Pony Fanfiction Thread

Also, I'd personally love to let loose Xenolestia on the Imperium.

The two deserve each other, they really do.

@Ros: It was legitimately the only simile I could come up with at the time(I was trying to pump it out before I went to bed). I think it does work as a simile—it arrived unnoticed and lingers unpleasantly—but maybe not tonally.

@Awesome: That's a fair point. And frankly, with everything else inside of them going to shit a sense as fragile as smell would be gone fairly quick, which would also contribute to their lack of taste.

It would also mean that their only fully-functioning sense, aside from their Magic Sight, would be hearing. I wonder if I could play on that, somehow. Maybe Changelings all really, really like music.

A lot of the story takes place in psuedo-Canada, and I had planned on explaining there were certain 'cues' one could use to pick out a Changeling(Nightingale and Beetle can pick out Changeling's at a distance based on smell and Magic-sight, but Silver Spoon wouldn't be able to pick them out in the same way). The two I have so far are 'smell of peppermint' and 'are bundled up much more than average'. 'listening to music' would knock it up to enough features that one could trust they probably weren't picking a random pony who happened to have those features out of the crowd.

Birthright: an original web novel about Dragons, the Burdens of Leadership, and Mangoes.

Anybody remember that Vinyl and Octavia thing I started forever ago? I did a second chapter. If anybody wants to look at it, that would be awesome. It's really short; only around 1500 words.

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I looked at it, and it was awesome.

I'll give it a look later today.

Cool, thanks.

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Sweet scene, though there's a lot of inconsistent spacing.

There is no beginning. There is no end. There is only... Hooty.

Seems short but I'm no good at, like, spacing like that.

I'm not sure what the deal with the spacing is. I'll have to go through and make that consistent.

EDIT: Story is now updated.

edited 5th Feb '16 3:15:59 PM by JapaneseTeeth

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Argh, really running behind this week and it's still pretty rough, but this is a longer draft that I struggled with, despite having a pretty clear picture of what would go on. I really didn't expect to take a lot of time on some of the scenes. Also, there's one part with the cells (will probably be pretty readily apparent) that I'm really unsure about keeping. I mean, I want to keep the result, but I feel like I might need to change the cause, even though I'm really not sure what to change it too.

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Not sure what you mean. That bit with the dress form?

Yeah. I'm wondering if that feels too weird, despite Dusky's opponent being unhinged enough to go through the trouble required for that kind of trolling.

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Fuck I am behind on your story. Bug me this week to get caught up in it.

(Spoilers for those who are reading Digital Harmony as this post contains some of the stuff I'm planning.)

So... I think I might need some writing advice. In my Digimon Adventure 02 crossover fic I'm planning on having a set of villains who represent perversions of the Elements of Harmony during the second story arc, and so far I've managed to come up with what I think are pretty good interpretations of what "corrupted" versions of the virtues might look like.

• Kindness is represented by Lotusmon. She attempts to "spare" ponies from the suffering induced by the Crapsack World that Equestria is turned into after the villain invades while the Mane 6 are in the Digital World, and does so by turning them into trees. She has a very unsettling "motherly" demeanor, referring to the ponies-turned-trees as her "children". Lotusmon immediately drops the act as soon as the ponies are returned to normal, undergoing an abrupt Villainous Breakdown where she reveals her true cruelty.

• Loyalty is represented by Dynasmon. Easily the most sympathetic of the major arc villains, Dynasmon is by no means a bad guy... in fact, he's downright nice towards the heroes, going so far as to offer them hospitality. He'd definitely be helping out the Mane 6 and Digi-destined fight the Big Bad if he had a choice. The problem is that, at least as far as he's concerned, he doesn't. Before the events of the fic the Big Bad all but forced Dynasmon into servitude by offering to rescue him from a fate worse than death if he chose to swear loyalty to him. Dynasmon, being a digimon with a very strict code of honor, utterly refuses to disobey the big bad's orders to destroy the protagonists. That said, he is the one antagonist who fights the most fairly and goes so far to ensure the heroes are at full strength when confronting him, and is implied to be a Death Seeker because he wishes for the heroes to succeed.

• Generosity is represented by Barbamon. He acts as the high priest of a Corrupt Church that rules the Crystal Empire and worships a being known as the Lightbringer (actually Sunset Shimmer). He "generously" offers what he calls "salvation" to the crystal ponies, offering them relative comfort and stability compared to the rest of Equestria and caring for their needs, in exchange for exorbitant tithes and most of their freedom. His palace is opulent to the point of absurdity and it's quite obvious that he's hoarding most of the Crystal Empire's wealth for himself, yet at the same time seems to be completely sincere in his belief that he's acting out of benevolence, and is utterly devoted to Sunset Shimmer.

• Magic is represented by Sunset Shimmer, as stated above, who appears in a form similar to Lucemon. She acts as the absolute ruler of the Crystal Empire, having taken advantage of the crystal ponies' desperation for someone to protect them after the Crystal Heart failed. As a result, she's not only revered as a savior but worshiped as a deity within the Empire. This was deliberately engineered on her part, as the crystal ponies' faith is the Crystal Heart's source of power, and now that the crystal ponies are placing their faith in her instead she's become considerably stronger as a result. Though her rule is unquestioned, she chooses to delegate most of the tasks of governance to Barbamon because she prefers being an object of worship over taking any sort of responsibility as a leader. In case it wasn't already obvious, her primary character trait is Pride, having underwent none of the character development in the Equestria Girls series. Despite this, she's still not entirely unsympathetic, treats the ponies who worship her with genuine respect, and her backstory reveals that she's primarily motivated by a desire to prove herself better to a world that rejected her and ridiculed her while growing up. It's also heavily implied that she has some serious self-esteem issues beneath her inflated ego.

• Laughter is represented by Piedmon, who has managed to escape from imprisonment in the space between dimensions after his defeat in Digimon Adventure. Somehow even more Ax-Crazy than his last appearance, he doesn't really work for the Big Bad so much as he chooses to go along with the main villain's plans for the sake of getting another chance to torment the Digi-Destined. After defeating and forcing a fusion with Discord, he becomes the most powerful villain aside from the big bad thanks to his Reality Warper capabilities as well as a Healing Factor acquired from the fusion. There's really nothing all that complex to his character — all he really does is eagerly torment his opponents while laughing at their suffering, but the threat he poses is undeniable.

So that's what I have so far. The tricky part with all this is that I'm struggling to come up with a suitable "corrupted" version for Honesty.

What I have planned so far is having Anubismon as the digimon representing Honesty, having him being a Straw Nihilist. He despises living beings for what he sees as them living a lie — convincing themselves that their lives hold meaning — and wishes to aid the Big Bad in bringing about the end of the world so that everyone will be forced to confront the hopelessness of their existence.

One other idea I've toyed with are him being a Barrier Warrior with a shield that "cannot be broken by any worldy power", which turns out to be exactly true when one of the heroes easily shatters his shields after obtaining a fallen shard of the Secratariat comet from the comics — a power that comes from outer space. Another is him trapping the heroes in a maze which is constructed subconsciously by their own desires, "proving" that their friendship is a lie when they get fed up with each other and their desire to be separated causes them to be split apart.

I'm honestly not sure if any of these ideas would really fit well together, at least not as much as I think that the other villains work as corruptions of the Elements of Harmony. Compared to the others what I have so far seems like kind of a stretch of what "honesty" means in most contexts.

Any thoughts on this? I'd like some feedback before I plan this out fully.

edited 8th Feb '16 2:29:55 AM by Zennistrad

Personally, when I think of a villain representing honesty, I think of a chessmaster that plays with his cards face up (he telegraphs all his moves ahead of time). However, I think this would be playing honesty too straight, and not corrupted enough to match the rest of your corrupted elements. What you've got up there, I've seen before (no man can defeat him etc.) and they have worked in the past, and they can definitely be put into the theme of honesty. It could work as you have it.

Edit:
You might want to contrast honesty against one of its opposites, like you have done with a couple of the other elements (kindness/cruelty generosity/greed) and have both elements in your villain's personality, one secretly. Honesty is the opposite of hypocrisy (saying one thing and doing another). Honesty is the opposite of secrecy (does he use spies?). Honesty is the opposite of lying. You can use equivocation to sell that he both lies and tells the truth at the same time. Possibly in a Not So Different speech?

edited 8th Feb '16 3:40:28 AM by war877

Maybe make it even weirder? Like, maybe have a crude drawing of a smiley face taped taped where the head would be. Or have it wearing some of Autumn Leaf's old clothes.

That's actually a pretty good idea, I didn't really think of that. That "contrasting against opposites" works for Dynasmon and Piedmon too. Dynasmon initially acts as though he's a friend to the heroes despite being one of the big bad's minions, but declares his intent to kill them as soon as they've begun to lower their guard, effectively betraying them. Piedmon enjoys making himself laugh, but wants to make everyone else utterly miserable.

I think the best way to do this would be to have Anubismon be a hypocrite. He starts off giving a big Hannibal Lecture about how everything is pointless and how he's going to help the Big Bad destroy the world, forcing everyone to accept the supposed truth that their lives are meaningless in the final hours before their deaths. However, when it becomes clear that he's outmatched, Anubismon becomes utterly terrified by the prospect of dying himself.

edited 8th Feb '16 9:33:48 AM by Zennistrad

Hmmm, that might just work. I don't know if I'll go with the spoilered part, though. It'd have a lot of creepiness potential if I had time to set it up, but it'd probably just end up as an info dump at this point.

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Or maybe that fedora the dress form is already wearing, belonged to Autumn Leaf. And Dusky just didn't recognize it. :P

That sounds like a pretty good plot to me. Or at least the makings of a good climax.

I'm just going to share this for anyone who doesn't mind a bit of wut.

There is no beginning. There is no end. There is only... Hooty.

Updated.

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http://ask-miss-harshwhinny.tumblr.com/tagged/posts/chrono/page/1

I think this is my favorite Ask Blog ever.

EDIT:

EDIT 2: ELECTRIC BOOGALOO: It turns out Skywriter is the author of that blog. Everything makes a lot more sense now.

edited 13th Feb '16 11:49:08 PM by MetaFour

Any good Cosmic Horror Story fanfics?

edited 15th Feb '16 5:27:51 PM by superboy313

How serious do you want your cosmic horror?

If it's okay to toot my own horn, my stories Alarm Clock and "Twilight Sparkle and the Strange Case of Old Res" straddle the line between Cosmic Horror and Lovecraft Lite, with "Strange Case" being the darker of the two.^note "Strange Case" is part of an M-rated anthology, but the story itself would only be rated T.

There's also a Fimfic group devoted to the genre: The Library of Lovecraftian and Lovecraft-Inspired Fiction.

edited 15th Feb '16 7:45:12 PM by MetaFour