I'm not going to treat Slytherin as if it's one entity, I'm going to pretty much avoid single trope involving them. So, none of that Harry having to prove that he belongs in that house or anything like that. The house is made of individual people, with individual opinions. Sure, they might have preconceived notions as to who Harry is, but I'm not going to have them treat Harry as if he's a Gryffindor spy in Slytherin, or even just outright treated as their mortal enemy with everyone being a mini Death Eater in training. I don't want Harry to just be outright shunned like we see all too often. If anything, I would rather have them see Harry as some exploitable resource. Perhaps exploitable is the wrong term, but they see him as someone they want to get in good graces with to further whatever their own agenda is.

Like I said, I'm starting off with the train as the first scene in the story. One of the first things Draco asks of Harry is if he was really raised by muggles. Harry's opinion of the Dursleys is very negative, but it's not like he hates every muggle. I'm not just going to have Draco go guns ablazing and have Draco be a bigot right off the bat, trying to get Harry to conform to his same views, but Draco finds out pretty quickly that Harry knows very little about their world. He's not appalled at Harry, he's appalled that Harry's heritage has been kept from him - even Hagrid was appalled at that. He realizes that Harry will be malleable, and maybe exploitable. He realizes that Harry isn't necessarily ignorant, he just doesn't know anything about their world at all, one way or another. Now, to add a bit of levity, and to emphasize that they're only 11, I have Draco immediately try and get Harry to become a fan of his quidditch team, before he can form any other opinions. After all in canon, Draco must know that Harry is a halfblood before they even meet, yet Draco still tries to extend an offer of "help."

I do agree that Harry would actively be looking for as much information as possible. That likely wouldn't be a secret. You can even have him be thirsty for knowledge, thirsty for a culture that he can call his own, seperate from the Dursleys'. It's not that farfetched for Harry to actually be interested in what Draco tells him regarding wizarding traditions or whatever. After all, I tentatively named the story "Greatness, At Any Cost"

For the troll scene, I can simply see the teachers arriving in time to prevent the troll from killing hermione. So then hermione has a choice to make. She can drop out of Hogwarts, or she can continue, knowing that she has no friends and that she nearly got killed. Perhaps Ron feels like the whole thing went to far, and he's apologetic after the fact. Maybe his brothers learn of what he did and step in, or perhaps Ron is a more sophitiscated person than is usually shown in fanfiction. Perhaps Ron tries to make it up to Hermione somehow, and they slowly become friends anyways. I'm not sure if there's a way to realistically stretch that to the point where they would discover anything regarding the Stone and someone end up going after it. I do want to avoid the whole trope of just swapping out characters and still having the same thing happen.

So, I've had an idea on how to actually get Harry to the Stone, if that's the direction I want to take. The answer is Quirrellmort. Harry getting sorted into Slytherin should change some things, and perhaps Quirrellmort will actually view Harry in a different light. On one hand, he's annoyed at the whole prophecy and losing his body thing. On the other hand, if he can exploit a situation to his benefit, he will. And, if he can kill two birds with one stone, even better.

I can see Quirrellmort noticing Harry acting like Tom Riddle was when he started Hogwarts, so very thirsty for knowledge. So, Quirrellmort dangles that in front of Harry. Quirrellmort want to test Harry's character and resolve. Perhaps he doesn't just dangle whatever dark magic in front of Harry, hoping he bites. There's more to power than just knowing dark magic. But, Quirrellmort can talk about things like that without suspicion, due to his position as DADA professor. Perhaps he manages to build a report with Harry. Perhaps events line themselves up, and Harry asks Quirrellmort about Fluffy, or what it it's guarding. With how I'm picturing it playing out, I don't think Quirrellmort would just outright tell Harry that it's the Stone. He would give Harry enough information to go on, enough to tempt him. If Quirrellmort does it just right, perhaps he can even get Harry to go after the stone himself - perhaps Harry thinks it can bring his parents back to life, or maybe Harry is just so thirsty for knowledge that his desire for it is high enough to risk it.

Either way, Quirrellmort get's Harry to go after the Stone. And regardless of the outcome, Quirrellmort will be satisfied. He uses it as a test. If Harry fails and gets injured, even killed, ohwell. But if Harry proves himself and manages to get the Stone, that's great as well. I can see Quirrellmort happy that he didn't have to get through all the traps himself (not that any of it would be difficult). Ultimately, Quirrellmort does want the stone for himself, so perhaps he follows after Harry. So, Harry would have to get the Stone out of the mirror, which means he would want the stone, but not actually want to use it? I guess he could simply want it to study it, or simply for what it represents, and doesn't really have interest in immortallity as an 11 year old, and the concept of infinite gold doesn't mean as much when he already has a vault full of more gold than he knows what to do with. Maybe that's when Quirrellmort shows up, and offers a deal he can't refuse. Quirrellmort will do his best to bring Harry's parent's back in response for the stone.

Whether or not Quirrellmort actually goes through with that, I can see it both ways. On one hand, he probably sees one's attachment to their parents as a weakness. On the other, he knows that true resurrection is impossible unless they soul still lingers via horcrux or similar immortallity gimmick, which is extremely unlikely. Easy solution is for Quirrellmort to give Harry the Resurrection Stone. That's a fair trade, one Stone for another. Quirrellmort might not even thinks the Resurrection Stone works, as perhaps he has no dead friends or family that would appear when he uses it.

Of course, all that would only work if it was actually the real Philospher's Stone, and not a replica. I like the idea of Dumbledore borrowing the Stone for the sole reason of dangling it and trying to get Voldemort out in the open. But, the idea of him using the real stone for that is kind of iffy.

 

Could it be avoided as an issue if Harry doesn't know what Quirrelmort has sent him after? Can you want to use something that you don't know what it even is? As far as Harry knows its something that he needs to get and no more so there are no thoughts of using it? He's only eleven and the Dursley's always told him 'Don't ask questions,' so he might not get further in the thought process than this could help my parents.

I think there is a difference between shunning and observing. Most of the upper years probably don't care what an eleven year old is like but those in a year or two above might be interested. I doubt they'd outright say much to him but he is Harry Potter. They'd pay attention, not because they're all related to Death Eaters or anything like that but because he's Harry Potter and that alone makes him interesting. Everyone he spoke to in Diagon Alley expected greatness of him, I doubt the school kids would be much different. They can all have separate motivations without being one house with perfect unity but even then I doubt any of them would ask what he wants to do in the world. What he thinks of Voldemort or any other questions they might have. They might ask in round-about ways or put out hypotheticals while he's nearby to see if he'll contribute. Either way, he's still interesting to them until he proves he's a bookworm. Its not about proving his place in the house, its about proving that Harry Potter isn't that interesting.

 

You've mentioned the possibility of Voldemort getting the Stone, but I'd suggest it's too big a divergence for your tastes. It would fast track the plot to OotP only with a twelve year old Harry and an even more uncooperative Ministry. All the major events would happen away from Harry, who is undoubtedly too young this time to be privy to the Order's affairs. The next years would look nothing like canon either. Malfoy wouldn't hand over the diary; the Weasleys don't take a nice vacation, so Sirius doesn't see their picture and escape Azkaban; the Triwizard Tournament is definitely not held at Hogwarts if at all. You'd have to be really heavy handed to follow canon with that divergence.

If Quirrellmort gets involved in Harry's life more, would you have to explain their burning touch or Harry's scar? I haven't read the first book in a long time, but you have. Didn't Harry's scar hurt after his Sorting and during the fight at the end?

 

I could still theoretically get the diary into Ginny's hand. It could take time for Quirrellmort to actually complete whatever resurrection potion he concocts with the elixir of life, because presumably he'd have to actually create it from scratch himself. So it could conceivably be some time before he's reborn and recalls his death eaters, and by such time, the diary could already be in Ginny's hands. Hell, it could ultimately not actually even work, and force him to try and find an alternate solution.

 

Maybe I can suggest something useful. What do you think if the whole third corridor setup was just a diversion for the real stone - which is in Dumbledore's pocket all the time - and all the Quirrellmort got after passing the defences was just an oversized ruby.

 

I'm working on trying to plan out some stuff in advance. Right now, I've only got the first chapter done, which pretty much just covers the actual divergence (train + sorting). So I really need to kind of plan in advance where I want to go with the story, and I want there to be some underlying themes. Obviously, the main theme of the entire story is Voldemort coming back to power. Right now, I'm halfway through book 4 of my canon reread, and the amazing thing is how pretty much everyone thinks Voldemort is still alive out there, a broken man, biding his time. But that pretty much all changes at the end of book 4 when that reality actually happens, everyone goes into denial mode. Harry's theme is going to be the pursuit of power, and to build his own fame. That comes with having to make difficult choices

Spoiler

Book 1:

Spoiler

Harry is being courted/manipulated/whatever from every side. People are trying to gain his favor, while taking advantage of his ignorance. It's not actually going to be as bad as it sounds, but I just got to work and I'm tired and can't think of a better way to phrase it. Essentially Student X knows that Harry is interested in Y, and use that their advantage, though the result is usually to mutual benefit. This leads to Harry getting a crash course in pretty much every topic. This is mostly just minor background stuff. Like, the first thing Harry would probably do upon arriving at Hogwarts is try learn more about his family.

Anyways, I figure at some point Quirrellmort has to become interested in Harry. To test him to see what kind of person he is or whatever, I talked about that in one of the other posts in this thread. Perhaps Quirrellmort opens up dialog by asking if anyone has ever examined Harry's curse scar, and being the Defense professor, he could show an interest in Harry's circumstance. I guess somehow Harry gets conned into going after the Philospher's Stone. I've been thinking about it, and even with a massive thirst for knowledge, I don't think Harry would actually break all the school rules and try and steal the stone for himself, not even if he just wanted to study it. That feels a bit too OOC to me, but perhaps the story could flow in such a way that it would make sense. Like, Quirrellmort wouldn'd directly tell Harry what was down there, he would dangle it out in front of him, to let him solve it himself. But I'm not sure what Harry would actually do with that information.

Alternatively, Quirrellmort could just offer Harry to go and see it? Perhaps Harry's not fully aware of the circumstances around the defense of the Stone. The whole situation would seem off to Harry, but perhaps the thirst for knowledge is greater than the smell of a fishy situation, and he doesn't realize the whole thing is a trap until too late. Probably ends with an Imperius Curse, which I think should work with the mirror? Not sure. Anyways, it would end with Harry not getting in trouble since he got Imperiused, but Harry won't admit that he only got cursed at the very end and that he actually went in on his own free will.

Book 2: The way I see it, there actually 3 conclusions to book 1 that could still lead to the events in book 2 happening. Voldemort gets the real stone, but the actual process to restore his body will take a very long time, as he needs to develop it, and he's not contacting his supporters for all of the normal reasons. Or, the Stone was a fake, but Voldemort only learns of that after he escapes Hogwarts. Or, he never gets the stone. Personally, I think it's more interesting if Quirrellmort actually escapes with the Stone, as I want to play up the idea that the traps protecting it weren't made specifically for first years to beat (as the manipulative!Dumbledore trope dictates) but were actually more difficult/perilous. It's completely possible that up to this point, no one even realizes that Quirrell was possessed by Voldemort (though Dumbledore can probably guess).

I really want to write a competant!Lockhart. Like, have him actually be a badass, and earned all his accolades truthfully. So, when he goes down into the Chamber with Harry, he manages to survive, and writes a best-selling story about the whole thing, and Harry gets a share of some of the profits.

As for the actual Basilisk stuff... I always found it stupid how no one could guess that Slytherin's monster was a snake. The symbol of the house is a snake, how is it hard to figure out? One you know it's a snake, and see that people are getting petrified, it doesn't seem difficult to discover that it's a Basilisk unless you have characters do the whole cringeworthy IT CAN'T POSSIBLY BE! schtick.

With how I see the story going, I can still Harry accidentally getting exposed as a parselmouth during the dueling club. Harry and Draco would still duel, but it wouldn't be a hate filled duel, rather just one of competition. So, I'm thinking that Harry would heard the basilisk through the walls like normal, and then minutes later, the attack would happen. Harry could think the first time was coincidence, but when it happens a second time, he knows something is up. In canon, Harry is often spurned by teachers whenever he presents a problem to them, but I think it could be different here. On one hand, he might harbor some mistrust since the Quirrell incident, but on the other hand, he has to weigh going to a teacher, with solving the problem himself. So, perhaps this leads to the first real interaction with Snape. Snape has mostly ignored Harry's existence up to this point, neither helping nor hindering him, though by year 2 he likely realizes that he is more like Lily than James. Harry explains that he heard a voice, one that Draco didn't hear, as Draco was with him at the time. Then a few minutes later word gets out that there was an attack.

Now, if this was a normal indy!Harry story where I was trying to just brute force every single plot point, Snape could just show Harry how to extract the memory for viewing. Perhaps that's still the way to go. Or perhaps Snape is simply intelligent enough to put two and two together, and that Harry's evidence is just further support of what he's thought all along, and that Slytherin's monster is actually a snake. Figuring out the actual pieces might be slightly more difficult. Like, Basilisk's are known for killing, yet none of the victims have died. And, how is a snake getting around the castle? Surely more than just the victims would have seen it moving through the hallways, portraits etc, as the thing is huge.

So, at some point, monster hunters and whatnot comb over the school, trying to find the basilisk, but they find nothing. Not even a scale or anything? No one makes the connection that Myrtle was the student who died last time, or perhaps it simply never came up. I suspect Draco would be the one regaling Harry with stories about what happened last time, and would bring up the fact that a muggleborn died. Wouldn't take too much trouble to actually look up who that was.

At this point, the "heir of Slytherin" panics, and leaves the message of taking someone (Ginny) down into the Chamber.

When Dumbledore and the monster hunters can't find the basilisk, it's decided that the school is going to have to shut down, and the students sent home, for a more thorough search, more thorough than anything done before. Word gets out that they've given Lockhart free-reign of one day to be a hero - the teachers still think he's a fraud because of how smug and seemingly blundering he is at time. Hell, Harry probably thinks he's a fraud as well, as he's so full of himself.

Harry, not wanting to go home early, goes to give Lockhart the information the information he has regarding Myrtle. Lockhart is in a panic in his room. He's not good at being put on the spot. Panics when he sees Harry there as well, as it's not safe to be walking around on his own. Eventually ends up at Myrtle's bathroom, learn the story, etc. Harry finds the entrance to the Chamber and opens it with parseltongue, much to both of their surprises. Lockhart tells Harry to turn around, but Harry says that he might need his parseltongue abilities again. At this time, the smart thing to do would be to inform the others that they found the entrance, but Lockhart is seeing dollar signs and book sales. He does tell Myrtle to inform the others, should he not return in a few hours.

In the chamber, they find Ginny. I'm picturing a scene where Harry barely even knows who it is, thinking her name is Gina or something like that. Anyways, they get Riddle's villain monologue about how the girl was pouring he heart into the diary (which up until this point, Harry didn't know anything about a diary). Lockhart duels Riddle, and tells Harry that the diary is a powerful magical artifact. Eventually, they prevail, without fawkes or the sorting hat or the sword of gryffindor. Not sure how they would go about killing the basilisk without fawkes, but they're both probably competent enough to take out the eyes ASAP.

Year 3: This is where things get interesting, since depending on how it goes, there's either a lot of content, or not that much. By this point, Harry would know all about Sirius Black, and his (apparent) role in his parent's death. He's the reason Harry is living at the Dursley's, and if he's escaped from the most secure prison in the world, that's bad news. Harry tells the Durlsey's this, and they panic. They don't want to be anywhere near Harry, so either they go on an early vacation, or they tell Harry to leave. Harry says he'll find a place to go, but in return, he wants his Hogsmeade form signed, which they reluctantly do. I'm not sure where Harry goes. He probably doesn't really have much of a relationship at this point. He's maybe spoken to Dumbledore like three times? So, perhaps ironically, he asks Draco for help, and his family is more than willing to take him in for the summer. The ironic part is that in hiding from someone Harry assumes his a Death Eater, he's now staying with an actual Death Eater. Which reminds me as I write this that I have no idea what I'm doing with Dobby in year 2. There's a small chance that Harry actually knows Dobby is the Malfoy's elf, which would stop that whole subplot from even starting.

Anyways, Harry ends up having a great summer. They play a lot of quidditch, and perhaps Harry even gets a birthday present for them. Lucius seems nice enough, though he's not actually there all that much. I'm not sure what his actual job titles are, like businessman, politician and philanthropist? He's on the board of governors at Hogwarts, and probably a lot of other things as well. Regardless, Harry's probably starting puberty around this time as well, so I'd probably include a scene where Harry notices how hot Draco's mom is.

The Sirius Black stuff is interesting, because the whole entire thing is built on a false assumption. Everyone assumes that Sirius Black is after Harry. Sirius tries to break into the Gryffindor common room, but is stymied by the portal. That's explained by people thinking Sirius probably thinks Harry is Gryffindor, like his parents were. Then, Sirius actually breaks into the dorm room in the middle of the night with a knight, nearly attacks Ron Weasley, but doesn't see Harry anywhere, confusing him (at least, that's what people think- truth is, he was looking for Ron and Scabbers the whole time). People just assumed that Sirius is deranged or crazy.

There's some timing issues here. For one, if Harry gets his Hogsmead permission slip signed, he's never going to get the Marauder's Map from the Weasley Twins. In fact, being in Slytherin would mean that he probably would never get the map anyways, unless I specifically had Harry befriend them earlier on. But honestly, that is quite cliche. There are a bunch of stories where Harry somehow befriends the twins but not Ron. I mean, it could make it work in this story pretty easily, as Harry could just me trying to make connections with interesting people.

The question is - how does the whole mystery get solved? I don't really have a good answer yet, but I have ideas. Firstly, I don't think the timeturner is going to play a role at all. And the idea of giving a third year student a timeturner is pretty ridiculous anyways. Secondly, I think the answer might lie in the giant plothole that always get mentioned - how do Fred and George never notice someone called peter pettigrew on the map? So, what if they do? What if they have? They were too young to really know what was going on during the first war, as they would have only been like 3 years old when voldemort got defeated. So, they might not necessarily know who peter is. Or, if they do, it's stored deep in their minds, and they only really remember it when Sirius's story is now at the forefront again. As for never noticing peter on the map sharing a bed with Ron - that can simply be timing. It's a common excuse, but it is plausible. They don't use the map that often, and when they do, it's to sneak out of the school, so they're on the lookout for teachers, not for who is sleeping in the third year gryffindor common room. Regardless, I think it's possible to make that work, up until the point where they do finally notice peter on the map. Perhaps I can go one step farther, and have them actually catch Sirius on the map as well. Knowing that Sirius broke into the Gryffindor Tower and nearly stabbed Ron, they (likely) wouldn't hesitate to turn their map over to Dumbledore. Peter being shown on the map as probably enough to investigate everything and ultimately lead to a happy ending for Sirius.

The issue here is apparant - What is Harry's role in the entire story? What is he doing? The truth is, I don't think there's a major plot point here. With what I describe above, Harry isn't pivotal in getting Sirius's freedom. And, to get him involved would probably be pretty contrived and I'm not really sure how to go about it.

So there's a few things Harry could be doing. Firstly, Harry could be planning to go after Sirius himself. To do that, he probably starts delving into some magics he had promised himself he wouldn't look at. The man is directly responsible for his parents death after all.

Secondly, there is the whole Dementor issue. Perhaps I can have a few more scenes involving Lupin. Harry can still learn the Patronus.

Thirdly, Quidditch. Harry and Draco's love for quidditch is probably why they're friends to begin with. So, I wouldn't have Harry get on the team first year, but I could see them both getting on the team second year, with Harry as seeker, Draco as chaser. Now, without Draco's hatred of Harry, there would be a need for the entire team to be fitted with Nimbus 2001's, so the games would actually be competitive. That would continue onto year 3. It's pretty much just filler, but I think it's important character development filler.

Fourthly, girls. This is the year where Harry really starts to notice them. In canon, his first crush is Cho. Perhaps a relationship could be started here, with the standard Hogsmead dates. They have a mutual enjoyment of Quidditch as well.

So, there's some small plot threads that could probably fill out a story, but the real trick is to make everything seem relevant so it's not actually seen as filler. I think in theory that having the main mystery solved by someone other than Harry could be interesting, but I'm not sure how it will actually work in practice. I'm not sure how I would actually have Harry find Sirius either. It would probably involve Harry seeing his animagus form a few times. Perhaps he mentions this to Lupin during one of their training sessions, and Lupin acts oddly, recognizing the description of the grim. Perhaps Lupin somehow manages to confiscate the Marauder's Map from the Twins, and tells Harry what it is, because Harry is interested in stories about his Dad. And perhaps they both see Peter on the map. It's a bit more contrived than I like. At some point in time, Harry probably discovers that Lupin is a werewolf, but I'm not sure how that would lead Sirius either. Perhaps upon hearing that Harry saw a grim on the Hogwart's grounds, he sees Lupin go out and try and be a hero, to stop Sirius himself. Or maybe after the break in attempts at the Gryffindor tower, Harry really wants to catch Sirius sneaking in, so Harry starts walking around at night with the Invis Cloak, hoping. to catch Sirius himself. Perhaps the twins even see this on the map, and confront Harry. Perhaps they tell Harry that he is a fool for walking around at night by himself, hunting for Sirius. Perhaps the twins have actually seen Sirius on the map before, and decide that if Harry really wants to go after him, that he's going to need help, so they offer their help?

Whether or not this leads to Harry meeting a free Sirius, I don't know.

Book 4: I figure Harry would go to the Quidditch World Cup with the Malfoys. I don't see Harry being far enough into a relationship to bring a date, especially if the top-box tickets are like 250 galleons each. I'm thinking of a scene where Harry is with Draco, and they get a "hint" that they probably don't want to be at the campsite that night. Of course, Harry has heard the rumors about the Malfoys, and he has his own suspicions about Lucius, but they're not exactly unique. He doesn't automatically assume that Lucius is a Death Eater. Though, depending on what happened year 1 with Quirrellmort with affect how resurrected!Voldemort will feel upon learning that Lucius housed Harry Potter in his own home and nothing came of it.

I'll be the first to admit that I have a fascination with year 4 rehashes. I'm always looking to work in a small twist that can have a big impact on the story. It's really hard to have a new and fresh idea in regards to the triwizard tournament, so, sometimes it can be defined by what's not there. So, what if Harry wasn't in the tournament? What if it was just Cedric, Fleur, Victor?

If that's what I choose to do, then, like year 3, I need something for Harry to do during the story, and that would be the standard size tasks cliche. First, I would raise the prize of the actual tournament. 1000 galleons is a lot, but it's not life changing, and it's certainly not enough to risk your life over. Perhaps some real value can be placed in being the winner. But, a 10,000 or 25,000 galleon prize feels like a real prize and gives some real weight to the tournament.

So, I figure there will be a bunch of side competitions, not a new concept, etc, etc. There will be two of interest for Harry. The first one, could be a quidditch tournament between the schools. The winners will get a small prize, perhaps a new top-shelf broom, or perhaps vouchers for the next world cup, or perhaps just a gold prize. I'm picturing a scene where Harry is playing seeker, and wins in convincing fashion, and Krum pulls him aside to give him some glowing words of commendation, telling him he has a bright future, etc.

Secondly, would be a dueling competition. Again, not a new idea. I figure for all these side tasks there will be some sort of preliminary qualifying events during the month of october before the other school delegations get there, and by and large, the older students are almost always going to qualify over a younger student. Perhaps there's ten students picked per school, maybe less. The number doesn't matter too much, other than I want Harry to get picked over some older students.

I suspect the dueling competition will be a round robin thing, where everyone duels everyone else. Now, if I wanted to make this a Harry/Fleur story, this is where I would plant the seeds. Fleur could be watching the duels, just like Krum was watching the quidditch (though I suspect everybody was watching everybody, unless there are conflicting schedules with multiple things going on at the same time, which I feel like there should be). Fleur knows Harry's story of course, but she is impressed by his dueling prowess as well. Perhaps she decides that he's the most interesting person at Hogwarts, so she asks him to the Yule Ball. I haven't decided if that's what I want to actually do yet, but it's certainly a possibility.

There is one issue with both of these, though it is a minor issue, is that neither beuxbatons or durmstrang likely don't have enough students to fill out either second task, unless they brought more students, which is fine, with them all knowing that whoever doesn't get picked as the main champion will be competing in the side tasks.

Lastly, there is one swerve I could add - what if Harry could only choose one event to do? He'd have to choose between quidditch and duelling. Essentially choosing between Harry's two sides. The story is named "greatness, at any cost", and one of those costs would be giving up quidditch to pursue becoming a better fighter. Not an easy thing to do, though obviously Harry could still play for the house team next year

We go back to the main plot - Voldemort's Resurrection. There are some assumptions to be made here. First, we have to assume that the Philospher's Stone plan didn't go to plan, whatever it was. It didn't work for whatever reason. Secondly, we have to assume that there are reasons for Voldemort waiting months and months to get his candidate through a complex scheme, rather than doing a snatch-and-grab.

First assumption is easy enough. Despite everything, this is still a canon rehash starting from year one, and I'm not good enough to come up with a completely new plot.

Second assumption is interesting. Perhaps Voldemort doesn't want to use Harry? Perhaps Harry passed whatever test in year one, and whatever magic stopped Voldemort wasn't actually a resulted of anything Harry did. Alternatively, he leaves Harry alone. He wants nothing to do with Harry until he learns the full contents of the prophecy. He's not putting anything to chance. Perhaps in year 1, he even discovered the true nature of Harry's scar (though he kept that information to himself). He could know that Harry is a Horcrux, and there is more value in keeping him alive and intact.

That means the result is the tired old idea of Voldemort wanting to use the most worthy student as his host. That means, Cedric dies and is used in the resurrection ritual. Essentially, Cedric will disappear and no one has any idea where. Whether or not it's labled as an accident, or Sirius Black is somehow blamed, either way it means that no one is any wiser as to Voldemort's success, until Dumbledore learns of it from Snape.

There is one small plot hole that I see at the moment, and that is if Sirius is free and Pettigrew is caught, who is helping Voldemort? I guess Sirius can be free somehow while Pettigrew escapes and is on the run, but that seems quite heavyhanded. Barty Jr can't really help Voldemort while he is at Hogwarts. So, the solution might just be that Voldemort is still in Quirrellmort form after all these years

That leads to book 5, which I actually haven't though about much yet. There's some questions that need to be answered. No doubt by this point, Dumbledore doesn't want Harry anywhere near Lucius Malfoy. Would Harry learn about the Order at all? I don't see why the ministry would send Dementors after Harry, thus, there would be no trial for underage magic. I don't want to go in the direction where people mistrust Harry just because he's in Slytherin. So, by all accounts, he should be an outstanding student. Perhaps even made prefect. So, even while at Hogwarts, Umbridge shouldn't have any particular beef with him. But, Harry would have a beef with her. She sucks as a teacher, and it seems to be on purpose. He takes offense at that. Whether or not that's enough to start the DA over, I don't know. Probably won't know until I actually get around to writing it, which going off my usual writing pace, will be approximately never. He also hates how her purpose seems to be to undermine Dumbledore, whom Harry has a lot of respect for. Lastly, will the ultimate goal be to lure Harry to the DOM? I don't think so. I think Voldemort's goal will be to learn of the prophecy, but that doesn't necessarily mean he has to lure Harry to the DOM to do it. He can go himself, or perhaps learn the information from Trelawny. Perhaps the Ministry is actually playing more into his hands than normal, as perhaps Trelawny gets fired, under the partial assumption that that would give Voldemort easier access to her. Harry's goal is likely to just stop the corruption and to get the Ministry to actually work against Voldemort. And this is assuming that Harry has been told that Voldemort is back. That has to be a thing, I guess.

So maybe Harry is brought to Sirius's house right away, Order Headquarters. Never steps foot back at the Dursleys. From there he learns about what is going on. At Hogwarts, there is some small worry about his roommates, as Draco's father is a Death Eater. Harry is convinced that Draco wouldn't do anything, because he's his friend, and he's had 4 years to do something on his father's order. Dumbledore agrees, and secretly hopes that Draco can be brought over to their side in the future by remaining Harry's friend. Also, all reports are indicating that Voldemort isn't interested in Harry at all at the moment. Voldemort is looking for more information about the circumstances involving his defeat before he does anything else. He's be extremely cautious, and isn't going to reveal his presence until he's ready.

Unrelated, my pairing ideas. Obviously, this sort of thing doesn't really matter, but I can't really help it. All roads have to lead to Daphne, right? I would be doing myself a disservice if that wasn't a case. I was thinking that Cho and Padma would be along the way, maybe even fem!blaise and Fleur. We'll see.

 

How you plan to deal with the main problem of the earlier books?
They are books for children and you plan yours for adults.
I assume your adult characters didn't have their brain removed.
I advise either few new plots or try to squeeze them to a narrow time phrase, like a Dresden Files Case.
Leads to Harry and his companions to try to crack the mystery fast before the adults gears (Which are known to be slow) start moving.

 

I don't get what you're saying. This is an outline, not the actual story, so saying that I'm planning for adults doesn't really make sense? What plans here are adult plans? It's pretty much just canon with slightly fewer cogs in machine. Unless your saying that it's convenient that villainous schemes always seem to start in the first week of term and just happen to end in the last week of term, which is not something I've said at all. The only real mystery here is the CoS which I specifically call out for not having retarded adults.

 

Few ideas from myself:
I like the idea of Harry 'involving' himself into this whole affair out of his own curiosity and desire of knowledge. I think that someone mentioned it before in this thread (or maybe I have red about it somewhere else - I'm too laze to go through all of this replies) but Quirell could somehow guide him to the stone (along with Dumbledore who would want his 'boy' to complete his destiny) and exchange it for maybe Ressurection Stone? If Voldemort got the Gaunt;s ring before book 1, he could have simply siphon? (I;m not sure if this is the right word) his energy and just become himself again (the thing that diary did to Ginny in COS) Also the idea of Stone being fake and being placed at Hogwarts do draw Voldemort and test Harry us somehow satisfying.
Harry's personality depends on how do you want him to enter this new world. Let's just say that ebused kids tend to be more observant and rather wary of new people.
Also about his relationships with his peers. I just recetly found the story called 'Harry Potter and the boy who lived' by Santii and I've found the idea of a child of a Death Eater befriending him very interesting (especially if the adults are involved).
Well that's all from me, and please excuse my poor English

 

These cliches usually destroy good stories with an amazing plot. My personal advice: avoid manipulative Dumbledore and abusive Dursleys. Then again, you already have a strong plan.

 

yeah, as soon as someone uses "Harry Potter and the Boy Who Lived" as an example, I kind of lose all interest in what they have to say.

 

May I ask the reason for this? I encountered the fiction from Taure's fanfiction list and I can say I enjoyed it very much.

Well, Dursley's were abusive but as everything, fanfictions blowed this out of proportion too. And for some reason, all the abuse Harry suffersgives Harry positive qualities and superpowers instead of halting or hampering his development. There is a reason it is called abuse guys.

Harry being friend with children of death eaters wouldn't be really jarring since he is in the Slytherin now. It would be just children being children. And It would be nice to have more instances of fictions portraying Slytherin other than Death Eater bootcamp.

I agree about Manipulative Dumbledore though. It is just bad taste imho.

Fake philosopher's stone though would be just another layer of security measure on top of everything. And it would be only one that matters since rest of them was passed by three first year students. Long ago I accepted that all those security measures where there to lure whoever trying to steal the stone and mirror in the stone being fake as my headcanon. Harry just stumpled upon the whole thing though.

I would like to read a competent Lockhart. I've made my first encounter with this concept couple days ago and it was a nice and refreshing experience. I don't know how common it is though.

 

Well what isn't a cliche right now? I'm pretty sure that every idea that everyone suggested here was used many other stories. About Dumbledore thought. I don't understand why everyone thinks that him manipulating Harry is something strange - you have a small kid with no knoledge about the world he's going to live in (becouse you 'put' him away from said world) and an enemy that thinks that this very child will be his doom. It's natural for every leader to use this kid as bait - even if Harry dies it's better to lose 1 child rather than half a population.

 

Being used in other stories isn't the same thing as being cliche. Cliche is something that is overdone and overused.

 

But that's my point - Harry Potter is overused in general. Only on ffnet you have over 750k stories in HP universe, so no matter how do you want to lead the story, there is no way it hadn't been done hundreds of times before (HP in Slytherin being the most popular).
But that's not really a problem, is it? There might be thousands stories, milking whatever is popular right now, but how many of them are any good?
Also can you explain what is so wrong with the relationship between HP and some random pureblood kid? If you want to put character in whatever house, it's very likely that said character will interact with other characters within this house, so it's reasonable that one of them will approach MC for whatever reason.

 

There's close to zero good Slytherin!Harry stories. That's kind of the point of this whole thread. Doesn't matter how many stories there are in the fandom when it's clear there is still a niche to be filled.

I'm not exactly sure what you're arguing here.

 

That was my point - just becouse something is overused it doesn't mean you can't make it interesting.

Well you said:

And I used this story as and example of somehow satisfying relationship between Harry and someone from the 'enemy team', so I'm just curious what made you ract this way.

 

Well, the answer to that is simple, and that's because it's not a very good story. This is definitely not the thread to discuss that story though.

 

You need to figure out what you want versus what is feasible for you.

And to be quite honest, a rehash of the entire series is completely unnecessary. The first two, and arguably third, year of Harry Potter exists to set up the world. Harry goes through trials because the series would be extremely boring if he didn't do shit except learn magic for the first three years. But in reality, for the overarching plot of Harry versus Voldemort, the first three books may as well not exist. Voldemort's attempts to regain a body are laughable at best (definitely not in character for supposed genius Tom Riddle), and it all just comes across as emphasizing how special Harry is.

Now, I applaud OTWTG because a) it rewrites the first three years in much the same way that canon does, except with very believable changes to canon that fit in with the "Harry is now in Slytherin" mold. b) It doesn't spend that much time on them (a total of six chapters), recognizing that they're not necessarily the most important parts of the story.

But, as you said, OTWTG has taken the author years to write, and we're still unsure if it will ever be completed. And OTWTG manages Harry's early years quite well.

If you have the time and interest to truly rehash 7 years, then I applaud you, but I would write merely an outline of Years 1-3. You should be spending the vast majority of your time on Years 4-7, because that's where the changes between canon and your story should be the most striking. Voldemort is what drives Harry Potter, and it should be the same for your fic. If, as I assume, you are keeping the plot point of the TWT ending with Voldemort's resurrection, then that is what you should focus on.

Give us a brief introduction of Harry in Years 1-3. Have him learn some magic. Maybe have him cuck Malfoy. Or perhaps even have him go through some nasty incidents with his Housemates and Snape. And sure, consider what should be done about the basilisk, Stone, and Sirius. Write that. But, honestly, I would put all of that into 3 chapters, one for each year. In the grand scheme of things, it's unimportant.

You also mention that you want to write a "good" Slytherin!Harry story. Which you acknowledge is a pretty large gaping hole in the fandom that is filled by perhaps 3 fics in total. Now consider why it's so difficult to write a good fic. Think about the cliches, the pitfalls, and the traps that come with writing such a fic. Think about the audience that is reading your fic (the 95% of fanfiction that doesn't have a brain). Ask yourself if that's worth it, if you really want to complete something like that, and if you're even capable of doing so.

Then start writing. Best of luck, and godspeed.

 

@Anarchy Voldemort didn't know about the Deathly Hallows until the latter books. He certainly didn't know about them in 1991. As far as he is concerned at that point, the stone in his family's ring is just that: a stone.