sorcerer of all time shouldn't really be taken lessons in wand lore from a teenage school dropout who is above average at best.

I'm not saying he couldn't have done better. Nor do I think he is the greatest antagonist in fantasy novels. However, a lot of his mistakes were where Harry was concerned, and face it, Harry alone couldn't have done much to the Dark Lord by himself. To Voldemort, Harry was a prophesied threat, but not a very serious one. He simply did no wish to leave any loose ends.
When it came to taking over the country, Voldemort was quite efficient. Remember, in the first war, when there were no prophecies, even Dumbledore couldn't stop him. Multiple ministers stepped up and failed.

If this still isn't convincing, try to look at it from a more relative frame, i.e., from that of the HP world. Compared to the ones opposing him, in the HP universe, he was far better. So, from the standpoint of the HP books alone, he was good enough.

 

I disagree Voldemort was a competent villain. He keeps repeatedly failing to kill a teenage mediocre wizard, only manages to kill Dumbledore cos he planned it himself, fails to recognize Snape is a spy over decades, hell even the whole get Harry to touch the cup plan is idiotic (how hard would it be to get crouch to slip a portkey on him when he is alone) He does take over the wizarding world but only after Dumbledore dies. I'm sorry but I expect a dark lord who is the greatest sorcerer to be a bit more competent than this. Honestly competent villains elevates series to whole another levels and HP remarkably fails in having them. Like I said Voldemort never had a red wedding type moment in the series where he masterfully plans it and gets the heroes by surprise and make them pay heavily.

 

And I've explained why I think he was.

Again, I've explained why it may have happened. If there is a fault in my arguments, feel free to point it out. I will take a look at them again.

Which means Snape was just that good at his job. The books repeatedly mention that Voldemort was perhaps the greatest Legilimens in at least Wizarding Britain, and Snape still managed to keep his cover. And yet, he could not save his own life, could he?
Also, he didn't have decades to ponder Snape's allegiance. He had like, three years, and in the second, Bellatrix probably told him Snape had sworn an unbreakable vow, and in the third, killed Dumbledore. That as good as cemented Snape's loyalties.

Killing Dumbledore was not necessary to take over Britain. He certainly had no troubles doing it in the first war, and Dumbledore was alive and well back then. He already had a plan where Snape would do it in the second war.

Quite hard, I'd say. The cup was probably already meant to be a portkey, which would bring the champion back to the front of the maze. Crouch only added another destination. I don't think portkeys would work in Hogwarts otherwise, the way they do for normal places. It'd require the Headmaster to make it, which does give lend a certain amount of authoritarian power. No one else could make a portkey that lead in or out of Hogwarts.



That being said, it's your opinion, and I can respect that. And, it seems, you've also read better books- that will certainly make HP villains look tame. Which is why I asked you to look at it from the standpoint of the HP books alone.

 

I still maintain Harry being led by a hacked portkey in the center of a maze filled with obstacles above his level cleared by a convoluted series of events that saw one champion imperioused and another crucioed in full view of a stadium full of people was really stupid plan by Voldemort.

 

What else do you suggest he should've done? Keep in mind Dumbledore is watching the whole thing like a hawk.

 

In fairness to Alexx, a much more practical option would have been for Crouch Jr to kidnap Harry at any point during the preceding nine months. It would have been tricky to pull off, I'm sure, but the existing scheme isn't exactly straightforward.

 

Voldemort loves a good story. He's the Dark Lord, kidnapping harry at the climax of a tournament that wasn't seen in centuries, and then killing him in front of all his remaining Death Eaters is supposed to set a certain tone for the rest of rule.

Just kidnapping Harry when he was in detention would be too boring by comparisson.

 

I remember a fic where his plan was to use the return Portkey to bring the Death Eaters into Hogwarts for a surprise attack after he kills Harry. Depending on how successful the attack was, he could potentially behead the Ministry and all three European schools in one fell swoop, while still having his own man impersonating one of the likeliest rallying figures of his opposition. Adding the shock of his resurrection and the death of his prophetised vanquisher, the war would be basically over before it even started.

It's a dream scenario for him, for sure, but I think it can justify some sacrifices on the easiness of the plan to bring Harry.

 

Sure, it makes sense given Voldemort's character, and there are lots of other potential reasons for it, but it is elaborate and complicated where there are definitely easier, and arguably better options. That's part of the fun though.

 

Voldemort could also have planned to kill Harry and and send his body back with some indication that Sirius Black did it - the ministry would dissolve into anarchy, Fudge would be criticised quite possibly ousted, the search for Sirius Black starts again in full force, and in the background, Voldemort rebuilds pulls together his old power base. And the prophet flashes a headline of POTTER KILLED IN HIS MOMENT OF GLORY BY DARK LORD'S LIEUTENANT. The war would be lost before it began. And if Sirius Black is actually captured, all the better. The only wizard apart from Dumbledore that could match someone like Bellatrix spell for spell is done with.

I can totally see Voldemort take advantage of the escaped convict situation.

 

Also worth noting that Voldemort could have used the Tournament to cover up Harry's murder without leaving a witness. As in, everybody would be suspicious if Harry just disappeared in the middle of the school year. But if Voldemort murdered him in front of his death eaters, made it look like a monster did it, and then send his body back through the portkey(which would explain why Crouch left it as a portkey to Hogwarts), then people would just assume Harry died in the maze to one of the creatures just as he grabed the cup. Then there wouldn't be anyone to raise alarms about Voldemorts return and even Dumbledore wouldn't know about the restoration of his body. Which would leave him in position for a stealthy takeover even better than Order of the Phoenix, where the order was working against him, or in HBP where the entire ministry was on alert.

If you just wanted to make them think Sirius did it, you could have done so at other point in time, but the Tournament is already known to have had dead students in the past, and the perfect place to just fully cover it up.

 

Fair point. I suppose I just wanted to explore the way Voldemort could exploit the Sirius Black situation.

 

There were loads of good villains in hp. Poor Old Professor Quirrell, umbridge, wormtail, malfoy, snape.

I think if we saw what radicalised riddle into Voldemort (either because of ww2 or shown how awful the orphanage was)