Well, yes, from what we're shown. Presumably that's why Goblin Uprisings keep failing.

 

I've seen a couple of Harry-raised-by-goblins fics but yeah, there aren't any that are actually good. Which is why this one's a pleasant departure from the norm really. Its better than most fics in the goblin/centaur/creature-raised!Harry genre.

But I think it falls into the same trap that a lot of fics in this general mold do. The author doesn't present the goblins as goblins, he tries to make them paragons of some sort that Harry can look up to. There is a fair bit of partisanship in there - in all things the goblins are right and the ministry is full of incompetents; and everyone other than the goblins is made to look stupid even if they have to be forced into the role - viz. Dumbledore.

I was really bugged by the characterizations - Dumbledore in particular. So many of the common tropes with him are present - the twinkle-of-doom, Amelia Bones yelling at him and cowing him, him being involved with Sirius' incarceration (at least a proper reason is given for that, albeit a really poor one). And while the fic tried not to fall into the usual cliche traps, it still caters to several tropes that I have a personal peeve with (wards, magical cores, magic-is-like-a-muscle etc).

If the story continues and the author handles Hogwarts well while getting some of his characterization straight, this can become good enough for a spot in the library.

 

I can't say I liked Dumbledore too much, but I've gotten used to milder forms of incompetence. As long as he isn't a cackling buffoon, I'm usually ok with it.

 

Title: Walking these Hallowed Halls again
Author: Zeoniu Zekial Kal Leos
Pairing: None so far.
Rating: T.
Link: http://www.fanfiction.net/s/5874671/
Story Summary: Harry Potter had thought his task would be over once Lord Voldemort killed him. When his eyes opened up and he found himself in purgatory, that notion was quickly erased. Now the chance comes to do things over again, but the question remains... of when?

Harry Potter - Rated: T - English - Adventure/Drama - Chapters: 6 - Words: 17,352 - Reviews: 22 - Updated: 10-23-10 - Published: 4-6-10 - Harry P.

Timetravel fic. Instead of meeting Dumbledore it's Sirius who turns up to talk with him after the forest killing curse took place, and somehow Harry is able to exploit a 'loophole' in being Master of Death to go back to a time before he was killed.

Logically this leads to him appearing when Tom Riddle is still in school on the off-chance that something can be done to prevent the uprising in the first place, but after five chapters+intro/prologue whatever Harry has just barely managed to get out of the Ministry proper-- which is another thing.

The Department of Mysteries manages to snag him on arrival to the past, and at least half the time so far has been spent building up an OC Unspeakable and the Department/Ministry as a whole.

Some points were alright, mostly the talk with Sirius and some of the elements of the war with Grindelwald that are hinted at, but it's overall pretty shitty.

 

The General by nos tres reges has updated twice in the last few days, sparking hope that the other fic by this (these) author(s) will also update in the near future. Naive, I know, but one must keep hope alive.

Anyway, some canon characters are OOC (you'll know who I mean) and there's a twist in chapter 6 that I did not see coming at all. All in all, I like it, and if it continues to progress and be updated at any kind of regular pace, I'll be tempted to place it in For Review once the plot is well underway.

 

They're not that OOC - I think it's likely that's what they would have been like had JKR provided us with a more well-rounded interpretation of their character. And agreed, it's a story well worth reading.

 

Unfortunately, The General is written by just one of the three authors, and so I'm not holding my breath for an update. Their other fic requires all three authors to be active.

 

You and your pessimism can suck it. I know it's only 1 of 3, but in my world of sunshine and roses, that glass is 1/3 full, bitch! ;-P

 

Personally, I quite enjoyed it. Its short so far, but it covering ground at quite the rate. Well written, and whilst the characters are OOC, it still works, and I'm enjoying reading them as they are.

 

The General is heating up. Dumbledore is pretty great, though a bit OOC. But I like it.

 

It's a good fic, but little lines and things stick out and really bug me. I'm not sure if he has a beta, but a lack of one would explain a lot of them away.

Things like this,

What does Arithmancy have to do with counting votes? That's basic math and politics.

EDIT: If you want to have Arithmancy incorporate math into it's magic that's fine. But it has to involve magic in some way. It's not simply math renamed. (Which is exactly what it is in that scene). It's a magical discipline being taught at Hogwarts. What he's discussing is simple politics, knowledge of public opinion, statistics, etc. Unless you're suggesting that Harry's endorsement is somehow magical it's ridiculous to use "Arithmancy" to calculate vote totals. It's math and knowledge of people. Wizards didn't rename reading or any other basic subject, there's no reason for them to have done so with stats. It may not directly contradict anything but that doesn't mean it isn't dumb.

Anyway, generally liked the update. Ron was so flagrantly, enormously OOC it was ridiculous though. And I don't think he's a more "well-rounded view" of the character. I think he's fundamentally been changed. But it's working so, w/e.

 

Pretty sure he's decided that Arithmancy encompasses statistics and stuff. Not a mistake, as we don't really know what is from canon.

 

Yeah, I'm not sure what your basis for claiming his interpretation of Arithmancy is "off" is. It's nothing more than a throwaway mention in canon; it's whatever the author wants it to be.

The fic itself is decent stuff. Not nearly as original or enjoyable as his/their other fic, but seeing as how I've pretty much written off that story as dead I'll take what I can get.

 

I like the General, it has a very interesting Dumbledore and a believable lead-up to Harry getting involved in politics.

I just thought that Ron was so OOC in the last chapter, it made me raise my eyebrows, he was like a male Hermione.

I like when Ron is smart about Wizarding culture and things that Harry and Hermione might not know... But how would Ron know what a bomb is...?

 

I'd be surprised if most Wizards didn't know about muggle weaponry. It seems prudent to learn about it, given the World Wars.

 

I understand how you can disagree. I don't understand how you can fail too see what I meant. Do you not understand the meaning of the words I wrote? That scene, is talking about counting votes. Simple math. Whatever Arithmancy was intended to be/you want it to, it's the height of stupid for it to be just another name for math. It's a class taught at Hogwarts, where every other class involve magic in some way. By logical progression, Arithmancy involves magic as well. There is no magic involved in counting votes.

tl;dr. Yes you can have Arithmancy just be math or have all math be Arithmancy. But that's fucking retarded.

EDIT:

It's fairly well established that most wizards don't know shit about almost anything muggles. Arthur Weasley is an example of a wizard who is actually interested in Muggles and studies their devices. And he can charitably be called a buffoon when it comes to Muggle things. The Weasley children have shown no signs of being more educated about Muggles than their dad. Fellytone, fireleg. Need I go on?

For gods sake wizards can't even dress enough like Muggles to pass muster. They seem to nearly universally have a superiority complex. I very much doubt that any save the Muggle raised and a few others have any idea of what Muggle weaponry is. Certainly not Ron Weasley.

 

I remember that fireleg thing now and I guess you're right about that. And, uh, I'm pretty sure muggle studies doesn't have anything to do with magic. Though I guess -mancy is a root word implying magic.

:facepalm:

Whatever, I'm not begrudging him the use of the word.

 

Not really, Hogwarts has Muggle Studies after all, and Astronomy isn't exactly magical either. The wizarding society is xenophobic and ass-backwards, so them calling mathematics by an anachronism makes perfect sense to me.

Or for a sillier idea, in Arithmantics you learn the art of subtly named spells such as "Countus Votus", and enchant abacuses to do the counting for you!

Anyway, this argument is getting inane, so I'll stop here.

 

Anybody who knows about a helicopter definitely knows about a bomb.

Draco and Ron used to brag about hitting helicopters while flying in their childhood

 

One must remember to separate out the general wizarding population from those in the know. In PoA the writer of the article about Sirius Black knew what a gun was; in OotP we hear in passing about a report being prepared for the Aurors on firearms.

Oh, also:

Arithmancy is about predicting the future with numbers. They are not saying that they are using Muggle statistics and have called it Arithmancy. They are, in fact, using a form of number magic to evaluate the likelihood of future events.