He did this with my post after the last update too. Just copy/pasted the whole thing, added a few more words at the end, then posted.

 

Wow, yeah it is a great Christmas since 5 am this morning when I half heartedly checked for an update...

I think the professors didn’t interfere because undefeatable Dumbledore put the age line i.e.: unbeatable. And Dumbledore didn’t do anything but stare intensely. Madam Maxime not interfering on the other hand, I can only chalk up to derisive curiosity. I do have to ask though, did the goblet really turn off too early or is there the possibility of someone behind the scenes not wanting Harry to be chosen? What jumped out a lot more to me is Harry’s lack of anger when he woke up. I mean, this is the guy who nearly had a temper tantrum when Dumbledore cautioned him against entering. As mentioned though, it could just be building up or Santi might just be telling us he grew up.

I am curious about the hints which supposedly told us he wouldn’t be champion according to Santi. As is obvious, I firmly believed he would be chosen, mainly due to Harry’s own confidence and determination. I cannot say I’m disappointed though as the comments elucidated a fraction of the things Harry could be doing instead and this way, the plot is not clichéd. Who exactly put Nathan’s name in is what we should be asking ourselves... I can’t even remember if Moody has been mentioned yet. Is it ridiculous to suspect Snape? I mean, yes, in canon he was the reformed spy but that was because of his guilt in killing Lily. Since she’s alive and therefore not some idealised image; is it possible he never turned to Dumbledore?

Rita being on the window sill was a nice ending. Assuming she heard the whole thing she could go from Harry believing his brother is incompetent to Calypso corrupting the Potter family. I don’t see how Harry could catch Rita yet as Calypso’s level in the Dark Arts could come from any Durmstrang student. If Harry does catch her I could see him blackmailing Rita to print exactly what he wants...or just handing her to Calypso for target practise... :awesome

Two things I’m gleefully looking forward to is Ron bashing (I assume he’s going to be the same as canon) and seeing the Potter parent’s first hand reaction to this. This being one son’s failed attempt to get in and the other’s failed attempt to get out of the tournament. Whatever happens, I know I’m going to be checking my email twice a day until Jan....

 

The only reason I really enjoyed the previous chapters is that I thought it was building to something big. We saw characters develop and Harry start to come into his own as a wizard. There have been some minor conflicts here and there, but I had thought based on some of the Santi's previous posts about looking forward to writing this year in particular that this would be the year that Harry would face an actual conflict.

I really have no desire to read 7 years of amazing magic and relationship drama because of dark magic views. 4 years of just that would be pushing the limit. Stories need a bigger conflict. At least a story of this nature does. It isn't a romance or a drama so it can't really get by on character interactions alone. I think everyone expected some sort of major conflict, and it doesn't seem like we are going to get it this year. So when? 7th year...post school? I'm not sure I'm willing to read character interaction and amazing magic for that many words with only minor conflicts.

Maybe you are, but for me, this story's greatness thus far came from the promise of a payoff.

 

Says who?

I mean, we've known for quite some time that we're not going to get a Harry leading the charge against Voldemort. We know that this isn't a war fic. It's not Harry vs. Voldemort, or Harry vs. Dumbledore or Harry vs. Grindelwald. The story is about Harry doing his own thing, and the various personal and academic conflicts that arise because of it. Nathan is the Boy-Who-Lived, not Harry. That's the whole point of this fic. I'm actually really looking forward to Harry's perspective on The Order as something of an outsider.

I think you've missed the point of this story. Its main focus has been showcasing a Harry who gets by on hard work and intelligence, and a magical system that rewards these two things. Accordingly, Dumbledore and Voldemort and Grindelwald, who are equally as intelligent as Harry but who have been working hard at it for much longer than him, will always be ahead of Harry. Harry will never catch up to them in this fic. Sure, he might get close, especially as the more you know the greater the diminishing returns on new knowledge. But he'll never close the gap, the same way that Voldemort could never close the gap on Dumbledore.

Given that, I think it's unlikely that we'll see Harry in a conflict-deciding duel with any of the above. The nature of the fic as a foil for canon demands that the winner be the more skilled and that luck not come into it, as it did for canon-Harry. That would mean Harry would have to lose. And while Santi could end this fic with Harry's premature death at the hands of a more skilled opponent, I don't think he would want to enrage us all like that...

Harry is skilled, yes. But he has his limits. The way I see it, this fic is as much about his limits as his skill. It's about how in a realistic world, even a prodigy doesn't have a walk in the park (like so many prodigy fics), because there are other prodigies too. Boy Who Lived is the first fic I've seen that really takes seriously the idea that our protagonist isn't the only prodigy out there.

 

Harry not getting into the TWT is a disappointment, there was this preparation, many build up chapters, this innovative ideas on how to beat the age line just for his plan to fail by seconds...it felt lame.

And his reaction frustrated me, he was entirely too relaxed after the whole ordeal, this can be due to his headache or his surprise at Nathan's situation but this just stood out like a sore thumb for me.

I hope Harry has a more active role than that of a mere spectator or a supporter, and while the good interactions and innovative magical theories are some of the greatest points of this fic I expect for it to go beyond that and provide some good action which is, I believe, a thing most of us expected from year 4.

While this chapter feels sub-par when compared to previous installments this might be biased by my disappointment.

This remains my favorite fic, and I am looking forward to whatever Santi has in store for us.

 

I actually agree with Rakkety Tam, so long as he isn't saying that Harry as Durmstrang champion is a required element for what he wants.

I'd go so far as to say that participating in the Triwizard isn't all that much as far as "payoff" at all to me. If you look at it in a vacuum (either in canon or in fics), the Triwizard is mere sport - a game, really. It's scarcely more meaningful than Quidditch. If the biggest thing in this year of Santi's story was Harry participating in the three tasks, I would have been disappointed.

The conflict, in canon, came from the circumstances around the Tournament. Things like the machinations of certain people to get Harry into the Tournament. The various manipulations to ensure that he won it. What it led to at the end of the year, etc.

But like Tam, I want to see conflict and a buildup to big things this year. I'm looking forward to all the interpersonal stuff as well, but I will be disappointed if the year ends in another whimper. The time for whimpery years should be at an end by now: if the stage hasn't been sufficiently set after three years, you start to wonder if it ever will be.

In order to make this possible, Santi is going to have to have a different path to conflict than canon!Harry. There's got to be a bunch of good ways to do this, but in the end I just hope that Harry gets to throw down in the climax of the year.

 

Just to be clear, I don't expect him to face Voldemort and win or to lead the fight. This fic is in the Santi's own words a fanfic about Harry becoming one of the most infamous wizards of all time. So, I came into this expecting some major conflict. The early comments about how he was looking forward to 4th year made me think we would at least get a taste of it this year then I see an author's note that seems to indicate that this will be yet another year of character interaction and Harry doing amazing magic.

 

May come of as weird but, I want to read Skeeter's article.

 

I'm... disapointed, for lack of a better word. I honestly didn't see any of the hints that you're talking about, and assumed you'd be going with Harry as Durmstrang's champion while keeping Nathan in as the 4th champion. I figured that there'd be a major focus and development of their relationship as Harry tries to keep his brother intact till the end of the tournament while being the best he could be. Add in Rita Skeeter stirring up discord between Harry and his family and between Nathan and his friends as he defends his brother, I was quite looking forward to it.

Oh well. This is nearly as good, especially since I now have no assumptions coloring my responses to future pieces.

 

I agree that this was a pretty disappointing update, not because of Harry not making it in but because of his utter lameness after the fact.

"Oh well, I tried my darnedest!"

That's not who this Harry is. I understand he's supposed to be CalculatedAndCool!Harry, but he's had enough rages in the story that by all indications, missing the entry into the Triwizard because he overslept a couple seconds or took too long pissing before it should have made him fly off the handle. If anything, this is the kind of thing that I could've seen being used to propel Harry deeper into unknown magics; Things that would make it possible for him to never experience disappointment like that.

Three ENTIRE schools, the three best in Europe no less, watching him fail? I agree, the magic is 'ingenious' or whatever the fuck Dumbledore wants to call it, but the fact is he failed. In front of all of Durmstrang, a results-oriented program.

But that ships passed. Even if he starts raging in the next chapter, it's too late. The rage should've come right when he woke up, and now that it hasn't, I don't know what to expect.

I also agree that there has to be a major conflict for our protagontist in this year, but on that front I'm definitely happy giving Santi the benefit of the doubt and waiting for him to finish the year before judging.

 

I don't know, I think if his old Ravenclaw classmates start to make fun of him and Durmstrang students disrespect him, he'll quickly get his rage on and be driven to learn some rather nasty Dark Arts and other powerful arcane arts. I think it just hasn't sunk in to Harry yet just how spectacularly he failed. Both Potter brothers are soon bound for an unpleasant year, especially if Skeeter has anything to say about it.

 

i love this story and about harry not getting into the tournament i think its not a major deal i mean he is at hogwarts he will go to class with most of the sixth years if i am not mistaken and he will most likly be better than all of them cause he is best in his class
so everyone will defenitly see how inteligent he is. and maybe there are some practice duels in DADA where harry can show his proficiency in dueling and silent casting. he also can work on his animagus further to be able to do it at the end of the year. he is defenitly better than any of his old yearmates.
i think there is alot potential in harry not praticipating in the tournament

 

This. The entire plot device feels too artificial - I'd almost say it could only happen in a story.

What I really like about your usual writing is that I tend to forget that I'm reading a story. That is, I start deliberating the motivations of your characters as if they were real: "Why is person A doing X? What would person B think about Y?" When Harry failed to enter his name by seconds, my train of thought shifted to the author instead: "Why is the author using plot device X?". It broke immersion for me.

Seriously, it reminds me of one of those horrible movies in which the good guys are racing the clock to defuse a time bomb, only to mysteriously succeed when the timer reads 00:00:01 :facepalm

 

Great Xmas gift, even if I only noticed it due to insomnia.

Plausible reason for Harry's non-reaction to not getting into the tournament; He just woke up and still has a bit of Dreamless Sleep running threw him, making him nice and relaxed. And Dumbledore did a decent enough job of complimenting his ingenuity and skill to help balance out any feelings of failure he my have had.

Also:

He called it.

 

Wat?
/10char.

 

In my opinion articles by Rita on Harry will have quite the opposite reaction and unite family stronger. Rita will obviously write also articles about Nathan and his friends (Hermione, Hagrid), so both Potters and Nathan will see this as more lies and will support Harry.
The same should be also true in Calypso case, but I can see Nathan and his parents being little wary of her.
I don't think that Rita really heard anything discriminating in hospital wing, there was only this bit about Calypso being in 6th year of Dark Arts and being negative influence on Potter.


I myself like that Harry won't be champion. Smart, independent Harry doing so much better than normal in three tasks is little cliché, we rarely see tournament from observer point of view.

I agree with people who said that Harry was too calm about not competing, in spite of being good in mind arts he is still emotional teenager, who failed at something he was really looking forward to and spent whole holidays preparing, he should be murderous but maybe it's little shock.

 

The Siberia joke wasnt funny to begin with. Let it go already. It is annoying to keep seeing that joke keep popping up every once in awhile in the story.

Seriously disappointed by this part of the story. This story focused on Harry's talent to overcome odds with his ingenious uses of magic but somehow you made this go the cliche route despite that. You just replaced Harry's name with Nathan's as the lazy fourth champion but changed the perspective to a talented wizard from Durmstrang named Harry. You don't HAVE to follow canon this closely you know right?

Why was Harry not a champion? Did he seriously get done figuring out how to get into the tournament less than a minute before the cup would be extinguished, so that he missed it by all of two seconds? I am calling BS on that. That was WAY too contrived of a plot device.


I'm starting to wonder if this story is just supposed to be a drama fest between Harry/Calypso, Harry/Nathan, Harry/Parents, Harry/Everyone Else. This was 4 years of Harry's life building up to one spectacular let down.

This story is put under Adventure on Fanfiction.net. Meaning I want to see some actual adventure. If this was supposed to be Drama/Romance I would have liked Santi not to waste my time by putting it in the wrong category.

 

I don't think that Harry will catch Rita until almost the very end of the year, much like canon. By that time, with articles proclaiming how 'evil' he is and the like, he will start to have his infamous reputation soon.

As for Harry's old classmates and the Dumstrang people mock him for not getting in... the fuck? Dumbledore said, to the entire school, that the process would have worked had, for example, Nathan immediately agreed to go under the disillusionment charm. He missed by a half a second. And the Dumstrang people already know that he is somebody to be feared because of the Cruciatus incident with Calypso.